Guru Grothe receives his heritage number

The man known as The Guru, Eric Grothe has become the latest former Leeds player to receive his heritage number from Chief Executive Gary Hetherington.

The man known as The Guru, Eric Grothe has become the latest former Leeds player to receive his heritage number from Chief Executive Gary Hetherington.

Grothe, heritage number 1147, made his debut at Headingley on a freezing cold New Years Day against Leigh and immediately announced his arrival from Parramatta. 

He scored a hat trick that day and went on to score 14 tries in 16 games in a mid-season spell at the club in the 1984-85 season.

The Leeds Rhinos Foundation Heritage Committee recently completed the task of giving a unique number to every player who has made a single appearance for the club, going back to the first game in the Northern Union, staged at Leigh on 7th September 1895.

In total, 1,419 men have worn the famous colours from Bob Armstrong in that first match, through to recent signing Mitch Garbutt.

Other notable numbers are; Bob Walton, who scored the first try at Headingley in the Northern Union (14), Joseph Aloysius Lavery (215), the club’s first overseas signing, First World War hero Samuel ‘Billy’ Jarman (225), Arthur Clues (847), Benjamin Lewis Jones (896), leading appearance-maker John Holmes (1022) and Garry Schofield (1183). Number 1,000 is Syd Hynes, the first-ever player/coach at Leeds, who won every medal with the club and recently received his certificate at the Players Association's Annual Lunch having flown in for the occasion from his home in Perth in Australia.