After so many years of away draws, the draw for the Third Round of the 1969 Challenge Cup provided Cas with a second consecutive home tie.

Having beaten Wigan in the previous round, this time Leeds would be the visitors. They had already beaten Cas three times earlier in the season, including a 22-11 win in the Yorkshire Cup Final. They came into the Third Round on the back of 16 consecutive victories, having lost only two league games all season. The match took place just two weeks after the second round win over Wigan. With the cold weather continuing, the pitch was again protected by a layer of straw until the morning of the match, when it was cleared by an army of volunteers, including 105 schoolboys who were rewarded with free admission to the match. Cas were forced into team changes as Alan Hardisty had failed to recover from the recurrence of an arm injury suffered against Wigan, and Derek Foster – who had featured in the first two rounds - was suffering with influenza. Derek Edwards moved from full-back to half-back, Trevor Bedford and Keith Howe stepped into the starting line-up and David Stephens came in as substitute back.

Castleford: 1 Bedford 2 Briggs 3 Howe 4 Thomas 5 Lowndes 6 Edwards 7 Hepworth 8 Hartley 9 Dickinson 10 Ward 11 Redfearn 12 Lockwood 13 Reilly Subs: 14 Stephens 15 Fox (both unused)

Leeds: 1 Risman 2 Smith 3 Hynes 4 Watson 5 Cowan 6 Shoebottom 7 Seabourne 8 Clark 9 Crosby 10 K Eyre 11 A Eyre 12 Hick 13 Batten Subs: 14 Langley (unused) 15 Fozzard (for Hick)

Referee: E Lawrenson (Warrington)

Attendance: 13,180

Tight and tense

The Third Round match was just as tough and uncompromising as the Second Round had been. Castleford’s Brian Lockwood, along with Watson and Hick of Leeds, received cautions from the referee during a first half which had very little open attacking rugby. This was illustrated by a 2-2 half time score. Then, in the 51st minute, Leeds made the first breakthrough with a try by Risman. Although he failed to convert his own try, Leeds had what seemed like a probable match-winning 5-2 lead. After missing with a couple of kickable penalty attempts, Mick Redfearn finally had some success with the boot to reduce the margin to 5-4. Cas were re-energised and put pressure on the Leeds line but failed to capitalise on clean breaks from Edwards and Lowndes and were still trailing as the match entered its final ten minutes.

Then with just seven minutes remaining Cas finally found a way to breach the Leeds defence. After Lowndes was tackled just short on the left, Cas moved the ball quickly to the right to create the space for Trevor Briggs to score the decisive try. Despite his earlier failures with the boot, Mick Redfearn held his nerve to convert the try from a difficult angle to put Cas 9-5 ahead. Leeds threw everything at the Cas line in the closing minutes but Cas held on to secure the win that took them into the semi-finals for only the fourth time in their history.