Bert Holcroft

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Bert Holcroft
Personal information
Full nameHerbert Holcroft
Born(1925-08-08)8 August 1925
Leigh, Lancashire
Coaching information
Club
Years Team Gms W D L W%
1965–66 Eastern Suburbs 36 3 1 32 8

Bert Holcroft was an English former professional rugby league footballer, coach and writer on rugby league coaching.

Military service

Bert Holcroft joined the Royal Navy at aged 18 and was 20 when he served aboard the

tank landing ship that had struck a mine. Holcroft was among those who saved 60 of the soldiers from the tank landing ship. In 2016 Holcroft was decorated with the Legion d'Honneur by the French government - an award Holcroft dedicated to the men saved on D-Day.[2]

Rugby league

After the war Bert Holcroft played rugby league for amateur team Wigan Road Working Men's RLFC as well as the reserve team of

Leigh. He also coached the B and Colts junior teams for Leigh.[2]

In the 1960s Holcroft and his wife, Bridget, moved to Australia where he coached junior side Murwillumbah Brothers to successive premierships in the Tweed Rugby League in 1961 and 1962.[3] Holcroft also coached the Bundaberg representative team where he introduced new training techniques relating to diet and weight training.[4]

Holcroft was appointed as coach of Eastern Suburbs in the New South Wales Rugby League premiership in 1965. Easts were a weak side at the time, having won just five matches in the two preceding seasons under Dick Dunn and fellow Englishman Nat Silcock Jr.. Under Holcroft they only won three games of 36 contested in the two seasons he was in charge; in 1966 Easts became the most recent (as of 2022) premiership team not to win a game during a season.[5]

Over the years Holcroft developed his training and fitness techniques into a series of books for rugby and football. Holcroft died on August 17, 2021.[6]

References

  1. ^ "HMS PETUNIA (K 79) - Flower-class Corvette". 31 May 2011. Retrieved 3 October 2018.
  2. ^ a b Maxwell, Kelsey (31 May 2016). "Former rugby ace helped save 60 drowning soldiers on D-Day". Leigh Journal. Retrieved 22 August 2018.
  3. ^ "Brothers legends set to celebrate". Tweed Daily News. 13 September 2011.
  4. ISBN 978-1925236088
    .
  5. ^ "Who were the worst NRL teams of all time?". Daily Telegraph. 4 November 2015.
  6. ^ "Herbert Holcroft". Leigh Journal. Retrieved 23 January 2022.
Sporting positions
Preceded by
Nat Silcock, Jr.

1964
 Coach

Eastern Suburbs
1965–1966 		Succeeded by
Jack Gibson
1967–1968
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