Desmond Lloyd Drummond (17 June 1958 – 29 January 2022) was an
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...
and
Great Britain
Great Britain is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean off the northwest coast of continental Europe. With an area of , it is the largest of the British Isles, the largest European island and the ninth-largest island in the world. It is ...
international
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 ...
footballer who played on the in the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s.
Background
Drummond was born on 17 June 1958 in
Savanna-la-Mar
Savanna-la-Mar (commonly known as Sav-la-Mar, or simply Sav) is the chief town and capital of Westmoreland Parish, Jamaica. A coastal town, it contains an 18th-century fort constructed for colonial defence against pirates in the Caribbean.
H ...
,
Westmoreland, Jamaica, and was of English-Jamaican descent.
During his youth he grew up in North West England and made
Bolton
Bolton (, locally ) is a large town in Greater Manchester in North West England, formerly a part of Lancashire. A former mill town, Bolton has been a production centre for textiles since Flemish people, Flemish weavers settled in the area i ...
his adopted hometown.
Career
Leigh
Drummond won 24
Great Britain
Great Britain is an island in the North Atlantic Ocean off the northwest coast of continental Europe. With an area of , it is the largest of the British Isles, the largest European island and the ninth-largest island in the world. It is ...
caps, the first against
New Zealand
New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and over 700 smaller islands. It is the sixth-largest island count ...
in 1980, the last against
France
France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of Overseas France, overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic Ocean, Atlantic, Pacific Ocean, Pac ...
in 1988. He signed for
Leigh
Leigh may refer to:
Places In England
Pronounced :
* Leigh, Greater Manchester, Borough of Wigan
** Leigh (UK Parliament constituency)
* Leigh-on-Sea, Essex
Pronounced :
* Leigh, Dorset
* Leigh, Gloucestershire
* Leigh, Kent
* Leigh, Staf ...
almost by accident, having travelled to watch his older brother
Alva Drummond play for the reserve team. Leigh found themselves a player short due to injury, and he was persuaded to play. He made such an impact that he was offered a professional contract within the week. He quickly became a star player at the Lancashire club, particularly after a series of televised appearances during the run to Leigh's 4-12 defeat by
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 the ...
in the
1976 BBC2 Floodlit Trophy Final at
Hilton Park,
Leigh
Leigh may refer to:
Places In England
Pronounced :
* Leigh, Greater Manchester, Borough of Wigan
** Leigh (UK Parliament constituency)
* Leigh-on-Sea, Essex
Pronounced :
* Leigh, Dorset
* Leigh, Gloucestershire
* Leigh, Kent
* Leigh, Staf ...
on Tuesday 14 December 1976.
The arrival of
Alex Murphy as coach in 1980 marked an upturn in fortunes for the club. Drummond played in Leigh's 8–3 victory over
Widnes
Widnes ( ) is an Industrial city, industrial town in the Borough of Halton, Cheshire, England, which at the 2011 United Kingdom census, 2011 census had a population of 61,464.
Historic counties of England, Historically in Lancashire, it is on t ...
in the
1981 Lancashire Cup Final at
Central Park
Central Park is an urban park in New York City located between the Upper West Side, Upper West and Upper East Sides of Manhattan. It is the List of New York City parks, fifth-largest park in the city, covering . It is the most visited urban par ...
,
Wigan
Wigan ( ) is a large town in Greater Manchester, England, on the River Douglas, Lancashire, River Douglas. The town is midway between the two cities of Manchester, to the south-east, and Liverpool, to the south-west. Bolton lies to the nor ...
on Saturday 26 September 1981. Then, as the weather-disrupted season reached its end, Leigh needed only to defeat already-relegated
Whitehaven
Whitehaven is a town and port on the English north west coast and near to the Lake District National Park in Cumbria, England. Historically in Cumberland, it lies by road south-west of Carlisle and to the north of Barrow-in-Furness. It is th ...
to win their first league title since 1907. Despite trailing at half-time, he scored a try in a second half revival which made the unfashionable Lancashire club the National Champions, with 26-
tries he was the top-try scorer in the
Championship
In sport, a championship is a competition in which the aim is to decide which individual or team is the champion.
Championship systems
Various forms of competition can be referred to by the term championship.
Title match system
In this system ...
during the
1981–82 season. Within three years, however, Leigh found themselves in a more familiar relegation battle, and were severely hampered when he badly broke an ankle in an away fixture against
Barrow. Although he recovered to return to the Great Britain team, he lost a little of his devastating speed. Even so, he recovered enough to score the BBC TV 'Try of the season' as a losing semi-finalist for Leigh against Leeds in the
1985 John Player Special Trophy semi-final. He left Leigh to join
Warrington
Warrington () is a town and unparished area in the borough of the same name in the ceremonial county of Cheshire, England, on the banks of the River Mersey. It is east of Liverpool, and west of Manchester. The population in 2019 was estimat ...
in 1987. He scored 141 tries in his 280 appearances for Leigh.
Warrington
Drummond played his first game for Warrington on Sunday 8 February 1987. He also scored Warrington's Try of The Season in the
1987–88 season against
St. Helens, (he was also the team's top try scorer for that season). Drummond was left out of the squad for the
1988 Great Britain Lions tour
The 1988 Great Britain Lions tour was the Great Britain national rugby league team's 18th tour of Australasia and took place from May to July 1988. It started with a Test match against Papua New Guinea before the best-of-three series against Austr ...
of Australasia after defending himself from a spectator who rushed onto the pitch shouting racial abuse. He again scored Warrington's Try of the Season in the
1988–89 season against
Hull Kingston Rovers
Hull Kingston Rovers are a professional rugby league club based in Kingston upon Hull, Yorkshire, England, that competes in the Super League, the top tier of British rugby league. The club has won five league championships, and one Challeng ...
. He played in Warrington's 16–28 defeat by
Wigan
Wigan ( ) is a large town in Greater Manchester, England, on the River Douglas, Lancashire, River Douglas. The town is midway between the two cities of Manchester, to the south-east, and Liverpool, to the south-west. Bolton lies to the nor ...
in the
1987 Lancashire Cup Final at
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 ...
,
St. Helens on Sunday 11 October 1987,
played in the 24–16 victory over
Oldham
Oldham is a large town in Greater Manchester, England, amid the Pennines and between the rivers Irk and Medlock, southeast of Rochdale and northeast of Manchester. It is the administrative centre of the Metropolitan Borough of Oldham, wh ...
in the
1989 Lancashire Cup
File:1989 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The Cypress structure collapses as a result of the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake, killing motorists below; The proposal document for the World Wide Web is submitted; The Exxon Valdez oil tanker run ...
Final at Knowsley Road on Saturday 14 October 1989, played in the 14-36 defeat by Wigan in the
1990 Challenge Cup
Year 199 ( CXCIX) was a common year starting on Monday (link will display the full calendar) of the Julian calendar. At the time, it was sometimes known as year 952 '' Ab urbe condita''. The denomination 199 for this year has been used since the ...
Final 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 ...
,
London
London is the capital and largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary down to the North Sea, and has been a majo ...
on Saturday 28 April 1990, in front of a crowd of 77,729,
and played, and was
captain
Captain is a title, an appellative for the commanding officer of a military unit; the supreme leader of a navy ship, merchant ship, aeroplane, spacecraft, or other vessel; or the commander of a port, fire or police department, election precinct, e ...
in the 12-2 victory over
Bradford Northern
The Bradford Bulls are a professional rugby league club in Bradford, West Yorkshire, England, playing in the Championship. They have won five Challenge Cups, six league championships and three World Club Challenges. The team jersey is predomi ...
in the
1990–91 Regal Trophy Final at
Headingley Rugby Stadium
Headingley Rugby Stadium shares the same site as Headingley Cricket Ground and is home to Leeds Rhinos. Headingley is the List of Rugby League stadiums in England, 5th largest rugby league stadium in England.
History
1889-1980s: Construc ...
,
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 populati ...
on Saturday 12 January 1991. He played his last game for Warrington and he finished his 182-game career on 26 April 1992, having scored 69 tries.
Later career
Drummond then enjoyed an
Indian summer
An Indian summer is a period of unseasonably warm, dry weather that sometimes occurs in autumn in temperate regions of the northern hemisphere. Several sources describe a true Indian summer as not occurring until after the first frost, or more s ...
at
Workington Town
Workington Town R.L.F.C. is a semi-professional rugby league club playing in Workington in west Cumbria.
Their stadium is Derwent Park, which they share with Workington Comets, a speedway team.
They became Rugby League Champions in 1951 and ...
, where he returned to Old Trafford twice in the Divisional Premiership, losing to
Featherstone Rovers
Featherstone Rovers are a professional rugby league club in Featherstone, West Yorkshire, England, who play in the Championship (rugby league), Championship. Featherstone is a former coal mining town with a population of around 16,000 and Rover ...
in 1993 and beating
London Crusaders in 1994, he scored try from a
Tony Kay
Anthony Herbert Kay (born 13 May 1937) is an English former footballer who became notorious after being banned from the professional game for life following the British betting scandal of 1964.
Kay played for Sheffield Wednesday before beco ...
assist. In the 1994–95 season, he helped Town to a credible ninth position out of 16 teams. In the
1995 Challenge Cup , Workington Town reached the quarter-finals, beating Drummond's old club, Leigh along the way 94–4. He announced his retirement at the end of the season, but was persuaded to come out of retirement a year later, and went on to play for
Chorley
Chorley is a town and the administrative centre of the wider Borough of Chorley in Lancashire, England, north of Wigan, south west of Blackburn, north west of Bolton, south of Preston and north west of Manchester. The town's wealth came pr ...
and
Barrow.
Outside rugby league
Drummond's rise to celebrity status was precipitated by his performances in the televised all-around sports competition
Superstars, finishing second in the 1983 Series final,
and clocking a world competition record 10.85 seconds for the 100 metres (noted Great Britain rugby league speedster
Martin Offiah
Martin Nwokocha Offiah MBE ( (''original pronunciation''), (''commonly used'')); born 29 December 1965) is an English former professional rugby league and rugby union footballer who played in the 1980s, 1990s and 2000s. Offiah was inducted i ...
was reported to have recorded a hand held 10.8 seconds for the 100, showing just how fast Drummond was).
An exceptional power-lifter and all-round athlete, Drummond's '
party trick' in the competition came in the assault course competition, which began with three hurdles, a vaulting horse and an 8-foot wall. Drummond took the hurdles in his stride, hurdled the vaulting horse, and would leap to the top of the wall without using the scrambling rope. He competed in the international event, but was hampered by a change in the scoring – whereas in the UK, points were awarded in the lifting events for performance against bodyweight, in the international competition the spoils were divided for the dead weight lifted, a disadvantage to the 5'7", 12 stone rugby man.
Retirement and death
After finally retiring from the professional game, Drummond took up an amateur role as coach to the
Bolton
Bolton (, locally ) is a large town in Greater Manchester in North West England, formerly a part of Lancashire. A former mill town, Bolton has been a production centre for textiles since Flemish people, Flemish weavers settled in the area i ...
rugby league club. He died on 29 January 2022, at the age of 63.
References
External links
Des Drummond at eraofthebiff.comWarrington's World Cup heroes – Des DrummondDes Drummond's try of the season 1988 against St Helens
{{DEFAULTSORT:Drummond, Des
1958 births
2022 deaths
Barrow Raiders players
Black British sportspeople
Chorley Lynx players
England national rugby league team players
English people of Jamaican descent
English rugby league players
Jamaican rugby league players
Great Britain national rugby league team players
Lancashire rugby league team players
Leigh Centurions players
Liverpool City (rugby league) players
Rugby league wingers
Warrington Wolves players
Western Suburbs Magpies players
Workington Town players
Rugby league players from Bolton
People from Westmoreland Parish