ALF MEAKIN was a pacy winger who played one game for Leeds and more than 50 for his home club Blackpool Borough after representing Great Britain as a sprinter at the 1964 Olympics in Tokyo.
His trip of a lifetime to Japan, where he defied injuries to make the team for the 100 metres, came after in 1962 he was part of England’s victory in the 4 x 110 yd relay at the Commonwealth Games in Perth, Australia.
Earlier that year, Meakin contributed to Great Britain’s third-place finish in the 4 x 100 metres relay at the European Championships in Belgrade, then part of the old Yugoslavia.
That team also included Berwyn Jones, the Welshman who went on to star in Rugby League for Wakefield Trinity, Bradford Northern, St Helens and Great Britain.
Jones’ move into Rugby League meant he lost amateur sporting status and the chance to compete at Tokyo, opening up a space for Meakin, who was returning from hamstring and ankle problems and had been expecting to miss out.
While Jones, also a winger, had played rugby union for his hometown club Rhymney in the South Wales Valleys, Meakin, who has died aged 87 after suffering dementia, had no grounding in either of the oval-ball codes.
“I’d never played Rugby League before, but I could beat people one on one, though I quickly realised there was much more to the game than that,” he once told the Blackpool Gazette.
Meakin, who finished sixth in his 100 metres heat in Japan, joined Leeds on triallist terms and played in the 15-3 defeat by Featherstone Rovers at Headingley on November 28, 1964, just weeks after returning from the Olympics.
He was last year presented with his Leeds heritage certificate, having been the 996th man to play for the club.
His wife Joy said at the time: “It was quite a surprise considering he’d only ever played once for Leeds.
“The game was after Tokyo. We were getting married and we didn’t have a lot of money.
“He’d never played rugby before; he was a football man. He used to say it was funny because he would jink inside, then jink back – but the opposition were still there, they hadn’t moved.
“It’s lovely he’s been remembered in that way and it’s something nice for our son (Adrian) and daughter (Karen) as well.”
Meakin made 53 appearance for Blackpool Borough, scoring 14 tries, between 1965 and 1967, and in a line of well-known wingers to play for the club, he came between Brian Bevan and Billy Boston.
While born in Swinton, he lived in Blackpool from the age of eight, and joined Blackpool and Fylde Athletics Club as a teenager.
He was a Lancashire and England junior champion, and joined the renowned Thames Valley Harriers on being stationed in the London area on National Service.
Meakin represented the RAF against other branches of the Armed Forces in high-profile athletics meetings.
He returned to Blackpool on completion of National Service, and worked largely in sales in the Fylde coast area.
At the age of 75, Meakin made headlines as the country’s oldest recipient of a bone-marrow transplant after being diagnosed with leukaemia. He went on to make a full recovery.
He never forgot his trip to Japan, telling the Blackpool Gazette: “It was really hard to get the injuries right in time, and I know I didn’t do myself justice, but I don’t think I’d have won if I’d been fully fit.
“The Olympics were really good and the Japanese people were great. And the highlight for me was meeting Jesse Owens (the four-gold American sprint sensation of the 1936 Olympics in Berlin), who was fantastic.”