HUNSLET Rugby League club are in mourning for former chair Grahame Liles, who passed away on Wednesday 4 September, at the age of 89, after a long illness.

Liles was at the helm of the south Leeds outfit from the late 1980s to January 2012 after having previously served the south Leeds outfit for several years as a director. He remained on the board until October 2012 when, with typical generosity, he gifted the club to the Hunslet Independent Supporters’ Trust and was appointed Club President.

A benign and supportive figure, he not only backed Hunslet with singular wisdom; he also dug deep into his finances to not only sustain the club’s drive for a place in Rugby League’s top flight, but to ensure it’s very survival.

A bookmaker by trade, he brought the innate honesty of that profession (in which a man’s word is his bond and a handshake is enough to seal an agreement) to Hunslet’s cause and felt badly let down when promises allegedly made to persuade the club to move to the South Leeds Stadium in the mid-nineties, to help facilitate soccer’s Euros at Elland Road, failed to materialise. He felt similarly wronged when his club – then known as Hunslet Hawks – was denied entry (by the Rugby Football League’s Independent Franchise Panel) to Super League in 1999, despite having beaten Dewsbury Rams in the qualifying Northern Ford Premiership Final. An undoubted highlight of his tenure, however, was Hunslet’s appearance in the only Plate Final, at Wembley, in 1997, against eventual winners Hull KR.

Grahame Liles, who leaves his beloved wife Margaret and an adoring family, was brought up in Wakefield and was a keen Trinity fan as a youngster. His services to his sport were formally recognised in 2007/8, when he proudly served as President of the Rugby Football League.

Current chairman Kenny Sykes said: “It’s a privilege to be in the hot seat at Hunslet and I’ve always been acutely aware of the great men who have preceded me in the role.

“Grahame Liles was very much in the vanguard of that body of fine servants of the club. He steered his beloved Hunslet Hawks through several severely testing episodes with great dignity and aplomb, always with his beloved and equally enthusiastic wife Margaret by his side. It’s not overstating things to say that the club might very well not exist but for his tireless involvement; he really will be badly and sadly missed.”

CEO Neil Hampshre commented “Whilst Grahame had been ill for some time this is still a shock that will reverberate around the Club.

“From the late 1970’s through to 2012, when he magnanimously gifted the Club to the supporters, his hard work, enthusiasm and outstanding financial contribution served to keep the Club alive.

“He offered fantastic support and advice to us in running the Club in the early days and I only hope he felt his faith in us was justified.

“Words can’t really justify what Grahame meant to this Club, he was simply a colossus. On behalf of everyone at Hunslet RLFC may you rest in peace my friend.”

Tony Sutton, the Chief Executive of the RFL, said: “We send our condolences to Grahame’s friends and family, and to all involved with the Hunslet club.

“Grahame will be fondly remembered as a long-term and steadfast supporter of the club, and also as a long-serving member of the RFL Council, having also served as President of the RFL in 2007-8.”

RIP Grahame, So we shall again.