Les Boyd

Les Boyd (born 17 November 1956) is an Australian former rugby league footballer of the 1970s, and 1980s. He played representative football for the Australian national side in international matches as well as the New South Wales side in the State of Origin. Boyd played club football in both Australia and England and his usual position was in the second row.

Born in Nyngan, New South Wales, Boyd, whilst attending Nyngan High School, played for the Australian Schoolboys team in 1972 under his future Western Suburbs coach Roy Masters.

From 1976 to 1984 Boyd played in the New South Wales Rugby Football League premiership for the Western Suburbs Magpies, then the Manly-Warringah Sea Eagles. He was selected to go on the 1978 Kangaroo tour and his hard running saw him emerge as one of the star forwards on the tour, culminating with him forcing his way into the test team for the final two Ashes tests against Great Britain. Boyd made his test debut for the Kangaroos when selected on the bench for the second Ashes test at Bradford's Odsal Stadium.

In 1980, he successfully sued Mirror Newspapers Ltd for publishing an article that stated he was 'fat, slow and predictable'. During the 1982 New Zealand rugby league tour of Australia and Papua New Guinea, Boyd was selected to play for the Kangaroos at second-row forward in both Test matches against the Kiwis. Later that year, Boyd made his second Kangaroo Tour when he was part of the undefeated 1982 Kangaroos side who became known as "The Invincibles". Despite normally being a second row forward, he played all three tests against Great Britain in the front row, scoring a try in the first test at Boothferry Park in Hull. The hard running forward was sent off in the first half of the second test at Central Park in Wigan by French referee Julian Rascagneres for kicking Lions Hooker John Dalgreen. In fairness to Rascagneres, he had called a penalty against Boyd for a flop in the tackle and was looking back down field. This caused him to miss Dalgreen (who was on his back on the ground) lashing out at Boyd with his boot, kicking him in the shin as television replays clearly showed (the English-based touch judge also missed the initial kick, only seeing Boyd's retaliation). BBC commentator Ray French called Boyd's retaliation a "vicious kick", though it appeared he had also missed Dalgreen's action. Boyd's send-off didn't affect the Kangaroos though. Leading 15-4 at the time, they powered on to win the match 27-6 and along with it, retaining the Ashes they had held since the 1978 Kangaroo tour and keeping their record of not having lost a series in England since the 1959-60 Kangaroo tour.