Wakefield Trinity Wildcats are pleased to announce that 1930s and 1940s scrum half, Herbert Goodfellow is the fist inductee into the club's 'Class of 2015' Hall of Fame.

Herbert was the organiser, and classy scrum half, in the post-war glory years when Trinity won the RL Challenge Cup in 1946 and he had a Trinity career spanning nineteen years which included Yorkshire county and England international honours along with his 434 club appearances.

Hailing from Sharlston, where many of his family still live, he signed for Trinity in 1932, debuting in 1934, scoring two tries against Keighley. A broken leg in 1935 caused him to miss the whole of the 1935-36 season but international honours followed a couple of years later when he was selected for an RL XIII representative side that played Wales at Newcastle. He made his Yorkshire county debut in 1938, one of five Yorkshire appearances and there was a visit to France in 1938 with another RL XIII rep side playing a French XIII. He also gained his one and only England cap in 1939 against Wales, at Bradford; a fact that many fans thought was a travesty as they believed Herbert to be the best scrum half in the league at the time.

The war years hampered Trinity's progress but the 1945-46 season proved to be one of the most successful in the club's history as Herbert starred in the 1946 RL Challenge Cup success, beating Wigan, 13-12 at Wembley. At the fourth time of asking, Herbert won a Yorkshire Cup winners medal, when Trinity beat Leeds, 8-7 in November 1947, after a 7-7 draw. He played his last game in October 1950 before moving to Oldham in February 1951

Herbert progressed from being a 'skinny' winger to one of the all-time great scrum halves, club captain, cup winner and England international and he stands 8th on the club's all-time appearance list and 7th on the all-time club-scoring list, being one of only thirteen players to score over a hundred tries for the club.

Wow. That's impressive.
I really don't know enough about Wakefield Trinity before the great 60s side.

There's an excellent book available by Mike Rylance, Pop Tart, outlining Trinity's history. If you don' want to buy it, it's available from Wakefield library, local history section.