THE Saints Heritage Society's Alex Service and Adrian Lawrenson met up with a true Saints’ great recently. And their chat with wing wonder Les Jones resulted in a wonderful insight into one of the club's most prolific scorers - and yet one who somehow slips under the radar when fans recall greats from the past.
For any rugby league-mad youngster to make his senior debut for his hometown club is truly the fulfilment of a dream.
To make it at the home of your greatest rivals, Wigan, at Central Park, in front of over 20,000 fans and to score a sensational try is truly beyond anyone’s wildest dreams!
On Good Friday 1967, Les Jones, a flying winger from Parr scored a brilliant 60 yard interception try in Saints’ 21-7 victory in his first senior appearance, giving him his first three points and the Heritage Number #841.
He became an instant hit with the fans after that!
It was the prelude to a fantastic career in the red vee spanning three decades, from the latter days of Saints’ ‘Four Cups’ squad in the mid-1960s; through the fabulous Seventies and the eventual breakup of the ‘Dad’s Army’ outfit by the early 1980s.
By the time he called it a day he had played 485 matches – more than anyone on the flanks for St Helens RFC, including the great van Vollenhoven and is second in the club’s all-time scoring charts behind him, with 283.
The club’s first Superstar, Alf Ellaby [123 appearances 234 tries] is in third place.
Les accrued 9 winner’s medals in major finals: 2 Championship finals, 2 Challenge Cups, 2 Premiership finals, 2 Floodlit finals and a Lancashire Cup victory which started it all off in a replayed final with Warrington in 1967-68.
He has beaten the Aussie and New Zealand tourists; toured Australia and New Zealand with the club in 1976, enjoyed a record £21,328 testimonial Year in 1977, represented his county and country and is a member of St Helens Player Association’s prestigious Hall of Fame. A fantastic rugby league CV indeed.
Yet somewhat inexplicably, he still tends to go under the radar when Saints’ fans compile their all-time favourite XIIIs.
Married for 52 years to Shirley, he lives in the Sutton Manor district of the town and is only too pleased to ‘get the oval ball out’ on occasions.
Les was, first and foremost a Saints’ supporter, walking from his home in Parr to Naughton Park, Widnes, to watch Saints win a re-played first round tie 29-10 on their way to Wembley, on a Thursday night in February 1961.
Little did he realise that three of those players, Austin Rhodes, Tom van Vollenhoven and Wilf Smith would be his team-mates at Knowsley Road several years later.
“I went to Parr Central school,” he remembers “and we lived in Malvern Road – Frenchy [Ray French] was a couple of doors away – and in those traffic-free days we just played sport from gaslamp to gaslamp, as you did.
"There was a local lad named Brian Highcock, a scrum-half who signed for Leigh on his 16th birthday and Leigh helped to start up an Under 17s at Parr Labour Club so he could gain experience.
"He came round to our house and asked if I wanted to play and although I was a scrum-half, I played on the wing and that’s where my career started.”
And that unforgettable debut against Wigan?
“I turned up for training on the Thursday night and [coach] Joe Coan came up to me and said I was playing the following day [it was Good Friday] because Tom van Vollenhoven had pulled a muscle.
"I think I was a bit nervous but not unduly. The lads in the dressing room beforehand just let me soak it all in but I do remember Tommy Bishop having a few words of encouragement.
"The thing was…I started the game well and soon settled down. Peter Douglas was my centre. Billy Benyon was injured.”
To the delight of the huge Saints’ contingent, Les snapped up an interception and burned Wigan full-back Tyrer with a scorching run on the outside before touching down and as the saying goes, a star was born.
Les fully acknowledges that his speed was his biggest asset: “I was a straight runner, basically.
"I had no sidestep as such but with my pace I didn’t need it. I also found that I could use my strength to knock would be tacklers away too.
"I developed a great understanding with my centre, Billy Benyon, who was the ideal winger’s centre but I also played outside John Walsh.
"He was less orthodox. You had to be alert as you never knew which side he would go but a great player.”
In fact, the first time Jones and Benyon were named together on the team sheet was the 1967 Lancashire Cup final replay, against Warrington, when Les scored a try as well as gaining his first winner’s medal.
His debut all those years ago at Central Park remains the undoubted highlight for Les, despite so many major finals in the red vee.
He said: “It doesn’t get any better than that and it created an instant bond with the spekkies.
"Personally, I was never afraid of going to play Wigan. Some of the lads were at their wits end before a match but I always looked forward to it.”
In fact, he has scored more tries against Wigan than any other Saint [a total of 21 tries in 31 matches] and that includes the likes of Vollenhoven and Ellaby! His nearest rival is Tommy Makinson with 20 in 35 matches, a proud record indeed.
Les had several jobs outside rugby, starting with a welding apprenticeship at “Capper Neils and a spell in the Timber Yard at Pilks but a major life change occurred when Saints’ Director Laurie Prescott, who worked for Greenall Whitley, asked him if he wanted to take over a pub.
His first was the Newmarket Hotel in Earlestown and Les and Shirley later became Mine Hosts at the Wheatsheaf in Sutton.
“After leaving the licensing trade I took a job as a rep with Kerrs Minerals,” he recalls, “the link there being Eric Latham, who was on the Board at Knowsley Road.”
Playing such a physical sport inevitably took its toll, including a badly broken arm “it had to be plated…and then I bent the original making a tackle,” he grimaces.
“They’ve put a titanium one in since but I missed a fair few games.” Then at the end of my career I had operations on both my achilles tendons at the same time which took several months of rehabilitation.”
Les represented Lancashire on nine occasions but his international representation included just a single appearance for both Great Britain and England. Was he disappointed?
“You know what…it didn’t worry me,” he adds.
“I didn’t really think about much else other than playing for Saints.” For Les it was always meant to be one sport and one team.
“Nothing would have stopped me playing rugby league. I was a local lad who always gave his best and if I made the occasional mistake, the spekkies never seemed to hold it against me.”
Amen to that.
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