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Deleted member 77198
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Similar to me. I watched rugby league as a kid because it was a great sport and in-part because of that great Wigan team from that era.
But being a Mancunian City fan, I could never get on board with the ‘Reds’/‘Red Devils’ thing at Salford (I can see why Salfordians don’t have that problem because it’s their club and their city and they were the original Diables Rouges… but just not for a Mancunian, it’s never sat right with me). And while players like Hanley and Offiah were part of the reason I got into the sport, I couldn’t get on board with Wigan either so had no club other than Great Britain who were my second sporting love after City when I was a kid. I wore this shirt to death for years:
It was only when I got on the rugby team when I was studying my degree at Warrington Collegiate at Padgate Campus (part of the University of Manchester when I was there) and we used to play in Warrington’s old kits from the season before, running out in Wire kits and we calling ourselves ‘Wire’. We were coached by Brian Chambers who was once on the Bradford coaching staff and for many years worked for Warrington. He got me to do my 9-week work placement with Warrington RLFC in my second year and I spent that time coaching the junior teams and in schools and working on matchdays, sometimes as the mascot Wolfie*
…despite not being a Warringtonian, I was a Wire after that.
However, if there was a Manchester rugby league team, I would support them. I’d have followed Manchester Rangers (and people may see me moaning about the disbanding of Manchester on here quite often!) if the RFL weren’t a set of Canuck chasing fantasists. I am bitter about that and think it was a stupid decision by the RFL (who are now housed on the very site Manchester would be playing on) to not grant Manchester a licence to play further up the ladder. Given a good quarter of a century, with the backers Rangers had, Manchester would have become a good rugby league club.
[*I was on the pitch at half time at one game as Wolfie and had to kick a drop goal over the sticks and in the act slipped on my arse in the mud and missed the ball, much to the Fletcher End’s amusement… I blame the size 25 feet of the Wolfie costume!]
