1941-1942

Eighteen clubs took part in the opening stages of this season?s League competition, fourteen Yorkshire Clubs and four from Lancashire, but owing to transport problems and the difficulty of raising teams the League table was worked on a percentage basis with each team fulfilling as many fixtures as possible. Dewsbury headed the table at the end of the season and won the Championship, defeating Hull in the Semi-Final, and Bradford in the Final. Leeds finished in eighth position, winning twelve matches out of twenty-three.

Wakefield Trinity provided the opposition in the 1st Round of the Yorkshire Cup, and gained a more than useful lead of five points in the ?first leg? which was played at Headingley. Goodfellow plotted and schemed the Wakefield victory in a style reminiscent of the famous ?Jonty? Parkin. The ?second leg? at Belle Vue, brought Leeds victory by 5 points to 4, but the margin was insufficient to put us through into the 2nd Round.

Leeds and Wakefield clashed again in the 2nd Round of the R.L. Cup Competition (Leeds had a bye in the first Round, in which Wakefield had defeated Batley by 7 points to 4). The ?first leg? was played at Belle Vue, where Leeds did well to come away with only three points deficit, which was comfortably wiped out in the ?second leg? which we won by 8 points to nil. The ?first leg? of the 3rd Round brought Hull to Headingley and the lead of fourteen points which we obtained gave us a comfortable passage into the Semi-Final although Hull won the ?second leg? at the Boulevard. Oldham were our next victims, a Leeds victory at Headingley in the first leg being repeated, far more convincingly, at Watersheddings a week later.

Thus Leeds and Halifax, finalists in the previous season, met at Odsal to decide the Final. The teams, each of which included notable guest players, were as follows:

Leeds: Brough; Edwards, Risman (both of Salford), Hey, Evans; Morris, Jenkins; Prosser, Murphy, Satterthwaite, Gregory (of Warrington), Brown (of Batley), Tattersfield.

Halifax: Lockwood; Bevan, Smith, Rule, Doyle; Todd, McCue; Brereton, Jones, Irving, Millington, Meek, Dixon.

Leeds earned a splendid victory by 15 points to 10, and the probability is that their winning margin would have been greater had Hey, who pulled a leg muscle in the opening minutes, not been a passenger on the wing for more than three-quarters of the game. The Leeds backs always were the better lot, and their forwards were sturdy enough to stand against the keen challenge of the Halifax six. Brough, who was in his thirty-ninth year, played a remarkably fine game, fielding the ball faultlessly, kicking with power and skill, and linking with his three-quarters in a style which roused memories of earlier days. Gus Risman and Alan Edwards had a big share in the victory, and scored all but three of their team?s points. Edwards, in fact, put Leeds on the victory track in the early minutes when he followed up at great speed to field a cross-kick and dived in at the corner to score the first points. Morris got the second Leeds try, making full use of a crafty punt by Jenkins, and Edwards claimed the third which was in the nature of a gift from the faulty Halifax defence. Lockwood, with five penalty goals, scored all the Halifax points.

So the Challenge Cup was retained at Headingley and an already impressive record enhanced: six appearances in the Final and six Victories.