Joe Thomspon / Arthur Clues : Fri Mar 20, 2009 1:38 pm
Apologies for the delay in posting this ...
On Tuesday evening, in the Premier Suite was the first in hopefully a series of events that paid tribute to the great players that the club has produced in days gone by. The first in this tribute series featured Joe Thompson and Arthur Clues and as well as looking back at their careers, also gave the chance for some unique personal memorabilia from the players own families to get a rare public display.
Both the players were described by in detail and indeed, there was even some film footage of both players in action. Harry Jepson, the club president shared his memories of seeing Thompson actually play (albeit his colours were nailed to the Hunslet mast in those days) and Prof. Tony Collins described some of the wider history around both players and the game as it was in those days in general.
The first half of the evening looked at Joe Thompson, born in rural Gloucstershire, but raised from a toddler onwards in the heart of industrial South Wales. In his late teens, he was already an established player with one of the biggest and most successful union clubs of the era Cross Keys and by the time he was 20, Thompson had already received the calling to pull on the scarlet jersey of Wales and play against England at Twickenham in January 1923.
It was then that Leeds made their move and a mere 11 days after playing for Wales, Joe 'went north' and signed for Leeds for £300 ... A sum in those days that would have bought several reasonable houses !
A whirlwind introduction to the game (who said Union forwards couldn't make it ?), including six games in nine days just prior to the semi-final meant that 11 weeks after playing for Wales, Joe Thompson was now making the first appearance in a Challenge Cup Final (which in those days were still played in Northern England) and to recieve a winners medal for the game against Hull.
Selection for the Welsh RL side and the other major representative opportunity for non-English players in those days, Other Nationalities soon followed.
Joe had a long international career was the first ever British player to make three tours down under. Of course, this was in the days before high speed air travel and the tour went by sea by liner and taking 3 - 4 weeks to arrive in Australia. Indeed, with the vast distances travelled, meant that tours could last 5 months.
As a goal kicking forward he also held many club scoring records during his time with the club, including the first Leeds player ever to kick 10 and 11 goals in a game, as well as being one of first to kick over 100 goals in a season. Indeed, his scoring records stood for the best part of 25 years and were only broken then by a certain other mercurial welshman, Lewis Jones.
When his playing career ended in 1933, he was the one and only player to be awarded a Life Member of the club. He'd also been employed by the then club chairman Sir Edwin Airey (the Paul Caddick of his day ?) after coming north, on his construction work on both the South and North Stands.
Perhaps the least know fact about Joe Thompson's influence on the game came shortly after he retired (although it is documented from the excellent book 'The Forbidden Game' by Mike Rylance). In the early 1930s, Rugby League was just getting foothold in France and in 1934 a team under Jean Galia was raised from the Union players of SW France to travel to Northern England and learn / experience what this game of Rugby League was all about first hand.
Imagine the contrast from Perpignan to industrial Leeds ? Yet 700 souls welcomed the French at Leeds Central Station, the visitors were given a civic reception and were accomodated at the Griffin Hotel on Boar Lane for the duration of their stay.
So, how did they learn the game they'd come over the play ? Well, the Rugby League got Joe Thompson and Wakefield hall-of-fame player Jonty Parkin in to coach the team. Despite the results on the field, the tour was clearly well accepted back home and the development of the Rugby League in Southern France flourished in the years leading up to the Second World War (indeed, we know what occured during that war in order to stop the development of league in that part of the world) and in the 75th Aniversary year of the French RL, its worth considering the small but important influence that Joe had in establishing the international game with our nearest neighbours.
The second half of the the evening was given over to Arthur Clues, Leeds first post-war Australian forward. The talk for this section was given over to former Leeds and GB coach Maurice Bamford, who has decribed Clues in several of his books as one of his greatest RL heros.
One of the most interesting items on display was Arthur's 1946 Kangaroo blazer, issued to him for the GB 'Indomitables' tour just after the war. That tour clearly had an influence, because as a result of the reports by the returning Leeds players, they recommended his signing and Clues was on his way from Sydney to Yorkshire in 1947.
Moving to England meant he was unable to play representative football for his national side again, but as an alternative in the days before long-distance air travel, Arthur made 14 appearances for the Other Nationalities side during his career. Three of those included the added spice of a 'feud' with Carcassone copper Eduard Poncinet !
One of the hardest Leeds players ever to take the field, during an era when the game was at its toughest, Clue was the enforcer in the Leeds pack. Without video refs and on reports, much of the physical combative element of the game went unchecked and games were punctuated with a fair amount of even-ing up. One photo was on display of Arthur leaving the 'scene of the crime' after dealing with Wakefield star Ken Traill, lying on the floor and clutching his mouth.
Sadly, the one down side to Arthur's career was his lack of winners medals during his time at Leeds. A mere one post war Yorkshire Championship medal belies the talent he brought to the game and the club.
After a spell with Hunlset at the end of his playing career, Clues is also known to a generation of Leeds residents for owning a sucessful sports shop in the city set up after his retirement.
He was still 'around' when Maurice Bamford arrived back to coach Leeds in the early 80s and would often pop in to the coach's office for a coffee and a chat whilst Maurice ran the team.
Sadly, neither players are still with us today. It was a fitting tribute that their memory and influence on the club, that their endevours could still fill a room and certainly in the case of Joe Thompson, there must be very few people still alive who actually saw him play.
For those that didn't go, it is worth remembering that there where were are today owes a great deal to the likes of them and what they did then. Leeds has a massive history and presently we are but merely but a chapter, so why take some time to enjoy other earlier parts of the book too ?
Great players and a great evening.
