BRADFORD Salem celebrate their centenary season in 2024-25 and the ambitious Heaton club want to go into that historic next campaign as treble winners.
Salem, who are one point ahead of Wetherby, need to win at West Leeds to secure the Counties One Yorkshire title this coming Saturday.
Then Bob Hood’s side have the Yorkshire Shield final against Keighley at Doncaster RUFC on Saturday, May 18, while the club have also entered the Papa John’s Community Counties One Plate, with the first team facing Leodiensian or Wensleydale in the last 16 on Saturday, April 20.
Salem’s rugby chairman Chris Robinson, speaking at their players’ dinner in the clubhouse, said: “We want to have an annus mirabilis. The players need to give one more push over the final weeks of the season.”
Neil Klenk, Salem’s club chairman, said: “We are on the cusp of something special, and if we win the league, Shield and Papa John’s it will be our most successful season ever.
“But we have won nothing yet and we need to keep our focus.”
Klenk then explained something of the history of the Heaton-based club, saying: “We played our first game on September 6, 1924 against Bradford ‘E’ at Idle, so it is fitting that we will be playing our centenary match against Bradford & Bingley in August.
“We hope to have former players such as Shane Goble, Dean McNicholl and Peter Street in attendance.
“Salem is a great club and we have had some great times, winning the Yorkshire Shield in 1960, 1962, 2009 and 2015, as well as the Provincial Insurance Cup at Twickenham in 1991 and 1992.
“We have also produced an England international in Dan Scarbrough, and wouldn’t it be great if we won the treble going into our centenary season?”
As far as league titles are concerned, Salem won Yorkshire Division Four, Three and Two in successive seasons from 1989-1992, also winning Yorkshire Division One in 1998 and Yorkshire Division Two in 2015.
Salem have also been on the wrong end in finals as well, losing four Shield deciders, three Aire-Wharfe Cup finals and a National Provincial Cup decider, again at Twickenham.
They have made great strides this season under new boss Hood and attack coach Andy Robinson, with a delighted Chris Robinson saying: “Bob’s great ability is to deliver messages.
“I was in the army for 23 years and this set up at Salem is the best that I have come across.”
Guest speaker was former England women’s coach Simon Middleton MBE, who, ironically, was helped through his coaching badges by Hood.
Middleton said: “I don’t think that I could have been any luckier in who I got as my mentor. I don’t need to tell you what he brings.”
Since leaving the England job in 2023, Middleton has been coaching men’s teams such as the Netherlands and Portugal in his bid to put something back into the game, but he didn’t rule out returning to club coaching at some stage.
Not giving too much away, he simply said: “Never say never.”
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