George Thomas

George Thomas (1857 – 14 June 1934) was a Welsh international rugby union wing who played club rugby for Newport and international rugby for Wales. He was also a professional sprinter and was an All-England Sprint Champion.

Rugby career Thomas joined first class team Newport in 1884 but did not represent Wales until December 1888 when he was selected to face the touring Māoris at St Helens. The Swansea crows was hostile towards the Wales team, as they believed that the Swansea team had been overlooked, and Thomas, along with Cardiff's Charlie Arthur received heavy censure. Despite the poor support from the crowd, Thomas had a good match and after William Towers had taken Wales into the lead, Thomas made the score comfortable by running in a try of his own from the halfway line. Not only strong in attack, Thomas was also commanding in defence, and when New Zealander Harold Lee dribbled the ball over the Wales' tryline, Thomas collected the ball, ran out of the try area with it before kicking the ball into the midfield. The move was described as an 'amazing show of nerve' . 1890 1888 1891