(Image: Ben Duffy/SWpix.com)
LEON Pryce’s move from Bulls to St Helens was one of the biggest cross-club transfers in Super League history.
The hometown hero, who had grown up watching the club on the Odsal terraces, was leaving for Knowsley Road after seven years at Bradford.
But on this weekend 21 years ago, Pryce signed off in style.
He featured in a Super League Grand Final on his 18th birthday, then made his England debut against France just two weeks later.
Someone who could play across the back line, he was integral to Bradford’s three Super League triumphs between 2001 and 2005.
Bulls were not far off winning five in a row, losing the 2002 final to Saints via Sean Long’s last-gasp drop goal.
But while that heartbreak lingers more, 2004 was a personal tragedy for Pryce, who was forced to sit out the Old Trafford defeat against Leeds with a dislocated shoulder.
The two sides locked horns again in the Grand Final one year later, and that October 17 farewell is one Pryce remembers well.
A sublime piece of skill allowed him to score the opening try, as he scythed through the helpless Leeds defence.
Bulls won the game 15-6, and as man-of-the-match Pryce told the T&A's Steve Deane afterwards: “It was my last game, so I had to do everything I could.”
But the end was nigh for this great Bradford side, with the likes of Rob Parker, Jamie Peacock and Pryce all moving on for 2006.
Pryce won the Grand Final with Saints that year, while Peacock became part of a Rhinos dynasty.
Sadly, Bradford had peaked, and they have never scaled those heights since.