T'Other Side: Bradford Bulls

Head Coach: Eamon O’Carroll

This season Eamon O’Carroll has taken overs as the head coach of Bradford Bulls, succeeding Lee Greenwood who became their caretaker coach in May 2023 following the departure of Mark Dunning. O’Carroll was the head coach at Newcastle Thunder from 2020 to 2022.

As a player he was a prop forward. He made his first team début with Wigan Warriors in 2005 and stayed there until he signed for Hull FC in 2012. After one season with Hull FC, he moved on to Widnes spending six seasons with them until he retired in 2017. He also played for the Ireland national team and was in their squad for the 2013 World Cup.

 

 

Captain: Michael Lawrence 

Michael Lawrence played well over 300 games for Huddersfield Giants, his hometown club, between 2007 and 2022. He was the Giants captain in 2021 and 2022.

In 2023 he signed for Bradford Bulls and was immediately appointed as their captain.

He has also played for the Jamaica national team and for England Knights. For Jamaica he was a starting prop in all their matches in the last World Cup.

Loan players and dual registration

Bradford do not currently have a dual registration agreement with a Super League side but they do have one with Rochdale Hornets which saw Jordan Baldwinson, Ben Blackmore and George Flanagan play games for Rochdale.

There have been a very large number of loans both in and out. Too many to list here but you can see them on the Bradford Squad chart above.

 

The Fev connection 

 

There have been 125 players that we know of who have played for both Fev and Bradford. They include:-

 

Highly renowned hooker, Keith Bridges’ professional career started as an 18 year-old for Fev in 1970. During his nine seasons at Fev he played 235 games and scored 44 tries. He is a member of the Rovers Hall of Fame and during his time in a Fev shirt he won a Challenge Cup winners medal in 1973 and played 38 games in our Championship winning side of 1976-77. He also played for Yorkshire, England and Great Britain whilst a Fev player.

In the first match of the 1978-79 season he suffered a serious knee injury which kept him out for the rest of the season and then he signed for Bradford Northern where he played 50 games between 1979 and 1982. In his time at Bradford he added two more Championship winning seasons in 1979-80 and 1980-81.

His final season was at Hull (FC) in 1982-83 where he achieved an exceptional record of winning the Championship with three different clubs. He also returned to Wembley to play again in a Challenge Cup final. Hull were the very hot favourites to complete a league and cup double but Keith ended up on the losing team when Fev pulled off a huge surprise and beat Hull 14-12!

 

Vic Darlison was also a hooker. His Fev début, at the age of 20, wasn’t the happiest of matches being beaten 16-0 by Castleford in April 1936. Between 1936 and 1939 he played 51 games but then he was involved in a swap deal and moved to Wigan with Joe Golby coming to Fev.

Vic remained a Wigan player until 1943 during which time he was on the losing side in the 1940 Yorkshire Cup final, beaten 12-9 by Fev! At this point you might wonder what Wigan were doing playing in the Yorkshire Cup. They weren’t! During World War 2 players often made guest appearances for other clubs and on that day he was playing for Wakefield Trinity as he did many times between 1940 and 1943.

In 1943 he was signed by Bradford Northern for whom he played 249 times before retiring in 1950. While he was at Bradford he also made one war time guest appearance for Fev in February 1945.

 

Born in Glasshoughton, Tommy Smales (we need to be clear that we are here talking about the one who usually played at scrumhalf, not the other Tommy Smales who was a loose forward) began his professional with Oldham in 1952 but came ‘home’ when he signed for Fev at the start of the 1952-53 season. He made 35 appearances for Fev (scoring 13 tries) before joining Huddersfield in 1955. He had two spells at Huddersfield, from 1955-1958 and from 1960-1963 and was at Castleford in between those.

In 1964 he joined Bradford and there played 61 matches (13 tries).

In 1967 he went to Australia for a season with North Sydney Bears and on return finished his playing career with a season at Wakefield.

During his career (but not while he was at Fev) he played for both England and Great Britain, captaining Great Britain six times.

Following his retirement he went into coaching and became head coach of both Castleford and then Fev.