The 1948–49 Challenge Cup was the 48th staging of

rugby league Rugby league football, commonly known as just rugby league and sometimes football, footy, rugby or league, is a full-contact sport played by two teams of thirteen players on a rectangular field measuring 68 metres (75 yards) wide and 112 ...

's oldest knockout competition, the

Challenge Cup The Challenge Cup is a knockout rugby league cup competition organised by the Rugby Football League, held annually since 1896, with the exception of 1915–1919 and 1939–1940, due to World War I and World War II respectively. It involves am ...

. The 29 clubs of the rugby league were joined in the competition by three junior clubs, one each from Yorkshire, Lancashire and Cumberland; respectively these junior clubs were Normanton, Vine Tavern and Broughton Moor.

First round

The first round ties were

two-legged In sports (particularly association football), a two-legged tie is a contest between two teams which comprises two matches or "legs", with each team as the home team in one leg. The winning team is usually determined by aggregate score, the sum o ...

and were to be played on consecutive weekends in February 1949. The draw was made on 17 January 1949. The tie between Vine Tavern and York was drawn to have the leg at York played first but the clubs agreed to reverse the tie to enable Vine Tavern to play their home leg

Knowsley Road Knowsley Road in Eccleston, St Helens, Merseyside, was the home ground of St. Helens from 1890 until its closure in 2010. St Helens Town FC played their home fixtures at Knowsley Road from 2002 until 2010. For a period, the venue also hosted ...

, home of nearby St. Helens. Featherstone's tie with Swinton should have had the first leg played at Featherstone. However Featherstone invoked their right under the competition rules as the first drawn club to decide where the first leg would be played and insisted that it was played at Swinton to avoid clashes with the home ties of neighbouring clubs, Normanton and Castleford, this was despite Swinton's opposition to the switch. The first leg ties were played on Saturday 12 February. The second leg ties were played on Saturday 19 February. The tie between Leigh and Wigan ended in controversy. In January the cup committee recommended that ties ending with the scores level should play 20 minutes of

extra time Overtime or extra time is an additional period of play specified under the rules of a sport to bring a game to a decision and avoid declaring the match a tie or draw where the scores are the same. In some sports, this extra period is played onl ...

(10 minutes each way) with a replay only being required if the scores remained tied after this period. This recommendation as accepted by the Rugby League Council but was not, officially, made known to referees. Therefore, at the end of the second leg the referee in the Leigh v Wigan tie, Alfred Hill, ended the game after 80 minutes and did not play any extra time. The second leg was declared null and void by the Rugby League Council and a replay ordered for the following Saturday at a neutral venue, Swinton's Station Road with only the score from the first leg being taken forward into the replay. The replay, refereed by W. Hemmings, was won 10–4 by Wigan who therefore went forward to the second round 21–16 on aggregate.

Second round

The second round draw was made on 21 February 1949 with ties to be played on Saturday 5 March. On the day the game between Wigan and Wakefield was postponed due to snowfall and was played the following Wednesday, 9 March, instead.

Third round

The draw for the third round was made on 7 March with ties to be played on Saturday 19 March.

Semi-finals

The semi-final draw was made on 21 March with neutral venues being announced immediately after the completion of the draw, the ties were played on 2 April.

Final

The

tournament's final was to be played by Bradford and Halifax at

Wembley Stadium Wembley Stadium (branded as Wembley Stadium connected by EE for sponsorship reasons) is a football stadium in Wembley, London. It opened in 2007 on the site of the Wembley Stadium (1923), original Wembley Stadium, which was demolished from 200 ...

. Bradford won the game 12–0 in the final played in front of a world record rugby league crowd of 95,000.

Trevor Foster Trevor John French Foster MBE (3 December 1914 – 2 April 2005) was a Welsh rugby footballer, and coach. He played rugby union for Newport and rugby league for Bradford Northern. Trevor Foster was a Sergeant Physical Training Instructor in t ...

and

Eric Batten Frederick "Eric" E. Batten (13 June 1914 – 3 September 1993) was an English rugby union and professional rugby league footballer who played in the 1930s, 1940s and 1950s, and coached rugby league in the 1950s. He played club level rugby leagu ...

scored the tries for Bradford and

Ernest Ward Ernest Ward (30 July 1920 – 9 July 1987) was an English rugby league footballer who played in the 1940s and 1950s, and coached in the 1950s. He played at representative level for Great Britain, British Empire, Combined Nationalities and Eng ...

kicked three goals as well as winning the

Lance Todd Trophy The Lance Todd Trophy is a trophy in rugby league, awarded to the annual Challenge Cup Final's man of the match. Introduced in 1945–46, the trophy was named in memory of Lance Todd, the New Zealand-born player and administrator, who was killed in ...

for man-of-the-match. This was Bradford's fourth Cup Final win in seven final appearances including one win and one loss during World War II.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:1948-49 Challenge Cup Challenge Cup