First game 5/09/1903, Last game 12/09/1914, Played 385 Tries 47 Goals 191 Drop Goals 7 Points 537.

Inducted into the Hall of Fame in 2006.

Welshman George “Ponty” Thomas was a Great Britain forward who lost his life in the First World War.

When he first arrived at Wilderspool in August 1903 from Newport Rugby Union Club, aged 22, some members of the Warrington committee questioned his small stature for a forward: he was only 5ft 8in and 12st 11lb.

Thomas replied by stating that “good stuff lies in little room” and so it proved as he quickly became the crowd’s favourite forward and a terror to opponents. A hard worker in the scrum and a fearless tackler, Pontnewydd-born Thomas could always be found in the thick of the action.

He played in four Challenge Cup finals, collecting winner’s medals in 1905 and 1907 and finishing on the losing side in 1904 and 1913. Thomas also set a club record which was to stand for 91 years when he scored 31 points in a match, from five tries and eight goals, as Warrington thrashed St Helens 78-6 in April 1909. The record stood until February 2000 when Lee Briers helped himself to 40 points in a Challenge Cup tie against York.

Thomas was outspoken and that almost certainly cost him a place on the first Great Britain tour to Australia and New Zealand in 1910. When Warrington’s first-team players went on strike in January 1914 over the non-payment of a £1 bonus it was Thomas who addressed the 4,000-strong Wilderspool crowd to explain their grievances.

Thomas did, however, play in Wales’s first international rugby league match when they faced the touring New Zealand “All Golds” at Aberdare on January 1 1908. Wales won 9-8 before a crowd estimated to be around 17,000 strong.

He won his sole Great Britain cap the following month in the second Test between the Northern Union and the Kiwis at Chelsea’s Stamford Bridge ground in London.

Following the outbreak of the First World War in August 1914, Thomas was one of the first to enlist and joined the South Lancashire regiment. He continued to keep himself fit and won the five-mile race for his company.

He also remained the larger-than-life figure the supporters knew and reportedly entertained the troops in the trenches by loudly singing “The Yellow Rose of Texas”.

In April 1916, Thomas, who was a private, sent a letter to Harry Ashton, the former Warrington captain and secretary, at the Orford Hotel from the Western Front in France.

Showing extreme candour and courage, he wrote: “I have had some trying times on the football field and our side usually came out on top but as true as there is a drop of British blood runs through my veins I hope to give the Germans a sound thrashing.

“But if I should fall you can tell the boys I fell fighting like a hero should do for his King and country. We have had a rough time of it and have constantly harassed the Germans. Many comrades fell and twice I had narrow escapes. I helped on one occasion to carry my sergeant to a place of safety and bandaged him up.”

In late June 1916, Thomas was made a colonel’s orderly before, in the early hours of Monday 3 July 1916 he was killed in action on the Somme. An eyewitness reported that he was “blown to pieces” by a German shell. He was just 35 and left a wife and young family, who lived at 12 Walton Road, Stockton Heath.

He has no known grave and is commemorated on the Thiepval Memorial, Northern France, on the Stockton Heath War Memorial and on the website maintained by the Commonwealth War Graves Commission under his full name, William George Thomas.

He was not forgotten at Wilderspool and in March 1922 a benefit match raised £127 8s 11d – up to £50,000 in today’s money – for his widow.

Memories of George Thomas were again revived in June 2000 when Warrington played London Broncos at Newport’s Rodney Parade ground in an “On the Road” Super League game.

Warrington were led out by captain Allan Langer and mascot-for-the-day Ethan Thomas, aged 10, George’s great nephew. Ethan had won the honour in a South Wales Arguscompetition by nominating George as his favourite player.

Hall of Fame: Gordon, Naughton, Thomas & Gregory