Leeds Rhinos Nostalgia: How the class of 1968/69 achieved their unbeaten milestone

Leeds’ longest unbeaten run in a single season came in the 1901-2 campaign when they went 22 games without defeat.

Twenty of those games were in the league, but the hot streak – from October 26, 1901 until the end of the season on April 19 the following year – was interrupted by a Challenge Cup defeat at Huddersfield in March.

Leeds won their opening eight games of the 1902-03 campaign, so their overall unbeaten run in the league was 28 matches, across two seasons and spanning an entire year.

The Loiners’ longest unbeaten sequence in the league was achieved in 1968-69, when they went 23 games without defeat – all but one of them wins – from October 23, 1968, to April 12 the following year.

During that time, though, they lost at Leigh in the BBC2 Floodlit Trophy and away to Castleford in the third round of the Challenge Cup, after two earlier wins in that competition.

Inspired by new captain Barry Seabourne, Leeds sealed top spot in the table – with 29 wins and two draws from 34 matches – and were crowned Yorkshire League champions.

Their run ended in the final game of the league campaign when a weakened team lost 32-15 at Bradford Northern.

Young forwards Phil Cookson and Graham Eccles – who both went on to win multiple honours with the club – both made their debut that afternoon. Leeds got back on track in the play-offs, beating Oldham, Workington and Salford before gaining revenge over Castleford in the final at Odsal.

Castleford were on course to be crowned champions for the first time, until John Atkinson touched down in the final moments and Bev Risman’s conversion snatched a 16-14 win for the Loiners.

Leeds set three other records that season.

They won all their 21 home games – in league and cup competitions – which was six more than the previous record for consecutive victories at Headingley, set in 1901-02.

They won all 17 of their home league games – the second of four times that has been done – and also beat the 1901-02 and 1956-57 mark of 15 successive league victories, by winning 18 in a row.

The 1968-69 team played some of the finest rugby in the club’s history and finished with four trophies, adding the Yorkshire Cup – for the first time in a decade – to the Championship, league and Yorkshire Championship titles.

Castleford were the opposition in the county final, at Wakefield’s Belle Vue and Leeds won 22-11 thanks to tries by John Atkinson, Bernard Watson, Alan Smith and David Hick, plus five goals from Risman.

Syd Hynes, who later went on to become one of the club’s most successful coaches, was top try scorer that season with 26 touchdowns, three ahead of Smith.

Risman booted 165 goals, just one short of Lewis Jones’ club record. That tally has since been beaten only twice, by Iestyn Harris with 168 in 1999 and Kevin Sinfield who landed 173 in 2012.

Also in 1968-69, John Holmes scored a try and 10 goals on his debut – as a 16-year-old full-back – in a 47-15 Lazenby Cup hammering of Hunslet at Parkside.

Holmes, whose brother Phil also made his first appearance for Leeds that year, played on until 1989. His 625 appearances – all but 21 in the starting side – set a club record which is unlikely to be beaten.

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