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Traditional 'nicknames' of English RL clubs

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Wellsy4HullFC

Juniors
Messages
178
Hull FC are the Airlie Birds because their old ground The Boulevard was situated on Airlie Street. Obviously a play on "the early bird gets the worm".

The less said about Sharks the better!

Weren't Bradford known as the Steam Pigs at one point?

As for Oldham, is it pronounced Rough-yeds or Roughy-eds? I've never quite known!
 
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Evil Homer

Moderator
Staff member
Messages
7,178
expansionist said:
Why? What particularly made it so memorable?
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Spud covered it pretty much. The team was playing alright and it was a pretty exciting game but they spent the whole time from minute one heckling and abusing their own players and coach. I'm not just talking about the usual old guys at the back either, it was families with kids etc. Really backwards people.
 
roughyedspud

roughyedspud

Coach
Messages
12,181
one of the first away games i remember going to was against halifax at the old thrum hall....all i remember was the halifax fans fighting against each other...


the thing is places like halifax,dewsbury,batley,huddersfield etc is they are situated in valleys beneath the moorlands with one road in and one road out.....it's like the land that time forgot...
 
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H

Heritage XIII

Juniors
Messages
1,162
Cas were also known as the Glassblowers & classy Cas when they went to Wembley, which was an industry in the town.

Love some of the lower division club names like Batley who were the Gallant Youths
 
deluded pom?

deluded pom?

Coach
Messages
10,897
Evil Homer said:
Super League club nicknames:

Castleford: The Fords
Huddersfield: Fartown/Fartowners
Hull FC: Airlie Birds
Hull KR: Robins
Leeds: Loiners
Salford: Red Devils
St Helens: Saints
Wakefield: Trinity/Dreadnoughts
Warrington: Wire
Widnes: Chemics
Wigan: Riversiders/Pie Eaters

As for the origins, Huddersfield's was taken from the name of their old stadium, Warrington and Widnes were the town's major industries (Warrington was famous for making wire and Widnes was known for chemical works). Castleford and St Helens are fairly obvious, and I'm guessing Hull KR's is because of their club colors of red and white. No idea where the other nicknames came from. Most of the teams still use these nicknames in some way, Loiners is really the only one that has completely died out.

The lower league teams all have nicknames too, I know that Bradford were 'Northern', Featherstone were 'The Flat Cappers', Leigh were 'The Leythers' and Oldham were 'The Roughyeds' as a few examples, again no idea about the origins.
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Never heard Cas called The Fords before. Loiners is a reference to the local name for a lane. Fev were never called the Flatcappers. That's just a recent piss take which the Fev fans ran with, credit to them. They were known as the Colliers.
Salford went to France in the 1930s and the French nicknamed them Diable Rouge or Red Devils. It's stuck ever since despite Man U thieving it in the 1970s.
Wigan are only the pie eaters to everyone else. It's an insult as Wireman explained earlier, Wigan miners broke a strike and ended up eating humble pie. Riversiders comes from the river Douglas which used run at tha back of a stand at the old Central Park.
 
Frank Discussion

Frank Discussion

Juniors
Messages
1,856
Great thread. I've only ever met one person from Halifax and he was the most miserable bloke I've met in my life. I asked him why he was so miserable and he said "because I'm from Halifax".
 
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Evil Homer

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Staff member
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7,178
deluded pom? said:
Never heard Cas called The Fords before.
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You hear 'come on you Fords' chanted at pretty much every Castleford game. It's obviously nowhere near as common as Cas or 'Classy Cas' but they aren't really nicknames. Also plenty of Wigan fans now identify as 'pies' even though it was originally an insult.
 
L

league13

Juniors
Messages
278
Evil Homer said:
Spud covered it pretty much. The team was playing alright and it was a pretty exciting game but they spent the whole time from minute one heckling and abusing their own players and coach. I'm not just talking about the usual old guys at the back either, it was families with kids etc. Really backwards people.
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Your doing a lot of criticizing Homer.Where are you from?
 
Lambretta

Lambretta

First Grade
Messages
8,689
Evil Homer said:
Which is why they probably won't ever make it.

I'm glad TBH, I was at a Halifax match last year and ended up sitting amongst some of their fans, it was honestly one of the most depressing experiences I've had at a RL game.
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That's only because you've never been to Doncaster or Hemel Hempstead

While I'm bagging Hemel, their nickname of the Stags is from the County logo
 
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The Clan

The Clan

Juniors
Messages
693
The Partisan said:
The Dreadnoughts name for 'Wakey' seems to be more about aspiration than industry or location ! Alledgedly about their post WW1 ability to be undefeated in battle according to one source I've seen. Didn't ring true unfortunately !



From memory the Adrian McGregor book covering the 94 Kanagaroos has a bit of history on a few of the old nicknames. ( And he will be the guest speaker at the QRL History Committee lecture in 2015 !)
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Whatever you may think of them now Wakefield Trinity are one of the founder clubs of Rugby League and have a proud history in the game to match anyone.

During the 50s and 60s they could lay claim to being the best club side in the world, being dominant in the UK and beating both NZ and Australian touring teams everytime they played.

The original Dreadnaughts nickname was well earned and a good fit
 
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