Rugby Reloaded

Is soccer the original form of football that was played in pre-industrial times? But modern soccer looks nothing like the ancient forms of folk football - and for its first few years it was barely distinguishable from rugby. So how did it become the most popular type of football? This week's episode examines whether it was soccer's rules that made it popular or something much more fundamental in l...

In the 1980s, few players bestrode rugby league like Kiwi Olsen Fillipaina. Size, speed, skills and a football super-brain, Olsen had it all. But perhaps even more importantly, he became a symbol of the emergence of Pacific Island players in rugby league and a genuine insipration to those who came after him. But being a pioneer takes its toll, and Olsen suffered from vicious racism and unsympathet...

This week's episode talks to Dr Kevin Marston about his research into the short history of America's first football club, Oneida FC of Boston, which was formed in 1862 in the midst of the American Civil War. What link did it have to American football and soccer and, perhaps even more intriguingly, how has its story been used by supporters of both codes to legitimise their heritage? It's a dispute...

This week's 'Rugby Reloaded' travels back in time to ancient China with Dr Kevin Moore to look at the incredible history of Cuju, the ball game that survived in China for 2,000 years. Was it the forerunner of modern football, as Sepp Blatter once claimed, or was it something far richer and more complex? For more on the history of rugby and the other football codes, take a look at www.rugbyreloaded...

This week's 'Rugby Reloaded' goes audio-visual and looks at the Mitchell & Kenyon rugby films of 1901-03. These are the earliest collection of rugby films from almost the dawn of moving pictures, and were filmed just as the Northern Union was mid-way in its evolution from rugby union rules to what became rugby league. And they also show some of the early giants of the sport - Dicky Lockwood, Alber...

This bonus episode of 'Rugby Reloaded' talks about the 'Life Without League: Rugby at the Time of Coronavirus' project with Dr Victoria Dawson. She started the project to encourage people to keep diaries during the extraordinary times we currently live in. We discuss the importance of diaries for historians of the game, how they help us reconstruct the past, how we should look at the history of ru...

This week's episode of ‘Rugby Reloaded’ goes back to August 1914 to explore how rugby league dealt with the global crisis of World War One. Just like today, the game faced pressures to stop playing, underwent unprecedented financial problems, and had to restructure itself. How did it find a way forward? This is the second of a two part episode that looks at the impact of war on the game - listen t...

This week's 'Rugby Reloaded' looks at the new Netflix series about the early years of English soccer 'The English Game'. Does it present an accurate account of the rise of working-class teams in soccer and the importance of Scottish players to the game? Or is it ultimately a romantic defence of the British class system and a distortion of the history of football? The episode also sheds new light o...

The new ‘Rugby Reloaded’ looks at the last time British rugby league faced a global crisis: the outbreak of World War Two. How did it cope with travel restrictions, stadium requisitioning and equipment rationing? What was the response of players and fans? This is the first of a two part episode that looks at the impact of war on the game. For more on the history of rugby and the other football cod...

his special edition of 'Rugby Reloaded' looks back at how rugby responded to the 1904 smallpox epidemic in West Yorkshire, and asks are there lessons to be learned for today? For more on the history of rugby and the other football codes, take a look at www.rugbyreloaded.com and follow me on Twitter at @collinstony.

Flankers playing at scrum-half? This week's'Rugby Reloaded' talks to rugby union journalist Rhiannon Garth Jones about how union's new positional flexibility seems to reflect the way changes in rugby union are leading it down the same path that league took 100 years ago. Is it merely borrowing from league or is union changing more fundamentally? For more on the history of rugby and the other footb...

In the divided nation of Ireland, rugby union seems to offer a unique form of unity, with one national team representing two countries. This week's 'Rugby Reloaded' talks to Dr Liam O'Callaghan about the roots of Irish rugby and the reality behind its apparent national unity between North and South, and Catholics and Protestants. For more on the history of rugby and the other football codes, take...

To celebrate International Women's Day this week we talk to journalist and broadcaster Joanna Lester about her amazing film 'Power Meri', which charts the rise of women's rugby league in Papua New Guinea and follows the national team, the Orchids, to the 2017 Rugby League World Cup. It's an incredible story about rugby league in PNG communities and how it has helped in the fight against women's op...

To mark the 100th episode of 'Rugby Reloaded' we have a special interview with David Hinchliffe, Labour MP for Wakefield from from 1987 to 2005, one of the founders of the All Party Parliamentary Rugby League Group, and author of 'Rugby's Class War'. We talked about his time in parliament, his attempt to outlaw rugby union discrimination against league, and his thoughts on rugby league today and i...

In 1903 Bradford City became the only club ever accepted into the Football League without ever playing soccer. They had begun as Manningham and were the first Northern Union champions but decided to depart for the greener grass of soccer. Four years later, local rivals Bradford followed suit, but many fans rebelled and formed what would become today's Bradford Bulls. What lay behind Bradford's Gre...

What really happened in Vichy? The new ‘Rugby Reloaded’ discusses new research on why French rugby league was banned in 1941 with Dr Melissa McMahon (@batsyblog). She analyses why league was singled out and how amateurism became weaponised as part of the Vichy government's attempts to return France to a reactionary past. For more on the history of rugby and the other football codes, take a look at...

The Six Nations is back - and this week's 'Rugby Reloaded' talks to rugby journalist and historian Huw Richards about the tournament in the inter-war years. Why did England and Scotland dominate the 1920s? Why were the French expelled? And what impact did rugby league have on Wales? Settle in for a deep dive into rugby union history! For more on the history of rugby and the other football codes, t...

It's the 25th anniversary of Super League, and this week's Rugby Reloaded catches up with former St Helens CEO Sean McGuire to take a deep dive into the lessons and legacy of rugby league's biggest leap since 1895. For more on the history of rugby and the other football codes, take a look at www.rugbyreloaded.com (which also has show notes for this episode) and follow me on Twitter at @collinstony...

This week’s ‘Rugby Reloaded’ talks to Ryan Bodman about his forthcoming book on the social history of rugby league in New Zealand. As Ryan explains, league in NZ has always been a game of the excluded and dispossesed: industrial workers, Maori and Pacific Islanders. He talks about the links between the sport and the labour movement, discusses how anti-Catholic sectarianism saw Irish Catholics come...

This week’s ‘Rugby Reloaded’ chats with Dr Kevin Moore, former Director of the National Football Museum in England and author of a new book, 'What You Think You Know About Football is Wrong: The Global Game's Greatest Myths and Untruths'. We discuss the unquestioned narratives of soccer, such as why did soccer defeat rugby, could soccer have America's national sport, the history of ancient Chinese...

This week’s ‘Rugby Reloaded’ talks to Lydia Furse about the forgotten history of Barette, a 12-a-side version of rugby that became popular with French women in the 1920s. Emerging during the tumultuous 1920s, it began to lose ground in the 1930s before being finally extinguished by the notorious Vichy government. For more on the history of rugby and the other football codes, follow me on Twitter @...

This week's 'Rugby Reloaded' takes a ten-minute trip back to the time when Australians wondered if they'd ever beat the British, fretted about stopping the player drain to England, and raised money to keep rugby union afloat. The 1920s and 1930s were the time when the Kangaroos were underdogs and today's league world was its mirror opposite. For more on the history of rugby and the other football...

This week's 'Rugby Reloaded' talks to Professor Heidi Norman about her work on the history of Aboriginal rugby league in New South Wales. Starting with Jackie Brooks in the early 1920s, she discusses the long and complex story of Aboriginal players, teams and carnivals, and asks what this tells us about rugby league and Australian society. For more on the history of rugby and the other football co...

The 1905-06 All Black tour was arguably the greatest ever, setting the template for all subsequent tours of Britain. Not only did the All Blacks win all but one match, but they despatched most of their opponents with stunning ease. But beneath the brilliance, Southern Hemsiphere rugby players were at breaking point - and the defining tour of rugby union would be the catalyst for the creation of ru...

When was the first organised women's rugby league match in Britain? All is revealed as this week's 'Rugby Reloaded' plus talks to Dr Victoria Dawson about her PhD research into the history of women's involvement in British rugby league. But as the interview reveals, it's not just on the pitch where women have made their presence felt in the game. Dr Dawson is also looking for interviewees for her...