Yes. Basnett was in the late 80's. Widnes got rid of him and signed some bloke called Offiah, IIRC. Not sure how he worked out for them, but Basnett never did much at Leeds.

Until recently i still had nightmares about some of these horrific days. I finally get over it and you then go and bring them up again!!!

The 39-4 and the 24-0 Regal Trophy Final loss was as bad as it gets.

Im not going to sleep tonight now!!!

I went to all of them. The first semi at Elland Road is one of my favourite games of the 80s. The less said about the replay, the better.



My first ever experience of a major defeat and just to rub it in, we made it home in time to see the last try again on TV.
Games like that one stay with you forever, for all the wrong reasons.

Not sure Offiah did much for them , i think they managed to offload him to Wigan where he played out an ordinary career . May have only scored a few tries for them , i seem to remember a figure of ten being mentioned .

I remember day Offiah signed for Wigan being at Headingley for an A Team game and saying to a guy who used to run his own coaches Ronnie Robinson that i wish we had signed him. "We dont want him all he can do is score tries" he said. I reminded him the day the flyer Offiah scored 10 against us!!!

He was right, all he could do was score tries, not many only 500 or so.

I wish we had signed him instead of Ellery, imagine how many offiah would have scored playeing outside Innes and with echoey throwing the long balls out wide, reckon he would have poutdone his own tally for wigan.

I remember being at the 10-10 Naughton Park game in the Cup. My Uncle told me he'd never seen me looking so ashen faced as David Creasser came across to take the kick. I missed the replay as my Dad worked nights and couldn't take me, but I went to both semi final games, although I hardly saw any of the replay as I was only 10 at the time and the Kop at Elland Road being busy to the point it was quite dangerous.

The cross bar semi final was the first time I had ever cried at a game of rugby, that was real pain, and I still get wound up about it now





I used to quite like Neil Hunt when he played for Leeds, although not sure he could be classed in the "best of" category.....I also quite liked Carl Gibson when he played on the wing, I very much enjoyed his 2 tries in the Yorkshire Cup final against Castleford....which being a fan at that time meant it was quite exciting to see Leeds lift a trophy, even if it wasn't any of the one's we really craved.

Can't say I "drank" in the Grange. My Gran lived on the end of Hollin Park Mount, we moved to Fearnville road when I was 4 from up near East End Park (where my Dad grew up). I spent many a summer lunchtime up the Grange with my Gran when I was a kid. I spent a lot of time at my Gran's when my Mum went back to work.
When I started going to pubs it was the Mansion, mainly because I went to Roundhay and that's where everyone we knew went. I decided that a CSE in metalwork was not the limit of my academic ambitions so dodged the Foxwood bullet.

Dear old Ronnie and his missus Margaret. Mr Leeds Rugby League Travel. Many happy memories on the Briardon Bezzer over't hill in the late '80s.