League Express editor MARTYN SADLER pays tribute to the player selected as the 2024 Albert Goldthorpe Rookie of the Year.
Choosing the League Express Albert Goldthorpe Rookie of the Year for 2024 was a difficult exercise, simply because of the quality of the contenders in 2024, including a significant number of candidates from Hull FC, despite that club’s terrible season.
Few of us would have imagined that Josh Rourke would be a candidate until he made his London Broncos debut in Round 16, when he returned after a lengthy absence with a broken leg to give an outstanding performance against Leeds Rhinos at Headingley.
After that he gave several more outstanding displays, including scoring two tries against Hull FC at the Magic Weekend.
Josh is one of those players whose earlier career was severely hampered by the Covid epidemic and he is a perfect example of someone who refused to be beaten by early failure.
Born in Preston, he was a talented sportsman from an early age and he signed for his local football side Preston North End.
It was only when that club released him that he decided to focus on Rugby League, spending his teenage years playing for Chorley Panthers.
At 14 he signed a scholarship at Widnes Vikings, initially playing as either a hooker or halfback and spending two years there before being released and returning to Chorley.
In 2019, at the age of 19, he had trials with Salford and played four times for their reserve side before the Covid pandemic struck and set back his career, as it did for many others.
After the pandemic, in 2022, he completed his first full season of rugby for Salford’s reserves side and he made his Super League debut in the final game of the season against Warrington Wolves.
Then, at the age of 23 and in need of regular rugby at the highest possible level, he joined Whitehaven and had an outstanding season in the Championship, thoroughly learning his trade and winning five player-of the-year awards.
After that, Rourke was on the move again, this time to Batley Bulldogs, who had just missed out on the play-offs in the 2023 season. But he wouldn’t play a single game for them and instead opted to join London Broncos, who activated a contract clause that would allow him to leave for a Super League club.
“They (Batley) had put in a lot of work to bring me to the club and I understood that and I did feel bad, but after having a conversation with my family I felt I just had to put myself first because opportunities to play Super League don’t come around very often,” he said at the time.
And, despite his bad luck in breaking his leg in a pre-season game last year, he went on to fully justify the Broncos’ faith in him, playing so well in his twelve games that he is a deserved winner of the Albert Goldthorpe Rookie of the Year title.
