Leeds Rhinos coach Brian McDermott doesn’t expect the Giants to remain in the bottom Super League XX spots.

Huddersfield’s 28-24 defeat at Headingley made it three losses from three 2015 starts.

But with the Giants having improved in each of those games – there was a big improvement between Hull in round one, at Wigan in round two and against Leeds in round three – the general consensus throughout the competition is that it won’t be long before Huddersfield start chalking up the wins, with next Friday’s home clash against Widnes Vikings being a good place to start.

And former Giants assistant coach McDermott is one of those who won’t be surprised to see the men from the John Smith’s Stadium start climbing up the Super League ladder, especially if they continue to show the battling qualities that brought them so close to making it five successive wins at Headingley after falling 18-0 behind after 25 minutes.

“I thought we should have had more of a hold on the game but you can’t dismiss Huddersfield’s resilience,” said McDermott, whose side maintained their 100% start to the season after Paul Aiton’s 74th-minute try finally sunk the Giants.

“Credit to them for coming from 18-0 down. Obviously they’ve got a bit more about them than their league position shows.

“I don’t think they’ll stay where they are.”

And those sentiments were echoed by his international winger Ryan Hall, who was delighted to have scored a try to beat the Rhinos’ bogey team.

“It was a good win for us. Any one over Huddersfield is good, because we haven’t done it too many times lately,” he said.

“That’s simply because they’re a good team, and you know you’re going to have to play well to beat them.

“I know they haven’t made a great start to the season, but they showed against us that their first win is probably just around the corner.

“We didn’t take any real notice of the fact they came to us having lost their opening two games, because we know what a quality side they are and that when they start to play to their full potential they’ll be an incredibly hard team to beat.”