Super 8s: Huddersfield Giants 12-36 Leeds Rhinos

Leeds Rhinos finished their Super 8s campaign with a comfortable victory at Huddersfield Giants.

Rhinos, already assured of a home semi-final, led 16-6 at the break through tries from Kallum Watkins, Danny McGuire and Jimmy Keinhorst, with Michael Lawrence pulling one back.

McGuire, Anthony Mullally and Rob Burrow crossed to seal victory as Ryan Hinchcliffe scored Giants' second.

Second-placed Leeds will play Hull next Friday in the second semi-final.

The Black and Whites sealed their own place in the play-offs with a 48-16 win at leaders Castleford, who rested several first-team regulars.

St Helens will travel to Cas in Thursday's first play-off game, unless 2016 champions Wigan beat Wakefield by 90 or more points on Saturday.

Rhinos are looking to win their eighth Grand Final, the last of which came in 2015 when they beat Wigan 22-20.

Leeds coach Brian McDermott:

"We showed a very good attitude. It was a tough encounter to start with so I'm very pleased.

"I'm not being disrespectful to Huddersfield but against a switched-on defence, I'm not sure we would have scored as many tries.

"Hull [their semi-final opponents] are a good team, extremely physical, and we're going to have to be good. We'll have to roll our sleeves up and get our tackling shoulders ready."

Huddersfield coach Rick Stone:

"We've a few injuries but we didn't manage the game as well as we could have. Defensively the soft tries we conceded were really frustrating for us.

"At this level you've got to make the opposition work for tries, and we handed them a couple.

"It was a wet slippery night, but Leeds definitely showed more resilience in defence."

Huddersfield: Rankin, Simpson, Mellor, Turner, McIntosh, Gaskell, Brough, Rapira, Leeming, Ikahihifo, Lawrence, Hinchcliffe, Ta'ai.

Replacements: O'Brien, Clough, Smith, Mason.

Leeds: Golding, Briscoe, Watkins, Keinhorst, Hall, Moon, McGuire, Garbutt, Parcell, Mullally, Ormondroyd, Ablett, Delaney.

Replacements: Burrow, Jones-Buchanan, Sutcliffe, Cuthbertson.

Referee: Scott Mikalauskas