{"id":202653,"date":"2025-10-15T20:58:12","date_gmt":"2025-10-15T20:58:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/202653\/"},"modified":"2025-10-15T20:58:12","modified_gmt":"2025-10-15T20:58:12","slug":"super-league-hopefuls-land-highly-rated-leeds-rhinos-youngster","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/202653\/","title":{"rendered":"Super League hopefuls land highly rated Leeds Rhinos youngster"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<img width=\"1200\" height=\"800\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/10\/sw_32-York-v-Bradford.jpg\" class=\"attachment- size- wp-post-image\" alt=\"Leeds Rhinos youngster joins York Knights\" decoding=\"async\" fetchpriority=\"high\"  \/>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">York Knights have completed their fourth signing from a Super League club in three days.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">Highly-rated outside-back Jack Smith has joined the Championship league leaders and 1895 Cup holders from Leeds Rhinos.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">He teams up with ex-Castleford Tigers centre Sam Wood, former Salford Red Devils prop Justin Sangare and winger Jon Bennison, from St Helens, in the Knights\u2019 squad for 2026.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">Smith, 20, is the reigning Betfred Championship young player of the year after impressing on loan at London Broncos.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">He joined Rhinos\u2019 youth system from Featherstone Lions and was promoted into the full-time squad two years ago, but did not make a first team appearance and was released when his contract expired at the end of the 2025 season.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">Smith featured on loan\/dual-registration for Halifax Panthers and Bradford Bulls last year and his last game for Leeds Rhinos was the reserves Grand Final in September when he booted two goals in an 8-0 victory over Warrington Wolves at AMT Headingley.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">Knights coach, Mark Applegarth tried to sign Smith when he was youth boss at Wakefield Trinity.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">He enthused: \u201cI\u2019m delighted we\u2019ve managed to secure him. I think he\u2019s another player that, given time, will turn into a fantastic signing.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">\u201cHe has got a really good head on him for such a young age and he\u2019s keen to improve. I\u2019m really looking forward to getting stuck into him coaching-wise and I\u2019m sure he\u2019ll show everyone what he\u2019s capable of as the year progresses.\u201d<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">Smith, who scored 49 goals and five tries in his 14 matches for London, said: \u201cI\u2019m looking forward to being a part of it and working with everyone going forward.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">\u201cI can\u2019t wait to get started, get around the lads and bounce on from the year the club had [this] year.\u201d<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">York will learn over the next two days if they have secured a place in Super League for 2026, either through the club grading system or application process introduced to increase the competition to 14 clubs.<\/p>\n<p dir=\"ltr\">Serious About Rugby League has launched a brand new podcast which can be watched in full on our <a class=\"in-cell-link\" href=\"https:\/\/youtu.be\/86PEmyarFog?si=Ln5Z8V7doIyNL5fn\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">YouTube channel here<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/1759084633_634_srl-logo.png\"\/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"York Knights have completed their fourth signing from a Super League club in three days. Highly-rated outside-back Jack&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":202654,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[5903,101,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-202653","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-rugby","8":"tag-rugby","9":"tag-sports","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom","12":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/202653","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=202653"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/202653\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/202654"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=202653"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=202653"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=202653"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}