Former Hull FC star winger Gareth Raynor has recalled his memories from a memorable night in Sydney back in 2006 when Great Britain claimed a long-awaited victory over Australia in the Tri-Nations Series.
Raynor, Hull’s third top-try scorer of the Super League era, earned his place in the squad for the series alongside fellow Hull FC stars Richard Horne, Garreth Carvell, and Kirk Yeaman – the latter of which featured as Raynor’s centre partner during the match.
It was a memorable night for the winger, who would score the crucial final try in the match in the closing stages, to secure Great Britain’s first win on Australian soil in 14 years.
The match will be shown tonight on Sky Sports Main Event (8pm), giving rugby league fans the chance to relive one of the most memorable international matches of recent times.
Speaking exclusively to hullfc.com, Raynor discussed his strongest memory of the victory .
“My main memory of that night is that Yeamo gave me a pass for once for my try,” the former centre joked.
“I was a player that didn’t get too nervous because I was so confident in my ability – my thoughts were that if I was nervous about dealing with them, they’d be nervous about dealing with me when I was on my game, but when you’re playing against the best team in the world with a big, intimidating crowd when you’re not expected to win I did feel nervous that night.
“As soon as we kicked off, Australia knew we were there to play and not roll over. Their thought process was “it’s the Poms, they’re good for 20, 30 minutes but we’ll get them later in the game”.
“We were right in the game when the Stuart Fielden and JP fight happened, but then Inglis goes 100 meters from the interception and everybody was thinking here we go again, apart from the players on the pitch.”
Raynor continued: “We got together and knew they were worried about us more than we were them, they’d scored an off the cuff try and not really troubled us other than that. We went back and scored through Paul Wellens and were in front at half-time.
“We knew the belief we had and the amount that they were worried and knew that we had a good chance.”
Raynor featured in a threatening set of backs for Great Britain – alongside an all-Hull centre/winger partnership with Kirk Yeaman next to him, stalwarts Keith Senior and Brian Carney lined up on the opposite side, with Saints star Wellens at full-baack.
The former centre recalls another important moment in the game, stopping one of Australia’s greatest stars from getting over the line.
“Another big moment in the game that I was involved in was that Darren Lockyer and Ben Hornby break – Hornby was diving to score a try from a Lockyer grubber, it looked like he was scoring on the bouncing ball but I came at about 100 miles an hour as I do and clattered into Horny and managed to dislodge the ball and save a try!
“There’s no such thing as an easy try in international rugby in my mind when I’m around! We then went down the other end and Lee Gilmour cuts inside and scores, then JP gets one.
Great Britain led 18-12 with ten minutes left on the clock, but Raynor knew that Brian Noble’s side had enough to hang on for a famous win, and it would be himself who clinched the winning score.
“We knew we had them on 70 minutes when they didn’t have it in the bag, they were down our end and Longy dashed out the line, hacked it on and got caught by Nathan Hindmarsh. We knew if we kept our composure, we’d score.
“The ball got whizzed down the line and came to Yeamo – my first thoughts were he better pass this time, I’ll never let him get away with this for the rest of his life. He couldn’t have scored himself so gave me the pass and I got over in the corner.
“It’s a great memory that from a great night to beat them there, especially when we’d had so much abuse from them all week in the press.”
The former Hull man, who made six appearances for Great Britain and two for England, explained that the side’s confidence going into the clash helped towards the win.
“Leon Pryce saying he’d rather be in Blackpool than Bondi was really big for us – we knew we wouldn’t get any respect from them or their press that week anyway, but that meant we could give it back to them saying that we liked our country better and we liked our beaches better.
“We were so fired up to beat them and we had a close-knit squad with loads of belief, and their arrogance meant they didn’t like the ‘pommies’ telling them that some things were better than what they had didn’t go down well and added to the belief in our squad.
“Leon had a body like a wet dog, so he wasn’t happy that the photographers followed him to the beach – he kept his baggy vest on while the rest of the lads had their tops off!
“It all added towards the spice if any more was needed.
“JP standing up to Willie Mason showed we weren’t going to roll over. The big fool got away with it, he should have gone for that and the one on Longy but the full squad took a stance and give it to them all back. They were waiting for us to crack but we didn’t crack. We knew we had it in us to cause an upset and we did – Brian Noble had us well drilled and we went out there and did it.”
You can watch Great Britain’s victory over Australia in the 2006 Tri-Nations Series at 8pm this evening on Sky Sports Main Event.
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