Billy Cleaver

Billy Cleaver

William 'Billy' Cleaver (15 September 1921 - 29 September 2003) was a Welsh international fly-half who played club rugby for Cardiff. He won 14 caps for Wales and was selected to play in the British Lions on the 1950 tour of Australia and New Zealand. He was part of the Welsh team that won the 1950 Grand Slam.

Born in 1921 in Treorchy, Rhondda, Cleaver was an exciting attacking player with a shrewd change of pace. After one terrible game, under heavy weather conditions against Scotland, Cleaver gained the nickname 'Billy Kick'; though this was a harsh moniker considering his normally style of play. Cleaver was a coal miner by trade and spent most of his life within the industry, though in a managerial role for much of his later career. He was also a keen patron of the arts and was the secretary of the Contemporary Arts Society for Wales and from 1980-83 was the vice chairman of the Welsh Arts Council.

Read more about Billy Cleaver:  International Career, Bibliography

Famous quotes containing the words billy and/or cleaver:

    “How old is she, Billy boy, Billy boy?
    How old is she, charming Billy?”
    Past six, past seven,
    Past twenty and eleven,
    She’s a young thing, and cannot leave her mother.”
    —Unknown. Billy Boy (l. 21–25)

    In prison, those things witheld from and denied to the prisoner become precisely what he wants most of all.
    —Eldridge Cleaver (b. 1935)