Premiership winners St Helens Top point-scorer(s) Sean Day 362 Start date 1984 | Man of Steel Ellery Hanley Top try-scorer(s) Ellery Hanley 55 Number of teams 16 | |
Promoted from Second Division Swinton
Salford
York
Dewsbury Relegated to Second Division Barrow
Leigh
Hunslet
Workington Town Champions Hull Kingston Rovers, Swinton Lions People also search for 1985–86 Rugby Football League season | ||
The 1984–85 Rugby Football League season was the 90th ever season of professional rugby league football in Britain. Sixteen teams played each other from August, 1984 until May, 1985 for the Slalom Lager Championship. Also these 16 teams plus several more competed for the Challenge Cup.
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Season summary
On 21 October 1984 Peter Wood kicked a record-equalling five drop goals for Runcorn Highfield in a match against Batley. On October 28, two tries by Mal Meninga inspire St. Helens, to beat Wigan 26–18, and win the Lancashire Cup for the first time in 16 years.
The 1985 Man of Steel award went to Bradford Northern utility back, Ellery Hanley. He also became the first man to score more than 50 tries in a season since Billy Boston, and the first non-winger to reach this figure for 70 years.
The increase of the Second Division to 20 teams meant that it would have taken 38 rounds to play out a full double round robin, which was considered too many matches, so a complicated fixture formula was used to reduce it to 28. For this season, Huyton relocated and were renamed Runcorn Highfield, Cardiff City Blue Dragons relocated and were renamed Bridgend Blue Dragons, and Kent Invicta relocated and were renamed were Southend Invicta, Huddersfield were renamed Huddersfield Barracudas, and Mansfield Marksman, and Sheffield Eagles joined the Second Division.
St. Helens beat Wigan 26–18 to win the Lancashire Cup, and Hull beat Hull Kingston Rovers 29–12 to win the Yorkshire Cup.
Championship
Hull Kingston Rovers finished on top of the First Division table to claim their fifth championship.
Challenge Cup
The 1984–85 Silk Cut Challenge Cup was won by Wigan after defeating Hull in the final.
The Final was played on 4 May at Wembley before a crowd of 99,801 and is arguably the greatest ever in Challenge Cup history. Just after half-time Hull were 22 – 8 down before staging a fight back, but Wigan held on to win 28–24, ushering in an era of dominance for the club.