Bury St Edmunds Team News and Preview!

22nd August 2024

Joe Ford and Sir Ian McGeechan have put out the first Doncaster Knights team of the season.

The squad will face Bury St Edmunds in a pre season friendly fixture at Castle Park, tomorrow night at 7:30PM.

The team is as follows:

Jasper McGuire
Ben Chapman
Lewis Thiede
Adam Hopkinson
Josh Williams
Archie Smeaton
Rhys Tait
Morgan Strong (C)
Will Metcalfe
Alex Dolly
Harry Davey
Sai Tobeyaweni
Zach Kerr
Semesa Rokoduguni
Jordan Olowofela
Fred Davies
Drew Turner
Joe Jones
James Harrison
Thom Smith
Taniela Ramasibana
James Blackett*
Max Woolgar-Norton

James Blackett is a guest player who was previously part of Newcastle Falcons and Max Woolgar-Norton is one of our Academy members.

Jacob Odams, is in his third year of the Doncaster Knights academy and often features for the Phoenix team. Odams will be featuring for Bury St Edmunds.

Head Coach Joe Ford shares his feelings heading into Friday’s game:

“It’s exciting, we’ve obviously got a lot of new players who have joined us, so getting to see them for the first time at Castle Park is exciting.”

Pre-season has been brilliant but it does get to a stage where you’re ready for a game, and I think the lads are, so i’m looking forward to what they’re going to look like on the pitch what they can bring.”

Ford explains the importance behind the pre season training camp at Bury and the training session at Sale:

“They’ve been everything. As staff and a group of coaches, the number one thing we wanted was to be tight as a team. Because we have had a lot of turnover, we knew we were probably behind a little bit on that, so we spent a few days on a camp in Bury which was invaluable for that. We had some pretty deep conversations that didn’t involve rugby.”

We have been trying to connect a little bit more and get to know each other, which we feel, if we can get that right, we’ll obviously turn up on field for each other a little bit more. That’s been the number one thing and we’re really happy with how that’s gone. I couldn’t have asked for more.”

Friday will be the first time the brand new Knights squad will play a game as a team. The squad contains a real mixture of exciting young talent, and experienced and skilful players. Ford said:

“We’ve got Geech [Sir Ian McGeechan] here, who is so experienced and he said to me, ‘you won’t understand the impact they’ll have on the young lads until they’re actually here’ and it’s proven to be right.”

We’ve obviously got Logo who’s won the Premiership a number of times, Roko has played for England, Joe Jones has been about the Premiership, George Wacokecoke, people like that. It’s been brilliant for the young lads and the lads whohave been here for years just to see what it looks like at the very top.

Ford explains how the Prem Cup fixture announcement has added an extra boost to the pre season training:

“We are really excited. A Battle of the North. Obviously with Sale, we’ve got connections, can’t wait for that one. We’ve got connections with Newcastle through Darren Fearn and a couple of signings.

And then Caldy are obviously the other Northern team in the Championship. I love the way they’ve done that. It’s going to add a little bit to the games and really excited for them.”

You can still purchase tickets for tomorrow’s pre season friendly against Bury St Edmunds. The tickets are significantly discounted, season tickets are valid for the game and U16s (as usual) go free!

Grab your ticket to see our brand new squad in action for the first time this season.