Harold Horder

Harold Horder

Personal information
Full name	Harold Norman Horder
Nickname	Wonder Winger, The Best Bear[1]
Born	24 February 1894 Surry Hills, New South Wales, Australia
Died	21 August 1978 (aged 84)
Playing information
Height	168 cm (5 ft 6 in)
Weight	67 kg (10 st 8 lb)
Position	Wing
Club
Years	Team	Pld	T	G	FG	P
1912–20	South Sydney	77	95	68	0	421
1920–23	North Sydney	50	50	73	0	296
1924	South Sydney	12	7	9	0	39
1925–26	Coorparoo
	Total	139	152	150	0	756
Representative
Years	Team	Pld	T	G	FG	P
1914–24	Australia	13	11	10	0	53
1915–24	New South Wales	9	23	18	0	105
1925	Queensland	1				7

Harold Norman Horder (23 February 1894 – 21 August 1978) was an Australian rugby league player. A national and state representative player whose club career was with the South Sydney Rabbitohs and North Sydney Bears between 1912 and 1924. Regarded as one of the greatest wingers to play the game,^[2] from 1924 until 1973 his 152 career tries was the NSWRFL record.

Playing career

Born in Surry Hills, New South Wales, Horder played 86 games for Souths between 1912–1919 and 1924, 9 games for New South Wales, 13 Test matches for Australia.

After following his brother Clarence "Spot" Horder to South Sydney, Harold in his first game, stepped and swerved through the entire Glebe team in a 90-metre dash to score one of the greatest individual tries in rugby league history. He went on to be the NSW Rugby Football League's top try-scorer in 1913, 1914 and 1917 and for each of the four seasons 1913, 1914, 1918 and 1922 he was the League's top point scorer.

The Gregory's reference records that in the 1912 City Cup-tie against Glebe, Harold induced the Souths selectors to name his relatively inexperienced brother Clarrie in the side, While Glebe was concentrating on Harold, Clarrie cut holes in the defence and Souths won 30-5. ^[3]

Horder was selected to make his debut for Australia during the 1914 Great Britain Lions tour of Australia and New Zealand.^[4] He was selected to go on the 1921–22 Kangaroo tour of Great Britain. He also scored a double in Norths' 1922 grand final win. He scored 102 tries for South Sydney and 50 tries for North Sydney. In his final season at Souths he became the first player to score 150 tries in NSWRFL history.

In 1918 he overtook Dally Messenger's record for the most points scored in an NSWRFL career (379); Horder's eventual total of 758 stood as the new career record for nine seasons until it was bettered by Arthur Oxford in 1927.

In 1925 moved to Brisbane rugby league club Coorparoo as their captain coach for two seasons after leaving Souths.

He appeared in an Australian film In the Last Stride (1916).^[5]

Accolades

The New South Wales Rugby League's Rugby League Annual of 1928 commented "if he is not the greatest of all rugby league footballers, he is unquestionably the greatest of all wing three-quarters".

Horder was inducted into the Australian Rugby League Hall of Fame on 7 September 2004 at the Dally M Awards in Sydney.^[6]

In 2004 Horder was named by Souths in their South Sydney Dream Team,^[7] consisting of 17 players and a coach representing the club from 1908 through to 2004. In August, 2006 he was also named at winger in the North Sydney Bears' Team of the Century.

In February 2008, Horder was named in the list of Australia's 100 Greatest Players (1908–2007) which was commissioned by the NRL and ARL to celebrate the code's centenary year in Australia.^[8]

Footnotes

1. Toby Creswell and Samantha Trenoweth (2006). 1001 Australians You Should Know. Australia: Pluto Press. p. 676. ISBN 1-86403-361-4. ISBN 9781864033618.
2. Headon, David (October 1999). "Up From the Ashes: The Phoenix of a Rugby League Literature" (pdf). Football Studies Volume 2, Issue 2. Football Studies Group. Retrieved 2009-07-07.
3. Pollard, Jack (1965). Gregory's Guide to Rugby League. Australia: Grenville Publishing. p. 224. p82.
4. Cunneen, Chris. "Horder, Harold Norman (1894–1978)". Australian Dictionary of Biography. Australian National University. Retrieved 7 February 2014.
5. "At the Movies.". The Mirror of Australia (Sydney, NSW : 1915 - 1917). Sydney, NSW: National Library of Australia. 27 November 1915. p. 14. Retrieved 28 September 2014.
6. Australian Rugby League Hall of Fame
7. South Sydney Dream Team from the official South Sydney website.
8. "Centenary of Rugby League – The Players". NRL & ARL. 23 February 2008. Retrieved 2008-02-23.

External links

• Harold Horder at the Online Dictionary of Australian Biographies
• Harold Horder at yesterdayshero.com.au

1. Heads, Ian and Middleton, David (2008) A Centenary of Rugby League, MacMillan Sydney