WHEN you lose an important contest in such a clash of styles, the temptation is to abandon your style in favour of that of your victorious opponent.

I believe Wire have to commit to their style of play and when the play-offs come around they simply have to execute that style much better.

This was a clash of styles between the fast-paced play around the play-the-balls and offloads of the Wire up against the methodical Leeds looking to complete as many sets as possible and use their size and kicking game to establish dominance in territory and possession.

It was Leeds who got the fast start, a few penalties and Wire handling errors allowing that dominance they wanted to establish.

For the first 20 minutes or so Wire's defence was incredibly impressive, limiting Leeds to a penalty goal, despite several attacks close to the try line, but it is difficult to quantify how much significance that opening spell had on the final outcome.

Eventually Leeds did cross the line twice in the first half, both from Ryan Hall and both with a hint of controversy about them.

McGuire's pass for the second looked so far forward that even the Leeds players stopped playing, Hall himself hesitated for a fraction of a second before continuing with his unopposed run to the line. Sinfield's three goals meant the lead at half time was fourteen points.

Wire came out after the break with enough energy and increase in tempo to rattle Leeds and score the first try of the half after just a few minutes, when Joel Monaghan caught a high, cross-field kick and managed to off load to Bridge.

The lead never quite got cut short enough to panic Leeds out of their five drives, followed by a long kick game plan.

A try by Moon stretched the lead back to 14 points, then an offload by Westwood close to the Leeds line was followed by extravagant handling skills from Ratchford.

He was able to stretch out and ground the ball with one hand to reduce the gap back to eight points.

Wire were never quite able to get the consecutive scores they needed to look like winning, Briscoe's long range effort from a Wire handling error all but sealed the victory and Westwood's bizarre-looking try at the end was nothing more than consolation.