T'Other Side: Newcastle Thunder

Head Coach: Chris Thorman

Chris Thorman was appointed as head coach at Newcastle Thunder prior to this season.

He was caretaker coach at York in 2010 and then Head Coach there in 2012. He had another brief caretaker coach role at Huddersfield Giants in 2018 before taking over at Workington from 2019 to 2022.

He made his playing début as a 16-year-old for Sheffield Eagles in 1999. He then played for the so-called Huddersfield and Sheffield Giants in 2000 and continued with them for a further two years when they reverted to being just Huddersfield Giants. During 2002 he scored a hat trick for Huddersfield against Doncaster, the third try coming only 6 minutes 54 seconds into the game!

He moved to London Broncos in 2003 and then to Parramatta Eels in the NRL in 2004. On his return he re-joined Huddersfield and spent 4 more seasons with them. In 2009 he was at Hull FC and then joined York City Knights in 2010 and was there until he retired as a player at the end of 2012.

In 2011, when York played Northumbria University in the Challenge Cup, they won 138-0 with Chris Thorman scoring 56 points (4 tries and 20 goals) setting a British record for points in a match.

Captain: Curtis Davies

Alex Foster was the Newcastle captain until he went on loan to Castleford in late July and since then Curtis Davies has taken over.

Curtis Davies made his professional début playing for South Wales Scorpions in 2015. He later joined Halifax and in 2018 played one game for Newcastle Thunder on dual reg. In 2021 he appeared for Hunslet in on loan from Halifax and then in 2022 he joined Workington and also played for Whitehaven on loan. He joined Newcastle for 2023.

His twin brother, Connor, has also played for South Wales, Halifax and Workington.

Back in 2013 Curtis played for the Wales Youth team and played for the full Welsh international team in 2018 and 2022 when both the twins came on a subs for Wales in all three games in the World Cup.

Dual Registration and Loan signings

Newcastle have a dual registration agreement with Hull FC for 2023 which has seen Hull FC players Denive Balmforth, Harvey Barron, Matty Laidlaw and Connor Wynne playing for them.

They also currently have Connor Moore on loan from Hull KR.

The Fev connection

Surprisingly, for a club that has only been in existence for such a short time, already 36 players have played for both Fev and Newcastle (Gateshead) Thunder.