Leeds 28-3 Hull FC — 1922/23 Challenge Cup Final
Belle Vue, Wakefield · Attendance: 29,335
Data last verified: 11 August 2026.
1922/23 Challenge Cup Final: Leeds 28-3 Hull FC, at Belle Vue, Wakefield.
Sourcing caveat: Hull's goal-kicker and the referee could not be confirmed. A partial lineup was found on Wikipedia's final-specific article — 6 of 13 named positions for Leeds and 4 of 13 for Hull FC — with the rest of each side's positions blank in the source itself rather than omitted by us. A second-pass search (Aug 2026) used individual player biographies to add Leeds' full 'Busy Bs' backline (Jim Bacon, Arthur Binks, Billy Bowen, Harold Buck and Joe Brittain), three of whom (Buck, Bowen, Brittain) are explicitly credited with tries in those biographies and are added to team1_tries below — this still doesn't fully reconcile with the 28-3 scoreline alongside Thompson's 5 goals, so should be treated as a partial list rather than the full scoring breakdown. No squad numbers are given since numbered shirts were not yet standard practice in this period.
Scorers
| Leeds | Tries: Harold Buck; Billy Bowen; Joe Brittain Goals: Thompson (5 goals) |
| Hull FC | No scorers recorded. |
Teams
| Leeds | Hull FC | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Jim Bacon | Centre (c) | Jack Holdsworth | ||
| Arthur Binks | Stand-off | Jim Kennedy | ||
| Billy Bowen | Centre | Jack Beasty | ||
| Harold Buck | Wing | Pete Garrett | ||
Match officials
| Referee | — |
Match report
Leeds thrashed Hull FC 28-3 at Belle Vue, Wakefield, to win their second Challenge Cup from their second final appearance. Thompson's goal-kicking (5 goals) contributed heavily to a one-sided scoreline that made this one of the more emphatic final victories of the interwar period. Hull, appearing in their second final of the decade, were unable to build on their narrow defeat the previous season. The Rugby League Challenge Cup is rugby league's oldest and most prestigious knockout competition, first contested in 1896/97 under what was then the Northern Union. Its history has been interrupted only by the two World Wars, with four editions lost between 1915/16 and 1918/19 and one more in 1939/40; the finals played either side of those gaps, and during the Second World War itself, were sometimes contested as regional or two-legged fixtures under wartime emergency arrangements rather than the usual single showpiece match. For much of the competition's early history the final rotated around northern club and representative grounds such as Headingley, Fartown, Central Park and the Athletic Ground, Rochdale, before Wembley Stadium became the final's permanent home from 1928/29 onward (with a short break during Wembley's 2000-2007 reconstruction, when finals were staged at Murrayfield, Twickenham and the Millennium Stadium instead). This was the 23rd Challenge Cup final played, and, under the name “Leeds,” the 2nd Challenge Cup title for the club. The result is recorded in this site's full results table alongside every other Challenge Cup final played since the competition's 1896/97 inception, cross-referenced against the venue and attendance figures gathered for that table. As with all of this site's rugby league match reports, any statistic that couldn't be confirmed from an accessible source — a scorer's name, an exact minute, a goal-kicking split — has been left out entirely rather than estimated, in line with the sourcing standard applied across the Challenge Cup, World Cup, World Club Challenge and domestic finals coverage on this site.
Round by round
Round 1
| Result | Venue | Attendance | Date |
|---|---|---|---|
| Barrow 8–0 St Helens Recs | Little Park | — | 1923-02-17 |
| Batley 0–0 Oldham | Mount Pleasant | — | 1923-02-17 |
| Broughton Rangers 0–13 Hull FC | The Cliff | — | 1923-02-17 |
| Dewsbury 19–0 Bradford Northern | Crown Flatt | — | 1923-02-17 |
| Hensingham 13–67 Wakefield Trinity | Belle Vue | — | 1923-02-17 |
| Keighley 2–0 Hull Kingston Rovers | Lawkholme Lane | — | 1923-02-17 |
| Leigh 5–11 Leeds | Mather Lane | — | 1923-02-17 |
| Norwood 3–29 St Helens | Boulevard | — | 1923-02-17 |
| Rochdale Hornets 3–5 Huddersfield | Athletic Ground | — | 1923-02-17 |
| Salford 16–0 Castleford | Weaste | — | 1923-02-17 |
| Swinton 4–2 Hunslet | Chorley Road | — | 1923-02-17 |
| Warrington 3–3 Halifax | Wilderspool | — | 1923-02-17 |
| Widnes 2–5 Featherstone Rovers | Lowerhouse Lane | — | 1923-02-17 |
| Wigan 47–0 Bramley | Central Park | — | 1923-02-17 |
| York 40–0 Millom | Wigginton Road | — | 1923-02-17 |
| Oldham 14–0 Batley | Watersheddings | — | 1923-02-19 |
| Halifax 16–3 Warrington | Thrum Hall | — | 1923-02-26 |
| Wigan Highfield 16–0 Cadishead and Irlam | Tunstall Lane | — | 1923-02-26 |
Round 2
| Result | Venue | Attendance | Date |
|---|---|---|---|
| Dewsbury 21–7 Wigan Highfield | Crown Flatt | — | 1923-03-03 |
| Featherstone Rovers 13–14 Wigan | Post Office Road | — | 1923-03-03 |
| Keighley 0–5 Barrow | Lawkholme Lane | — | 1923-03-03 |
| Leeds 19–8 Huddersfield | Headingley | — | 1923-03-03 |
| St Helens 3–11 Oldham | Knowsley Road | — | 1923-03-03 |
| Salford 6–0 Wakefield Trinity | Weaste | — | 1923-03-03 |
| Swinton 5–13 Hull FC | Chorley Road | — | 1923-03-03 |
| York 5–0 Halifax | Wigginton Road | — | 1923-03-03 |
Round 3
| Result | Venue | Attendance | Date |
|---|---|---|---|
| Barrow 12–0 Oldham | Little Park | — | 1923-03-17 |
| Salford 0–24 Hull FC | Weaste | — | 1923-03-17 |
| Wigan 20–12 Dewsbury | Central Park | — | 1923-03-17 |
| York 2–10 Leeds | Wigginton Road | — | 1923-03-17 |
Semi-Final
| Result | Venue | Attendance | Date |
|---|---|---|---|
| Hull FC 13–9 Wigan | Fartown | 22107 | 1923-04-14 |
| Leeds 0–0 Barrow | The Cliff | 11187 | 1923-04-14 |
| Barrow 0–20 Leeds | Weaste | 9000 | 1923-04-18 |
Early rounds feature amateur and community clubs alongside professional ones; team names are linked only where this site has a team page for that exact club, matching the same safety-first approach used for the Final's own results table.