Peter Jackson at Parc y Scarlets for Phil Bennett’s memorial service
The 440-mile drive there and back took him all of nine hours, not that Fran Cotton was complaining.
He would have gone twice as far and spent three times as long on roads clogged by the rail strike to see Phil Bennett off on his final journey.
As the great and the good of Welsh rugby filed into Parc y Scarlets, they greeted the pilgrim from Cheshire by insisting he join the guard of honour out on the pitch, a mighty English oak standing tall among such revered old Lions as Gerald Davies, Graham Price, Derek Quinnell, Tommy David and Sir Gareth Edwards.
“There was no way I was going to miss this,” Cotton said.
“‘Benny’ was my favourite player. I thought the world of him. When I think of great flyhalves, I think of Benny, Barry (John) and Dan Carter. There are perhaps half a dozen at the same level. You think of Jonny Wilkinson but he was a completely different type of ten.
“People rave about Jackie Kyle but I never saw him play.
“I can only go on those I’ve seen in my time. Benny, Barry and Carter would be my top three all-time great tens.”
On a day when the old town famous for its tin and its rugby turned out in force, even the weather, deteriorating from flaming June to wet, chilly late autumn, showed some respect for the occasion.
The rain stopped, mercifully so as the mourning multitude awaited the arrival of the hearse, the silence broken only by the squawking sound of a few seagulls until the five limousines of the cortege moved slowly along the touchline to the sound of Rod Stewart’s Sailing.
The memories took Cotton back to distant shores, to South Africa and that blessed summer of 1974, to the parched grass of the great Springbok shrines where the Lions ruled and where nobody ran riot to more devastating effect than Bennett.
“Conditions were perfect, nice firm grounds, plenty of ball provided by a good pack of forwards and Benny was absolutely fantastic. Some of the things he did made you draw breath and say: ‘Wow!’
“When you gave him frontfoot ball, opponents found it virtually impossible to stop him. His pace off the mark, his side-step, as in his famous try in the second Test of the South Africa series, meant they could never get near him.”
When their paths first crossed, at Stradey Park in 1967, Cotton couldn’t get near him either, until they met for the post-match beer. The embryonic English giant, then 21, was in his second season with Liverpool RFC, the 19- year-old steelworker’s son in his first full season with Llanelli.
Cotton, right, went back north mightily impressed by what he had seen but never imagining how much England would suffer at the feet and hands of the mercurial teenager over the next 11 years.
“That day at Stradey Park he played with No.15 on his back,” Cotton said. “After about half an hour, I remember thinking to myself: “‘My God, who’s that lad at fullback?”
Their friendship endured despite Bennett’s famous ‘Look-what-they’ve-done-to-us’ team talk, delivered when an English revival threatened Welsh dominance during the Seventies before disappearing like a mirage.
“Benny was a passionate, proud Welshman and that was his way of getting the best out of the team. I didn’t take it that seriously. I’ve had a lot worse than that in my time.
“The last time I saw him would have been at a ‘74 Lions reunion. I kept in regular touch. He had that great gift of making you feel all the better for having spoken to him.
“More than anything he impressed me as a man. You looked forward to seeing him.
“I never heard him criticise anyone, never heard him boast about what he’d achieved.”
Those achievements continued even in death, his passing inspiring a mass choir of some 3,000 to sing Guide Me O Thou Greet Redeemer as only the Welsh can. Graham Thomas, Bennett’s biographer and ghost writer of a thousand columns for The Mirror over 20 years, spoke with deep affection for the rugby player and family man.
They loved him in Felinfoel and Llanelli because he was one of them, a love made all the greater by the fact that he turned down a fortune to sign for his favourite Rugby League club, St Helens, because he couldn’t bear the thought of leaving home.
“Walking down the street with Phil, women would stop to say hello and building workers on scaffolding would lean over and shout out to him,” Thomas told the mourners. “Phil would look up and wave. He seemed to know everyone’s name. His was, truly, a wonderful life.”
The privilege of eulogising Bennett the player fell to Delme Thomas, of Llanelli, Wales and the Lions who half a century ago became the last man to captain a club team to victory over the All Blacks.
The old warrior, erect and trim in his 80th year, walked slowly to the microphone in the middle of the pitch. As usual, he rose to the occasion but never more magnificently so than at noon on Friday.
“It is very hard to stand here and say what I feel about my friend,” Thomas said. “What can one say about Phil Bennett? The greatest player I have ever seen play the game of rugby. That’s a big thing to say because I played with some great players. Many of them are sitting here today.
“Not only was he a great rugby player but a great friend.
“I was on the phone to my old mate, Willie John McBride and we’ve kept in touch over the last 55 or 60 years since going to New Zealand with the Lions.
“He used to say to me: ‘Del, I hate small men.’ And he still says it. It’s his favourite saying and I could understand, to a point, what he meant. Six months ago, when we were all concerned about his health, Willie John said: ‘Del, I still hate small men but I love Phil’.
“Barry John was such a great player that they called him ‘King John’. When he dropped a big bombshell by retiring at the age of 27, a lot of people thought it would be the end of Welsh rugby.
“Up stepped this boy from Felinfoel and we never looked back. I have never seen a performance like his when we played the All Blacks in 1972.
“He stamped his authority on rugby in such a way that people all over the world knew who Phil Bennett was.
“He was a wonderful boy.
“Mind you, I put him over my shoulders more than once when he’d had a few drinks but there was never a cross word. I don’t think he knew how to say a bad word about anyone.”
The most emotional moment came at the end, inspired by Thomas’ faith. “I refuse to say goodbye,” he said. “As a Christian, I hope I will meet you again. May God bless you all.”
He placed both hands on the coffin and walked off to a standing ovation. Ten minutes later the friend he acclaimed as ‘the greatest’ was being carried home to Felinfoel for burial alongside Stewart, the infant son whom he and his beloved wife, Pat, lost shortly after his birth.
By then his legion of fans, headed by sons Steven and James, had made the service as unforgettable as the man himself….
