The 1988–89 Yorkshire Cup was the eighty-first occasion on which the Yorkshire Cup rugby league competition was held.

Leeds Leeds () is a city and the administrative centre of the City of Leeds district in West Yorkshire, England. It is built around the River Aire and is in the eastern foothills of the Pennines. It is also the third-largest settlement (by popula ...

won the trophy by beating the previous season's runner-up,

Castleford Castleford is a town within the City of Wakefield, West Yorkshire, England. It had a population of 45,106 at a 2021 population estimate. Historically in the West Riding of Yorkshire, to the north of the town centre the River Calder joins th ...

, with a score of 33-12.
The match was played at Elland Road,

, now in

West Yorkshire West Yorkshire is a metropolitan and ceremonial county in the Yorkshire and Humber Region of England. It is an inland and upland county having eastward-draining valleys while taking in the moors of the Pennines. West Yorkshire came into exi ...

. The attendance was 22,968 and receipts were £83,591.
This was the sixth time in an eleven-year period in which

, previously only winners once (in 1977), made eight appearances in the Yorkshire Cup final, winning four and finishing runners-up on the other four occasions. It was also the second season in succession that

appeared, and lost, in the final within that eleven-year period.

Background

In the 1988–89 season there were no junior/amateur clubs taking part, no new entrants and no "leavers" and so the total of entries remained the same at eighteen.
As a result, a preliminary round was required to reduce the number of clubs entering the first round to sixteen.

Competition and results

Preliminary round

Involved 2 matches and 4 clubs

Round 1

Involved 5 matches (with three byes) and 13 clubs

Round 2 - Quarter-finals

Involved 4 matches and 8 clubs

Round 3 – Semi-finals

Involved 2 matches and 4 clubs

Final

Teams and scorers

Scoring - Try = four points - Goal = two points - Drop goal = one point

The road to success

The following chart excludes any preliminary round fixtures/results

Notes and comments

1 * The first Yorkshire Cup match played by the newly renamed

Huddersfield Huddersfield is a market town in the Kirklees district in West Yorkshire, England. It is the administrative centre and largest settlement in the Kirklees district. The town is in the foothills of the Pennines. The River Holme's confluence into ...

who dropped the "Barracudas"'s suffix
2 * The record score (and highest winning margin) at the time for a Yorkshire Cup match, beating the previous record win of 79-5 (1948)
3 * The receipts are given as £76,658 by the Rothmans Rugby League Yearbook of 1991-92 and 1990-91 but the details given in a section of the

v Ryedale-York match programme for the preliminary round on Sunday 23 August 1992 (and all verified by The Rugby League Record Keepers Club), show the receipts as £83,591

General information about the Rugby League Yorkshire Cup competition

The Rugby League Yorkshire Cup competition was a knock-out competition between (mainly professional) rugby league clubs from Yorkshire. However teams were sometimes included from outside the county such as

Newcastle Newcastle usually refers to: *Newcastle upon Tyne, a city and metropolitan borough in Tyne and Wear, England *Newcastle-under-Lyme, a town in Staffordshire, England *Newcastle, New South Wales, a metropolitan area in Australia, named after Newcastle ...

, Mansfield,

Coventry Coventry ( or ) is a city in the West Midlands, England. It is on the River Sherbourne. Coventry has been a large settlement for centuries, although it was not founded and given its city status until the Middle Ages. The city is governed b ...

, and even London (in the form of Acton & Willesden).
The Rugby League season always (until the onset of "Summer Rugby" in 1996) ran from around August to May. This competition always took place early in the season, in Autumn, with the final taking place in (or just before) December (The only exception was when disruption of the fixture list was caused during, and immediately after, the two World Wars).

References

External links

Saints Heritage Society1896–97 Northern Rugby Football Union season at wigan.rlfans.com

Hull&Proud Fixtures & Results 1896/1897Widnes Vikings - One team, one passion Season In Review - 1896-97The Northern Union at warringtonwolves.org
{{DEFAULTSORT:1988-89 Yorkshire Cup RFL Yorkshire Cup Yorkshire Cup