As a younger man I remember watching him and not being impressed as he didn't seem to be doing a lot (i.e. screaming down the wing for a hat trick - I was young, what can I say).

As I learnt more about the game I realised what an essential part of the team he was. He became one of my favourite players.

In a strange way he taught me more about rl just by watching him than most other people have with their 'expert analysis' etc...

Great points!.

Looking back, I still feel he was a bit too 'nice' for his era and lacked that bit of nastiness and intimidatory factor required to really be in the top echelon of forwards back then - I had a conversation with Eric Grothe fairly recently on that subject - we both agreed on that point and said he'd have excelled in today's sanitised version of the game. He was an absolute athlete back then, imagine him with today's training regimes and sports science.

He would have been frightening with the level of conditioning players have now. Easily an 80 minute prop

Superb post and one that summed him up perfectly. Possibly the nicest Leeds player ever.

He loved the fans and we had many a good night in his company in the mid-80s when players and fans would de-camp to the Smiths Arms after a Sunday game.

I know for a fact that if the press were struggling to choose a man of the match, the default position was 'give it to Roy' because he could never be faulted for effort.

was a raw prospect that became the finished article and didn't need to straight arm people as rarely missed man and ball.

paul dixon wasn't a dirty player either but very tough .

Laughton let him go a week after he made 50 plus tackles away at Hull. Said he didn't hurt people enough.Then Laughton brought slackers like Eyres, Worrall and Goodway to take his place.

He came to a fund raising do for an new amateur team I played for as a guest. Not only did he refuse to have his beer bought for him he ended up buying for us lads.

was watching dougie on sky legends on u tube , mentioned the mistake of buying worrall
off topic basnett was worst widnes buy

Basnett was a let down but i would have to say Eyres imo was the biggest flop we recruited from Widnes, he came in with a real big rep and high expectations and never lived up to them. And as G1 says, we lost big Roy off the back of his signing and he got nowhere near Roy's level playing for us.

Eyres was good at Widnes. Not sure why he was such a flop at Leeds. Same thing with Basnett.

Big Roy was Peter Fox’s first buy in his second season at Bradford. Our defence was terrible until he arrived and he played a large part in us staying up in 91/92 season. When we added others around him later he really shone in attack too, never better than when he scored the last minute winner vs Leeds at Valley Parade in 1993.

Mostly because he didn't have Sorensen and Grima in the middle of the park frightening the living daylights out of people so he could run at outside backs all day. Eyres was, much like Paul Medley, all flash and no substance.

I think that's a bit harsh. He like Medley just had to be used in the right way.

Medley went alright for us with Karl Fairbank and Kelvin Skerrett looking after him.

Medley would've been superb nowadays with the game being less dirty.

Even now though, second rowers have to be prepared to roll their sleeves up and do the unglamorous stuff of 40 tackles a game and driving the ball away from your own line. That wasn't Medley. Didn't get interested until the ball got over halfway.

TBF I think you do him a bit of a disservice. He wasn't that bad.

With modern training & conditioning methods allied to playing mostly in the summer on better pitches Medley would likely have been an outstanding player.
His pace & size would have troubled any opposition.
Only my opinion obviously.

Good game that. I remember having to be dragged out of the club with strippers on Manningham lane to make kick off.

As for Eyres his only issue at Leeds was that he was, like most players at that time, there purely and simply for the £££££ and he took hte urine.