The rugby league world is in mourning after Joyce Churchill, wife of\u00a0league icon Clive, died at the age of 99.<\/p>\n
The fullback who was installed as one of rugby league\u2019s original Immortals died in 1985 and was survived by his wife and his son, Rod.<\/p>\n
Since then, Joyce attended several NRL events and most notably handed out the coveted medal named in his honour, the Clive Churchill Medal, given to the best on ground in the NRL grand final.<\/p>\n
Famously, she was in attendance at the Rabbitohs\u2019 drought-breaking 2014 grand final triumph, the club\u2019s first since her husband coached the side to glory in 1971.<\/p>\n
And following Joyce\u2019s passing there was an outpouring of grief and love.<\/p>\n
In a statement on Wednesday night, the NRL paid tribute to Churchill.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe ARLC and the NRL are deeply saddened by the passing of Joyce Churchill, aged 99,\u201d the statement said.<\/p>\n
\u201cJoyce Churchill was a staunch and passionate supporter of rugby league and proud representative of her late husband, Immortal Clive Churchill.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe legacy of the Clive Churchill Medal will live on thanks to the extraordinary contributions of Clive and Joyce Churchill.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe send our deepest condolences to Joyce Churchill\u2019s family and friends, as well as those who were touched by her generosity and support.\u201d<\/p>\n
Souths also released a statement saying: \u201cThe South Sydney Rabbitohs are mourning the passing of Life Member, Mrs Joyce Churchill, who passed away on Monday at the age of 99.\u201d<\/p>\n
While fans labelled the news \u201cterribly sad\u201d and \u201cheartbreaking\u201d.<\/p>\n
Her legendary husband, Clive, played 158 games for the Rabbitohs during his illustrious career and is widely regarded as one of the greatest rugby league players of all time.<\/p>\n
Churchill also earned 38 caps for Australia, where he was dubbed \u2018The Little Master\u2019 due to his skilful footwork and small stature.<\/p>\n
After retiring from the game, he coached South Sydney, Northern Suburbs, Canterbury, Queensland and Australia.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The rugby league world is in mourning after Joyce Churchill, wife of\u00a0league icon Clive, died at the age…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":406527,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[568],"tags":[64,63,761,762,158,85],"class_list":["post-406526","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nrl","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-national-rugby-league","tag-nationalrugbyleague","tag-nrl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/406526","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=406526"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/406526\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/406527"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=406526"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=406526"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=406526"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}