T'Other Side: Newcastle Thunder

      

FIRST TEAM SQUAD

LAST TIME OUT

2021 MATCHES

New Signings for 2021

Head Coach: Eamon O’Carroll

Eamon O’Carroll was Steve McNamara’s assistant coach at Catalans Dragons from 2018 to 2020, leaving to become head coach at Newcastle this season.

His playing career started with Wigan in 2006. In 2012 he moved to Hull FC but transferred to Widnes in June of the same year. He stayed at Widnes until he retired in 2017.

He played internationally for Ireland and also played for England U18 in 2005.

 

Captain: Bob Beswick

 

36 year-old Bob Beswick is now in his 17^th season as a professional player. He also started with Wigan and made his début in 2004. He joined Widnes in 2006 and moved on to Halifax in 2011. After just one season at Halifax he spent 4 seasons at Leigh. In 2016 he was named in the Leigh squad but the hooking role was filled by Micky Higham and Liam Hood and Beswick didn’t play any games. In 2017 he became one of Toronto’s inaugural squad and he joined Newcastle in 2020.

He, too, is an Ireland international and has made 24 appearances for them.

 

Star Man: Kieran Gill

 

A Castleford Tigers academy product, Kieran Gill made his first team début with Oxford on dual reg in 2016. That same year he went on loan to Oldham, a move that was repeated in the following two years. He made his début for Cas in 2017 and in 2018 he played one game for Newcastle Thunder on dual reg and then had a season long loan with them in 2019, signing for Newcastle in 2020.

 

While he has been at Newcastle, he has become something of a try scoring phenomenon. In 2019 he scored 28 tries in just 23 appearances and in the fore-shortened 2020 season he managed 6 tries in 5 games. So far this year he has scored 8 tries in 9 games, that being twice as many as any other Newcastle player.

 

 

Loan signings

 

Connor Aspey (Salford), Ellis Longstaff and Matthew Wright (both Warrington) had loan spells with Newcastle earlier this season.

 

Currently (as far as we know) they have Connor Bailey (season long loan from Wakefield), Mitch Clark and Sam Halsall (both Wigan) and Owen Harrison (Hull KR) in their squad.

 

They also signed Samy Kibula on a season long loan from Wigan but Samy suffered an injury in training pre-season that will keep him out for the entire year.

 

The Fev connection