21 June 2021 The Evolution of the English Back Row The major achievements of the England rugby team since 1910 have been invariably linked to the selection of back row combinations of the highest quality. Read More
21 June 2021 The Evolution of the English Back Row The major achievements of the England rugby team since 1910 have been invariably linked to the selection of back row combinations of the highest quality. Read More
22 May 2021 He Saved Many Lives But Not His Own. Lest We Forget- Kit Tanner On this day 80 years ago, Kit Tanner lost his life after rescuing 30 people from the wreckage of HMS Fiji. Here Malc King of the Gloucester Rugby Heritage archive pays tribute to a remarkable man. Read More
19 April 2021 Selected but never played Part 2 (1920-1996) In the days before substitutes were introduced into international rugby, many players faced a dilemma following their selection to play for their country for the first time. Read More
05 April 2021 Selected but never played Part 1 (1871-1914) ...there were over 90 players who had the misfortune to be selected to play for their country in a test match but who never took the field and so remained uncapped. Read More
26 March 2021 Meet the 1871 Captains... When England and Scotland took the field for the first time on 27th March 1871, they were led by Francis Moncrieff and Frederick Stokes. At 21, Edinburgh born Moncreiff was the senior of the two and, as a former pupil of Edinburgh Academy and captain of Edinburgh Academicals, was in the most familiar of circumstances as the two teams ran out at Raeburn Place. Read More
11 January 2021 Denzil Batchelor's All-Star XV Denzil Batchelor was a sports and war correspondent, poet and playwright. He played rugby at Oxford University in the 1920s and was a lifelong fan of cricket and rugby. This All-Star XV is an extract from his book ‘Babbled of Green Fields’ published in 1961. Read More
30 November 2020 ‘L’art du drop goal’ – a French phenomenon? Kicking a drop goal has often proved a decisive factor in the winning of matches at international level since the second match between England and Scotland at The Oval in 1872 when Harold Freeman for England and Charles Cathcart for Scotland each scored a drop goal. Read More
02 November 2020 International Triplets There have been around 30 known cases of "triplets" appearing for their country, but only a select group of six families have produced siblings who have appeared alongside at least two other brothers in the same international team on the same day. Read More
05 October 2020 Ernie Crawford - a legendary Irish full back The Irish selectors alighted on the Lansdowne and Leinster player William Ernest ‘Ernie’ Crawford as their full back when they chose the team for the first post-war Ireland international against England at Lansdowne Road, Dublin on February 14th 1920. Read More
14 September 2020 The Stellenbosch Three-quarter line If asked to name the most illustrious three-quarter line from one club or country, northern hemisphere rugby historians are most likely to name the Oxford University and Scotland three-quarter line of the 1920s... Read More
10 August 2020 Alan Rotherham - the Original Half-Back When international rugby began in 1871 it was a twenty-a-side game dominated by forward play and protracted scrummaging. In 1877 the number of players was reduced to fifteen. Over the following decade and a half the number of forwards slowly decreased as the number of backs slowly increased and teams discovered the benefits of a more attacking, open game, utilising running and passing backs. Read More
08 June 2020 Dai Gent's All-Star XV Swansea born Dai Gent twice trialled for Wales before being selected for England. A prototype scrum-half at a time when the English were playing half-backs, he memorably partnered Adrian Stoop in the English midfield in the first test-match to be held at Twickenham, in 1910, where England beat Wales for the first time in 12 years. Read More