1978-1979

Never write off Leeds! Approaching the end of a fruitless campaign, with pride in pawn and honour in hock the men in blue and amber redeemed themselves in a glorious grandstand finish for the third year in succession, with a prestigious triumph in the Premiership Final. The reprieve was merited, the relief immense, after a long, hard winter of discontent, with several months in the doghouse of frustration and failure.

Three players had been transferred during the summer, Chris Burton and Gordon McHugh going to Huddersfield, and David Treasure, to Keighley; two more were released during the season, Stuart Johnston and Ricky Winterbottom joining Bramley.

No Esso Yorkshire Cup for Leeds this time. We could hardly complain: two years earlier at Odsal, Holmes had sealed a 1st Round victory with an injury-time conversion; now it was Bradford Northern?s turn to win a thrilling pipe-opener to the season, with a converted try in the 77th minute. Nevertheless, it was galling to lose by the odd point after leading 15-5 midway through the first half, and we promptly vented our spleen on Bramley with a crushing 47-11 victory in the Preliminary Round of the Floodlit Competition, with Alan Smith scoring three of the eleven tries, and hooker Gary Hetherington, signed from York as additional cover for David Ward, kicking four goals.

September opened with little indication of the traumas that lay ahead, a 9-point-draw at Workington being followed by wins at Post Office Road and over Salford at Headingley, with Gibson at full-back, showing his prowess as a goal-kicker. Confidence was suddenly drained, however, by the onset of a bout of highly-contagious dropballitis, which contributed in no small measure to successive defeats at Widnes, at St. Helens In the 1st Round of the John Player Competition, and then against Hull K.R., who recorded their first win at Headingley for twelve years, with Agar dropping four goals.

October brought little relief! A further setback at Leigh was bad enough, but a fifth consecutive defeat this time at the hands of Hull in the 1st Round of the Floodlit Competition, was grim to bear indeed. With only four minutes remaining, and Headingley?s clamorous cauldron of commotion at boiling point, Leeds were heading for victory with a hard-earned 8-7 lead, only for Lloyd to put the Boulevarders ahead with a mighty penalty from half-way, and ?Old Faithful? had barely struck up his haunting hymn of praise, before Macklin dummied his way over, for Lloyd to rub salt into our wounded pride with a touchline conversion. Now saddled with the stigma of 1st Round elimination from three knock-out competitions, Leeds sweated blood to break the sequence of defeats with a win over Castleford, put up a highly creditable display against the Australians, and then compensated for a narrow defeat at Rochdale, where forward Neil Lean made his debut, with a victory over lowly Barrow. Even so, rhythm and cohesion were still sadly lacking, and the defensive screen was woefully suspect.

If confirmation was needed, Wigan and Warrington were only too willing to oblige, as we slumped to the unenviable record of two wins from our last eleven games. Enough was enough, frustrated in their earlier negotiations for established players, the management signed Graham Joyce, second-row forward, and Ian Slater, stand-off or centre, from Bradford Northern. The immediate effect, be it coincidental or otherwise, was remarkable: with Hague now at full-back, we won four of our next five matches in impressive style, scoring thirty-one tries in the process and conceding only nine.

Thus, with self-respect and credibility restored, Leeds reached the turn of the year with sights firmly fixed on the R.L. Cup trail, but only to slip back once more on the switchback of inconsistency in the League, a home defeat against Bradford Northern being followed by two splendid wins over St. Helens and Widnes, and then a confidence-sapping, lacklustre display at Wigan, just a week prior to the 1st Round of the Cup. As ever, a visit to The Boulevard was daunting, the battle hard. At half-time we held a 3-2 lead, thanks to a try by Crane, yet had frittered away a 10-5 scrum advantage through haphazard handling. We paid for it in the second half! No sooner had Norton swerved powerfully between the posts, for Lloyd to convert, than Hull went 10-3 ahead through a Norton drop goal and a Lloyd penalty, and though hopes of a dramatic recovery were raised by an unconverted try from Dyl, dreams of a Wembley hat-trick were finally shattered when Lloyd was awarded a penalty try. The decision was perhaps controversial, not the final result: Hull were worthy winners on the day.

Now there was only the Premiership, Reason said it was outside the bounds of probability, Faith thought otherwise. Taking full advantage of Headingley?s electric blanket Leeds avoided any embarrassing backlog of fixtures and won nine of the ten remaining league matches, to finish in 4th place. Ironically, the solitary and inexplicably abysmal defeat, against Workington Town at Headingley, would have beggared description had it not been the occasion for John Atkinson to score his 300th try in Leeds? colours.

No fixture fatigue for Leeds! Fresh and eager, after almost a month?s lay-off we beat St. Helens in the 1st Round of the play-off with flashes of superb rugby, and then the Semi-Final against Wigan hung in the balance at 5-5 just after the interval the introduction of substitute Dick and an opportunist try by Hague generated a 15-point match-winning rally. And so to the Final at Fartown! Sanderson had contributed a couple of tries in each of the earlier rounds, and Dick three goals against Wigan: now paired together, like Cheek and Impudence, with Sanderson working the scrums and Dick at stand-off for the unfit Holmes, they pointed the way to victory with such exuberant self-assurance that Leeds never even contemplated the possibility of defeat, despite the loss of the injured Dyl. For all that, it was a team victory, with Ward an inspiring captain, and backs and forwards alike as enterprising in attack as they were sound in defence. The result brooked no argument, Leeds winning hands down by 24 points to 2. Nor could there be any question as to the winner of the Harry Sunderland Trophy: Kevin Dick?s sure boot had not only kicked seven goals and dropped another, but had also, along with Sanderson, driven Bradford back time and again with touchfinders of unerring accuracy.

The Leeds team was:. Hague; A. Smith, D. Smith, Dyl (Fletcher), Atkinson; K. Dick, J. Sanderson; M. Harrison, D. Ward, Pitchford, Joyce, Eccles (Adams), Cookson.