1978–79 John Player Trophy

1978–79 John Player Trophy
1978–79 John Player Trophy
Structure	National knockout championship
Teams	32
Winners	Widnes
Runners-up	Warrington
	← 1977–78 1979–80 →

This was the eighth season for rugby league's League Cup competition, which was now known as the John Player Trophy for sponsorship reasons.

Widnes won the final against Warrington by the score of 16-4. The match was played at Knowsley Road, St Helens, Merseyside. The attendance was 10,743 and receipts were £11709.

Background

This season saw no changes in the entrants, no new members and no withdrawals, the number remaining at eighteen.
Bad weather - Due to an exceptionally inclement (i.e. frost, snow etc.) winter there were very few Rugby League matches played during the months of January and February

Competition and results

^[1]^[2]

Round 1 - First Round

Involved 16 matches and 32 Clubs

Game No	Fixture Date	Home Team	Score	Away Team	Venue	Att	Notes	Ref

1	Fri 22 Sep 1978	Castleford	18-10	Swinton	Wheldon Road
2	Fri 22 Sep 1978	Salford	25-7	Rochdale Hornets	The Willows
3	Sat 23 Sep 1978	Leigh Miners W.	9-21	Halifax	Hilton Park	1621	1
4	Sat 23 Sep 1978	St. Helens	16-11	Leeds	Knowsley Road	4700		^[3]
5	Sun 24 Sep 1978	Barrow	8-26	Bradford Northern	Craven Park
6	Sun 24 Sep 1978	Doncaster	2-30	Wigan	Bentley Road Stadium/Tattersfield	1332		^[4]
7	Sun 24 Sep 1978	Huddersfield	10-21	Widnes	Fartown			^[5]^[6]
8	Sun 24 Sep 1978	Hull Kingston Rovers	67-11	Oldham	Craven Park (1)		2
9	Sun 24 Sep 1978	Keighley	20-4	York	Lawkholme Lane
10	Sun 24 Sep 1978	Leigh	13-13	Huyton	Hilton Park
11	Sun 24 Sep 1978	Milford	5-38	Dewsbury	McLaren Field	3129	3
12	Sun 24 Sep 1978	New Hunslet	7-17	Hull F.C.	Elland Road Greyhound Stadium			^[7]
13	Sun 24 Sep 1978	Wakefield Trinity	27-2	Batley	Belle Vue			^[8]
14	Sun 24 Sep 1978	Warrington	14-4	Blackpool Borough	Wilderspool		4	^[9]
15	Sun 24 Sep 1978	Whitehaven	3-9	Featherstone Rovers	Recreation Ground
16	Sun 24 Sep 1978	Workington Town	17-8	Bramley	Derwent Park

^[10]

Round 1 - First Round - Replays

Involved 1 match and 2 Clubs

Game No	Fixture Date	Home Team		Score		Away Team	Venue	Att	Rec	Notes	Ref

1	Tue 26 Sep 1978	Huyton		8-10		Leigh	Alt Park, Huyton

Round 2 - Second Round

Involved 8 matches and 16 Clubs

Game No	Fixture Date	Home Team	Score	Away Team	Venue	Att	Notes	Ref

1	Sat 2 Dec 1978	Widnes	11-10	St. Helens	Naughton Park	5030		^[3]^[6]
2	Sun 3 Dec 1978	Castleford	20-9	Workington Town	Wheldon Road
3	Sun 3 Dec 1978	Featherstone Rovers	0-7	Warrington	Post Office Road			^[9]
4	Sun 3 Dec 1978	Hull F.C.	12-18	Bradford Northern	Boulevard			^[7]
5	Sun 3 Dec 1978	Hull Kingston Rovers	16-14	Salford	Craven Park (1)
6	Sun 3 Dec 1978	Keighley	P	Wigan	Lawkholme Lane		5	^[2]
7	Sun 3 Dec 1978	Leigh	17-8	Dewsbury	Hilton Park
8	Sun 3 Dec 1978	Wakefield Trinity	15-10	Halifax	Belle Vue			^[8]

^[11]

Round 2 - Second Round Replays

Involved 1 match and 2 Clubs - and due to the first match being postponed because of extremely inclement weather

Game No	Fixture Date	Home Team		Score		Away Team	Venue	Att	Rec	Notes	Ref

1	Wed 6 Dec 1978	Keighley		9-5		Wigan	Lawkholme Lane				^[2]

Round 3 -Quarter Finals

Involved 4 matches with 8 clubs

Game No	Fixture Date	Home Team	Score	Away Team	Venue	Ref

1	Sun 17 Dec 1978	Bradford Northern	16-13	Wakefield Trinity	Odsal	^[8]
2	Sun 17 Dec 1978	Hull Kingston Rovers	23-10	Castleford	Craven Park (1)
3	Sun 17 Dec 1978	Keighley	4-15	Widnes	Lawkholme Lane	^[6]
4	Sun 17 Dec 1978	Warrington	27-0	Leigh	Wilderspool	^[9]

^[11]

Semi-finals

Involved 2 matches and 4 Clubs
Bad weather - Due to an exceptionally inclement (i.e. frost, snow etc.) winter there were very few Rugby League matches played during the months of January and February^[2]^[8]

Game No	Fixture Date	Home Team	Score	Away Team	Venue	Notes	Ref

1	Sat 27 Jan 1979	Warrington	P	Hull Kingston Rovers	Wilderspool	6	^[11]
2	Wed 24 Jan 1979	Widnes	21-3	Bradford Northern	Naughton Park		^[6]
3	Sun 1 Apr 1979	Warrington	9-5	Hull Kingston Rovers	Wilderspool		^[9]

Final

The final was originally scheduled to take place on 27 January 1979, but was rescheduled due to the postponement of the semi-final matches. The final took place on 28 April 1979, a week before the Challenge Cup final.^[12]

Fixture Date	Home Team	Score	Away Team	Venue	Att	Rec	Notes	Ref
Saturday 28 April 1979	Widnes	16–4	Warrington	Knowsley Road	10743	11709	8, 9	^[6]^[9]^[13]^{[page needed]}^[14]^{[page needed]}

Teams and scorers

^[13]^[14]

Widnes	No.	Warrington

	teams
David Eckersley	1	Derek Finnegan/Finnigan [1]
Stuart Wright	2	Michael "Mike"/"Mick" Kelly [2]
Mal Aspey	3	Steve Hesford
Eric Hughes	4	Billy Benyon
Mick Burke	5	Dave Sutton [3]
David Moran [4]	6	Ken Kelly
Reg Bowden [5] (c)	7	Parry Gordon
Jim Mills	8	Roy Lester [6]
Keith Elwell	9	Tony Waller[7]
Glyndwr "Glyn" Shaw	10	Mike Nicholas
Alan Dearden [8]	11	Brian Case
David Hull	12	Tommy Martyn
Mick Adams	13	Alan Gwilliam [9]
? Not used	14	Eddie Hunter [10] (for Ken Kelly)
? Not used	15	? Not used
	Coach

16	score	4
2	HT	2

	Scorers
	Tries
Stuart Wright (1)	T
David Hull (1)	T
	Goals
Mick Burke (3)	G	Steve Hesford (2)
	Drop Goals
Keith Elwell (2)	DG
Mick Adams (2)	DG

Referee		G. Frederick "Fred" Lindop (Wakefield)
Man of the match		David Eckersley - Widnes - Fullback
Competition Sponsor		John Player

Scoring - Try = three points - Goal = two points - Drop goal = one point

Prize money

As part of the sponsorship deal and funds, the prize money awarded to the competing teams for this season was as follows:^[15]

Finish Position	Cash Prize	No. receiving prize	Total Cash
Winner	£8,000	1	£8,000
Runner-up	£3,500	1	£3,500
Semi-finalist	£1,750	2	£3,500
Loser in Rd 3	£900	4	£3,600
Loser in Rd 2	£700	8	£5,600
Loser in Rd 1	£550	16	£8,800
Grand Total			£33,000

The road to success

This tree excludes any preliminary round fixtures

First round		Second round		Third round		Semifinals		Final

Keighley	20

York	4
		Keighley	9

		Wigan	5
Doncaster	2

Wigan	30
				Keighley	4

				Widnes	15
Huddersfield	10

Widnes	21
		Widnes	11

		St. Helens	10
St. Helens	16

Leeds	11
						Widnes	21

						Bradford Northern	3
New Hunslet	7

Hull F.C.	17
		Hull F.C.	12

		Bradford Northern	18
Barrow	8

Bradford Northern	26
				Bradford Northern	16

				Wakefield Trinity	13
Wakefield Trinity	27

Batley	2
		Wakefield Trinity	15

		Halifax	10
Leigh Miners W.	9

Halifax	21
								Widnes	16

								Warrington	4
Whitehaven	3

Featherstone Rovers	9
		Featherstone Rovers	0

		Warrington	7
Warrington	14

Blackpool Borough	4
				Warrington	27

				Leigh	0
Leigh	13 (10)

Huyton	13 (8)
		Leigh	17

		Dewsbury	8
Milford	5

Dewsbury	38
						Warrington	9

						Hull Kingston Rovers	5
Hull Kingston Rovers	67

Oldham	11
		Hull Kingston Rovers	16

		Salford	14
Salford	26

Rochdale Hornets	7
				Hull Kingston Rovers	23

				Castleford	10
Castleford	18

Swinton	10
		Castleford	20

		Workington Town	9
Workington Town	17

Bramley	8

Notes and comments

1 * Leigh Miners' Welfare are a Junior (amateur) club from Leigh (formed by merger of Astley & Tyldesley and Hope Rangers - and now renamed as Leigh Miners Rangers) ^[16]
2 * new record score between professional clubs in the competition - at the time, beating the previous record of 9-51 set when Blackpool Borough lost at home to Leeds by 9-51 in season 1972–73
3 * Milford are a Junior (amateur) club from Leeds
4 * Warrington official archives^[9] show the game as being played on 30 September but RUGBYLEAGUEproject^[1] and Wigan official archives^[10] shows it as played on 24 September
5 * Postponed due to frozen pitch
6 * Postponed due to frozen pitch - was due to be televised by BBC
7 * Postponed due to the postponement of the Semi Final ties caused by frost and other extremely inclement weather.
8 * The Final had been due to be played on Saturday 27 January but was put back due to backlog of semi-finl ties caused by enforced postponement due to extreme inclement weather
9 * Knowsley Road was the home of St Helens R.F.C. from 1890 until its closure in 2010. The final capacity was 17,500 although the record attendance was 35,695 set on 26 December 1949 for a league game between St Helens and Wigan.

References

^ ^a ^b "Rugby League Project".
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d "Wigan "Cherry and White" archived results". Archived from the original on 2014-02-21. Retrieved 2014-07-12.
^ ^a ^b "Saints Heritage Society - History - Season 1896-97".
^ "Wigan "Cherry and White" archived results".
^ "Huddersfield Rugby League Heritage" (PDF).
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e "Widnes Vikings - History - Season In Review".
^ ^a ^b "HULL&PROUD - Stats - Fixtures & Results".
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d "Wakefield until I die".
^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e ^f "Warrington Wolves - Results Archive - 1897".
^ ^a ^b "Wigan "Cherry and White" J Player Round 1 archived results".
^ ^a ^b ^c "Wigan "Cherry and White" J Player round 2 onwards archived results".
^ "Sport In Brief". The Guardian. London. 16 January 1979. p. 13. ProQuest 186085378.
^ ^a ^b Raymond Fletcher and David Howes (1990). Rothmans Rugby League Yearbook 1990-1991. Queen Anne Press. ISBN 0 35617851 X.
^ ^a ^b Raymond Fletcher and David Howes (1991). Rothmans Rugby League Yearbook 1991-1992. Queen Anne Press. ISBN 0 35617852 8.
^ Fletcher, Raymond; Howes, David, eds. (1992). Rothmans Rugby League Yearbook 1992-93. London: Headline Publishing Group. p. 396. ISBN 978-0-7472-7906-8.
^ "Leigh Miners Rangers". Archived from the original on 2014-01-01. Retrieved 2014-07-12.

External links

[RLP.orgMisc-1] "Rugby League Project".

[CherryMisc-2] "Wigan "Cherry and White" archived results". Archived from the original on 2014-02-21. Retrieved 2014-07-12.

[SaintsMisc-3] "Saints Heritage Society - History - Season 1896-97".

[4] "Wigan "Cherry and White" archived results".

[HuddHeritageMisc-5] "Huddersfield Rugby League Heritage" (PDF).

[ChemicsMisc-6] "Widnes Vikings - History - Season In Review".

[HullMisc-7] "HULL&PROUD - Stats - Fixtures & Results".

[WakefieldTIDMisc-8] "Wakefield until I die".

[WiresMisc-9] ^ ^a ^b ^c ^d ^e ^f "Warrington Wolves - Results Archive - 1897".

[CherryJPR1Misc-10] "Wigan "Cherry and White" J Player Round 1 archived results".

[CherryJPR2etcMisc-11] "Wigan "Cherry and White" J Player round 2 onwards archived results".

[12] "Sport In Brief". The Guardian. London. 16 January 1979. p. 13. ProQuest 186085378.

[Roth1990-91Misc-13] Raymond Fletcher and David Howes (1990). Rothmans Rugby League Yearbook 1990-1991. Queen Anne Press. ISBN 0 35617851 X.

[Roth1991-92Misc-14] Raymond Fletcher and David Howes (1991). Rothmans Rugby League Yearbook 1991-1992. Queen Anne Press. ISBN 0 35617852 8.

[15] Fletcher, Raymond; Howes, David, eds. (1992). Rothmans Rugby League Yearbook 1992-93. London: Headline Publishing Group. p. 396. ISBN 978-0-7472-7906-8.

[LWWMisc-16] "Leigh Miners Rangers". Archived from the original on 2014-01-01. Retrieved 2014-07-12.

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