Super League: Catalans Dragons 14-22 Huddersfield Giants

Chris McQueen scored two crucial tries, including the pivotal final score

Huddersfield Giants survived a late fightback from high-flying Catalans Dragons to move up to third in the Super League table.

The Giants, in their first match since the Challenge Cup final loss to Wigan, raced into an 18-2 half-time lead.

Catalans hit back after the break to reduce Huddersfield's lead to 18-14 with 25 minutes remaining.

But as the hosts pushed to complete an unlikely comeback, Chris McQueen's last-minute try confirmed the win.

As good as Catalans were in the second half, the Giants were even stronger in the first. Ricky Leutele was first to cross after four minutes before a Will Pryce penalty rounded off a fine start.

Adam O'Brien went over in the 24th minute, with McQueen making it a hat-trick of tries for Giants just before half-time, finishing off a fine team move.

After the break Catalans upped their tempo as Arthur Mourgue and Matthieu Laguerre crossed to add to Sam Tomkins' first-half penalty.

Laguerre's try reduced Giants' lead to four in the 55th minute, and the centre thought he had completed his side's turnaround with a 74th-minute try, only to be penalised for an earlier foul.

Huddersfield then marched downfield, scoring through McQueen, to round off a crucial victory and stop their second-placed opponents going level on points with league leaders St Helens.

Huddersfield Giants head coach Ian Watson:

"That was a big, big effort to back up after a Challenge Cup final with all of the emotion that goes into it and the disappointment of losing it. To then come here to Catalans and get a result is a great, great result.

"I think this shows how serious we are about this competition, obviously we have missed out on one last week so we didn't want to miss out again.

"I thought the character of the players shone through and that's what got us the win."

Catalans Dragons coach Steve McNamara:

"Huddersfield probably deserved to get the win based on what they did and what we didn't do. It's been a long time since we've had a defeat like this in the league, particularly at home.

"The first half was not acceptable, we conceded a couple of really soft tries but we fought so hard to get back into the contest and it was a poor decision at the end, I thought it was the wrong decision to deny a try for Matthieu.

"But the biggest disappointment of the night was our performance, we were too far off, individually and collectively and we need to move on really quickly and play against a strong opposition."

Catalans: Tomkins, Yaha, Laguerre, May, Davies, Pearce, Mourgue, Garcia, Whitley, McMeeken, Dudson, McIlorum, Napa

Interchanges: Seguier, Dezaria, Chan, Kasiano

Huddersfield: Lolohea, Wardle, Leutele, Cudjoe, McGillvary, Cogger, Pryce, English, Jones, McQueen, Trout, O'Brien, Lawrence

Interchanges: Levi, Hewitt, Mason, Ashworth

Referee: C. Kendall

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