Head Coach: Leigh Beattie (caretaker)
We
know very little about Leigh Beattie. As far as we can ascertain he has never
played professionally in the UK, and certainly not in the summer era. Nor has
he previously held a position as head coach. All we have been able to discover
is that he has been with the Bradford Bulls for many years and has at various
times been kitman, groundsman and U16 academy coach. In January the new owners
of Bradford Bulls announced that they had appointed Geoff Toovey as head coach
but we believe that they are still waiting for all the paperwork to be accepted
before he can officially take over. Toovey was a half-back or hooker with Manly
and played 13 times for Australia and made 16 appearances for New South Wales
in State of Origin. He was head coach at Manly from 2012 to 2015
Captain: No idea!
Leon
Pryce was the Bradford Bulls captain until he retired a couple of weeks ago. We
have trawled the Bradford Bulls website and searched on Google but we can’t
find any reference to who has succeeded Leon as captain!
In the backs
From 2008 until
2015 Jonny Campbell was a Batley
player. He plays either on the wing or at fullback. He missed out on the 2014
season because of a 12 month ban for contravening RFL gambling rules. After 130
games for Batley, he joined the Bulls last year but played for them only 3
times and had a loan spell with Keighley. This year he has been playing far
more often with 7 games on the wing and 4 at fullback together with one
substitute appearance. Winger, Ethan
Ryan, is the Bulls top try scorer this year with 10 tries. He is the only
ever-present. He recently turned 21 and started his professional career with
the Bulls last season when he scored 16 tries in 14 games. Oscar Thomas is a fullback who can also fill in at stand-off. He is
a Londoner who began with London Broncos and has had 3 loan spells with London
Skolars, the last of those being at the end of last season when he was a Bulls
player. He is a very effective goal-kicker and this year he has been the Bulls
main kicker having been successful 44 times out of 51 attempts.
In the halves
The Dane Chisholm saga has now been
resolved. He joined Bradford in July last year from the Canterbury Bulldogs but
when the club went into liquidation he joined Sheffield Eagles. However, after
only 7 games for Sheffield he appeared to have some sort of falling out there
and Bradford announced that they had re-signed him on April 12th. But Sheffield
insisted that they still held his registration and it was not sorted out until
May 24th. Joe Keyes is one of
several Bradford players who began his career at London Broncos. He signed for
the Bulls at the end of June last season and has had representative experience
with the England Academy and with Ireland. Currently on loan from Leeds Rhinos
is Jordan Lilley. Lilley is seen, in
the long term, as a future Super League regular but the Rhinos are happy to
offer him opportunities to develop in the Championship.
In the Pack
Although 25 years
younger, Sam Hallas is the cousin of
former Great Britain international Graeme Hallas. He began the season at
Bradford on loan from Leeds Rhinos and has recently returned for a second spell
playing at hooker or loose forward. Liam
Kirk is a prop forward who has been a regular in the team this year but
often starts on the bench. He made3 his first grade debut last season with
three substitute appearances for the Bulls. Jon Magrin is yet another former London Broncos player who signed
for the Bulls this year. He is a Maltese international.
The Fev Connection
Three members of
the current Bradford Bulls squad have played for Featherstone Rovers. James Mendeika was one of the host of
youngsters brought in from Warrington Wolves by John Bastian in 2014. In his
case he was actually signed by Fev (several were loans) and he played 21 games,
scoring 20 tries. After just one game the following year he went to Bradford,
an opportunity to become a full-time player. Jordan Lilley is one of four players at Bradford on loan this
season from Leeds Rhinos. This very promising young halfback played for Fev
three times under dual reg in 2016. Colton
Roche had two spells with Rovers, making just one sub appearance in 2014
but returning for the 2016 season during which he impressed initially but then
seemed to fall out of favour.
There are four members of
the current Fev squad who have played for Bradford Bulls. They are Kyle Briggs, Keal Carlile, Richard Moore
and Chris Ulugia. In addition there
are three Leeds Rhinos players who have played for Rovers under dual
registration this year who have also played for Bradford. Jordan Baldwinson and Anthony
Mullally both had a loan spell with them in 2014 and Mikolaj Oledzki
is on loan with them at the moment. Jason Walton was signed by the Bulls
for this season but left them without ever playing when the club went into
liquidation.
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