Tony Finan’s shock passing

It is with great sadness and shock that we report the death of Tony Finan, one of the Oldham area's biggest and most well known ambassadors for Rugby League in this town, writes ROGER HALSTEAD.

On Friday night Tony was a member of the official Oldham Players' Association contingent which represented Oldham at the Huddersfield Giants' annual dinner, but he died in hospital yesterday.

As a young man Tony played for Huddersfield as an accomplished hooker, but his playing days over, he spent the rest of his life championing the cause of rugby league in this area.

He was a retired rugby league referee here, a member of the Oldham Referees' Society, a very pro-active member of the Oldham Players' Association, and well-known locally as a man with a particular passion for the development of local boys and girls in rugby league.

Until ill-health caught up with him, Tony was a regular attender at Oldham Players' Association monthly meetings at Springhead, usually sitting on the front row and nearly always with something positive to say.

He was, as they say, an Oldham man with rugby league in his blood and represented this town and this club with pride and passion .

He never actually played for Oldham — one of his lifetime regrets, I suspect — but he was a top player at Huddersfield, a referee here, his hometown, and rarely missed the opportunity to attend a local amateur club when the Players' Association, previously known as the ex-players, was sponsoring.

Ray Hicks, one of the 'big three' at our Players Association, said:

"This terrible news of Tony's passing comes as a terrible shock and it will be a big shock to the hundreds of local rugby league people who knew him well.

He has been in and out of hospital and care homes recently with various problems, notably his back, but we believed he was recovering and only last Friday he was in our party at the Huddersfield dinner.

It goes without saying that we send our love and sincere condolences to all his many friends and relatives, most of whom are rugby league people.

As soon as funeral details are known, we will make sure everybody knows."

Outside of rugby league, Tony and his late wife, Ethel, had the Weavers' Arms, Ripponden Road for a spell, and they also ran a chippie in Waterloo Street.

Rugby League was his lifetime passion and he was well known as a fighter for it - and for the cause of the town's rugby league youth - until he died.

A fitting inscription on his tombstone would read "rugby league man — through and through".