Derby RFC is very sad to announce the death of former player Roger Lucas this week. Roger had been living with cancer for 14 months.

Roger was a fantastic prop forward for Derby in the 70s (1^st team debut in 1971/72 season) and the 80s playing a total of 424 games for the club. This was a tremendous feat considering during the 1980s he also spent 3 seasons at Nottingham RFC. This time at Nottingham came about after the John Player Cup game between Nottingham and Derby in 1981 that Derby lost by the small margin. Part of the reason Derby fared so well (Nottingham were a “first class side”, Derby were a Junior club) was due to Roger seeing off two Nottingham props. That left Nottingham with insufficient props the following week so they asked to borrow Roger “for a few games”. The few games turned into three years!

Roger was not an archetypal prop forward in terms of shape. He had a relatively lean stature but, being a farmer, was “as strong as an ox” and would have propped against many international prop forwards in his time at Nottingham and fared well. He was also a mild mannered man, but would not let an opponent get the better of him.

Living and farming in Swarkestone, Roger decided later on in his playing career to move to Melbourne RFC and has certainly been instrumental in seeing them rise through the lower leagues to where they are today, also now having excellent facilities.

He leaves a wife, Sue, 3 sons and a daughter and very many rugby players at Derby, Nottingham and Melbourne very sad at his untimely death.

RIP Roger.

Submitted by Colin Cornfield.