Born in Usk on 18 July, 1922, Cale learned his rugby at Ebbw Vale and Newbridge and played against the 1947 Australians for the combined Pontypool, Blaenavon and Talywain side. He won the first of his seven Welsh rugby union caps in the win over England at Cardiff Arms Park in 1949.
He played in three of the four championship matches that season while with Newbridge before switching to Pontypool the following season. A devastating tackler, he became one of the mainstays of a Welsh pack that remained unchanged throughout the 1950 campaign as a team led by John Gwilliam moved from wooden spoonists to Grand Slammers.
Wales used 18 players during their victorious season and now fewer than 12 of them were picked for the British & Irish Lions tour to New Zealand and Australia later in the year. Gwilliam had to turn down an offer because he couldn’t find a replacement teacher to take over his post at an Edinburgh school, while Cale was deemed to be ‘too rough’ to take.
Having been the best back row forward in the championship by a country mile, and one of the few northern hemisphere players who might have caused the All Blacks a few sleepless nights, he was left at home.
He scored a try in the opening game of the championship at Twickenham and then forced the error out of Jackie Kyle in the Triple Crown decider against Ireland at Ravenhill that paved the way for Malcolm Thomas’s match winning try in a 6-3 victory.
By the time the Lions tourists returned in September, Cale had made the first of his 128 appearances in the 13-a-side code for St Helens. His robust style was ideally suited to rugby league and he added four Welsh league caps to his seven union Test appearances.
He eventually faced New Zealand when the Kiwis played the Saints at Knowsley Road in 1951 and he was a losing finalist against Leigh in the 1952 Lancashire Cup final. There was disappointment, too, at Wembley in front of a near 90,000 crowd in the 1953 Challenge Cup final when a Huddersfield side inspired by Welsh scrum half Billy Banks pulled off an upset to win 15-10 and deny Saints a first victory in the tournament.
Having won the Lancashire League title earlier in the season, Cale and co went on to clinch the Championship title for only the second time in the club’s history three weeks later, hammering Huddersfield in the semi-finals a week after that Wembley debacle. His career came to an end midway through the 1953/54 season.
His funeral will be at St Mary’s Church, Usk on Wednesday, 7 June at 1.45pm.
