1951–52 Northern Rugby Football League season

1951–52 Northern Rugby Football League season
1951–52 Northern Rugby Football League season
League	Northern Rugby League
1951–52 Season
Champions	Wigan
League Leaders	Bradford Northern
Top point-scorer(s)	Willie Horne 313
Top try-scorer(s)	Lionel Cooper 71
	← 1950–51 1952–53 →

The 1951–52 Rugby Football League season was the 57th season of rugby league football.

Season summary

Wigan won their eighth Championship when they beat Bradford Northern 13-6 in the play-off final. Bradford had ended the regular season as the league leaders.

The Challenge Cup Winners were Workington Town who beat Featherstone Rovers 18-10 in the final.

Liverpool Stanley was renamed Liverpool City, and Cardiff, and Doncaster joined the league.^[1]

Wigan won the Lancashire League, and Huddersfield won the Yorkshire League. Wigan beat Leigh 14–6 to win the Lancashire Cup, and Wakefield Trinity beat Keighley 17–3 to win the Yorkshire Cup.

Championship

Final standings

	Team	Pld	W	D	L	Pts
1	Bradford Northern	36	28	1	7	57
2	Wigan	36	27	1	8	55
3	Hull	36	26	1	9	53
4	Huddersfield	36	26	0	10	52
5	Oldham	36	25	1	10	51
6	Warrington	36	24	1	11	49
7	Leigh	36	23	2	11	48
8	Workington Town	36	23	0	13	46
9	Hunslet	36	22	1	13	45
10	Barrow	36	21	2	13	44
11	Doncaster	36	21	1	14	43
12	Widnes	36	20	2	14	42
13	Leeds	36	19	2	15	40
14	Swinton	36	18	3	15	39
15	Salford	36	18	2	16	38
16	Wakefield Trinity	36	19	0	17	38
17	Batley	36	18	1	17	37
18	Dewsbury	36	18	0	18	36
19	Whitehaven	36	16	4	16	36
20	St. Helens	36	16	2	18	34
21	Halifax	36	16	2	18	34
22	Featherstone Rovers	36	14	2	20	30
23	Belle Vue Rangers	36	12	3	21	27
24	York	36	12	3	21	27
25	Hull Kingston Rovers	36	10	1	25	21
26	Rochdale Hornets	36	10	1	25	21
27	Bramley	36	10	1	25	21
28	Castleford	36	8	1	27	17
29	Keighley	36	8	1	27	17
30	Cardiff	36	5	0	31	10
31	Liverpool City	36	4	0	32	8

	Play-offs

Source: wigan.rlfans.com.
League points: for win = 2; for draw = 1; for loss = 0.
Pld = Games played; W = Wins; D = Draws; L = Losses; Pts = League points.

Play-offs

Semi-finals			Championship final

1	Bradford Northern	18

4	Huddersfield	15
			Bradford Northern	6

			Wigan	13
2	Wigan	13

3	Hull	9

Challenge Cup

Workington Town beat Featherstone Rovers 18-10 in the Challenge Cup Final played at Wembley Stadium on Saturday 19 April 1952 in front of a crowd of 72,093. Workington full-back and captain-coach Gus Risman became the oldest player to appear in a Cup final at age 41.^[2] Three Australians, Tony Paskins, John Mudge and Bevan Wilson came up with decisive plays to help relative newcomers Workington to victory.^[3] It was the club's first Cup Final win in their first Final appearance.^[4] Billy Ivison, Workington Town's loose forward, was awarded the Lance Todd Trophy for man-of-the-match.

European Championship

This was the twelfth competition and was won for the fourth time by France on points difference.^[5]^[6]

Results

19 September

England	35–11	Wales

St. Helens

3 November

Other nationalities	17–14	France

Hull

25 November

France	42–13	England

Marseilles

1 December

Other nationalities	22–11	Wales

Abertillery

6 April

France	20–12	Wales

Bordeaux

23 April

England	31–18	Other nationalities

Wigan

Final standings

Team	Played	Won	Lost	For	Against	Diff	Points
France	3	2	1	76	42	+34	4
England	3	2	1	79	71	+8	4
Other nationalities	3	2	1	57	56	+1	4
Wales	3	0	3	34	77	−43	0

References

^ "1951-52 Season summary". Archived from the original on 2009-08-26. Retrieved 2009-08-08.
^ news.bbc.co.uk (11 May 2004). "Cup final facts". BBC Sport. UK: BBC. Retrieved 6 March 2011.
^ AAP (London) (1952-04-21). "Australians star in Cup Final". The Sydney Morning Herald. Retrieved 2023-12-27 – via Trove.
^ "RFL Challenge Cup Roll of Honour". Archived from the original on 2009-04-03. Retrieved 2009-08-07.
^ European Championship 1951-52 at rugbyleagueproject.org
^ Raymond Fletcher; David Howes (1995). Rothmans Rugby League Yearbook 1995-1996. London: Headline Book Publishing. p. 424. ISBN 0-7472-7817-2.

Sources

[1] "1951-52 Season summary". Archived from the original on 2009-08-26. Retrieved 2009-08-08.

[2] ws.bbc.co.uk (11 May 2004). "Cup final facts". BBC Sport. UK: BBC. Retrieved 6 March 2011.

[3] AAP (London) (1952-04-21). "Australians star in Cup Final". The Sydney Morning Herald. Retrieved 2023-12-27 – via Trove.

[4] "RFL Challenge Cup Roll of Honour". Archived from the original on 2009-04-03. Retrieved 2009-08-07.

[5] European Championship 1951-52 at rugbyleagueproject.org

[6] Raymond Fletcher; David Howes (1995). Rothmans Rugby League Yearbook 1995-1996. London: Headline Book Publishing. p. 424. ISBN 0-7472-7817-2.

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