TODAY IN SOUTH AFRICAN RUGBY LEAGUE HISTORY
10 NOVEMBER 1923 – TANK VAN ROOYEN WIGAN DEBUT
10 NOVEMBER 1923 – TANK VAN ROOYEN WIGAN DEBUT
Gert Wilhelm [George] ‘Tank’ Van Rooyen was the first Springbok to move to British rugby league after the First World War. He played for three clubs, Hull Kingston Rovers, Wigan and Widnes, despite not switching codes until he was aged almost 30. He was born in Steynsburg, and played for Johannesburg Pirates and Transvaal, as well as appearing in two tests against the All Blacks for the Springboks in their 1921 tour of Australia and New Zealand. In September 1922 he joined Hull KR, and despite making 25 appearances for the club in his first season, missed out on playing in their team that beat Huddersfield 15–5 in the Championship final. After a further 10 games for Hull KR in the 1923-24 season, he was transferred to Wigan and made his debut on 10 November 1923 against Wigan Highfield at Central Park.
The legendary Wigan full-back Jim Sullivan, who played for Wigan from 1921 to 1946, remembers van Rooyen as “the most fabulous character I have known in rugby league”. He remembered a “great giant of a man... solid granite... the strongest man I’ve ever seen apart from the old music hall acts. There were times when I thought he was more than human.”
Some of the feats Sullivan could remember included carrying a bag of cement under each arm with ease, shifting snow from the pitch with a wooden plank 12 feet by seven inches; single-handedly lifting a horse out of manhole and hoisting a broken down van off its wheels.
He made 32 appearances in his first season for Wigan, scoring four tries. And honours came his way, with a Lancashire League medal and Challenge Cup winner’s medal. He played in every round of the Challenge Cup, and in the final Wigan beat Oldham comfortably at Rochdale Hornets’ Athletic Ground. Wigan won 21–4, and their main concern was whether the massive crowd could be kept off the pitch
The legendary Wigan full-back Jim Sullivan, who played for Wigan from 1921 to 1946, remembers van Rooyen as “the most fabulous character I have known in rugby league”. He remembered a “great giant of a man... solid granite... the strongest man I’ve ever seen apart from the old music hall acts. There were times when I thought he was more than human.”
Some of the feats Sullivan could remember included carrying a bag of cement under each arm with ease, shifting snow from the pitch with a wooden plank 12 feet by seven inches; single-handedly lifting a horse out of manhole and hoisting a broken down van off its wheels.
He made 32 appearances in his first season for Wigan, scoring four tries. And honours came his way, with a Lancashire League medal and Challenge Cup winner’s medal. He played in every round of the Challenge Cup, and in the final Wigan beat Oldham comfortably at Rochdale Hornets’ Athletic Ground. Wigan won 21–4, and their main concern was whether the massive crowd could be kept off the pitch