YORK City Knights’ friendly at home to Castleford Tigers a week tomorrow will be held in memory of former academy boss Paul Higgins.

The match will also see the launch of a charitable rugby league fund set up in honour of the 56-year-old grandfather of six who died suddenly at a schools’ rugby league festival in October.

Fittingly, The Press understands that up to nine players he brought through the youth system at Huntington Stadium will take to the field tomorrow night when the Knights first play their friendly away to Hunslet Hawks.

Furthermore, two more players – teenagers Dan Fairclough and Tom Lineham – have been drafted into the match-day squad from the York College RL team that Higgins also led.

Knights player-boss Paul March said he expected the youngsters to give their all tomorrow night, not only to show they are worthy of first-team reckoning, but also with Higgins in mind.

He said: “I think every time they take to the field they’ll think of Higgo. They’ve been coached by him and he was a good bloke to be around.

“Myself and (director of rugby) James Ratcliffe have been involved with the York College team since Paul’s death, and James has taken on that role.

“That plan was always to create a pathway through from there to the Knights academy, and Dan Fairclough and Tom Lineham are the first to do that.

“Hopefully it sends signals out to young players that they can get into the Knights that way.”

The nine likely to be on show tomorrow who played under Higgins in the academy are Tom Hodgson and Steve Grundy, who have since become first-team regulars, Luke Watling, who also plays for York College, Dan Hunter, Adam Endersby, Jack Stearman, Dan Walton, and the Wilcox-Harrison twins Tom and Ollie.

March added: “Higgo was a great bloke and he was like a father figure to most of them, especially Hoddo (Hodgson).

“I’m sure he will give 110 per cent in memory of Paul and I’m sure the rest of them will as well.”

Seven days later, Higgins’ work in developing junior rugby league across North Yorkshire will be officially remembered when York take on his former club, Cas, for the Paul Higgins Memorial Trophy.

That night will also see the launch of the ‘Higgo’s 13-a-side Rugby Foundation’. This body, who hopes to become a registered charity, will raise funds for the good of junior and community rugby league across North Yorkshire, whereby clubs can apply for grants to pay for such things as equipment, kit and coaching courses.

Higgins, who lived in Acomb, had headed up the pioneering rugby league development course at York College, as well as the North Yorkshire RL Service Area, working out of the Knights’ offices. He was also a scholarship coach with the Knights and had been the club’s academy boss for three years before stepping down at the end of last season.

A former player and academy and scholarship coach with home-town club Cas, he also held various roles throughout amateur and development rugby league.

He died, aged 56, after a heart attack during a children’s rugby festival at Millthorpe School in York.

His widow, Marilyn, said she and his family had been so overwhelmed by the tributes that flooded in they decided to start the Higgo’s Foundation. It will work in tandem with the Knights Foundation to benefit the lauded community programmes in which Higgins was involved.

Knights general manager Ian Wilson said: “It’s fitting that we will be playing Castleford, Paul’s former club. He was a well-respected person in York and Cas and we feel it’s fitting he will be remembered in this way. He did an awful lot for rugby league.”