Knights give Smith a lift from school
ROBBIE Smith is pleased to have swapped the classroom for his first full-time rugby contract at Steve Boden’s Doncaster.
The Championship Dream Team 2021/22 outside centre joined the Knights this summer after three seasons with Hartpury University RFC.
“It’s really exciting work with Joe Ford and Steve and the facilities here are great,” said Smith. “Joe says a lot of good things, things I have not heard before, and has a lot of good insights. He has helped me out with my core skills and seems like a really down-toearth bloke.”
As well as playing Championship rugby while at Hartpury, the 25year-old was working as a teaching assistant at Gloucester’s famed St Peter’s School.
But now his focus is fully on making a success of the move to Doncaster and, potentially in time, treading the well-worn path of players moving on from Castle Park and into the Premiership.
“Being full-time was one of the things that drove me here, so I could stop being a teaching assistant alongside rugby,” he said.
“It was a great experience and a nice change from the rugby environment. I wasn’t working with the most well-behaved kids, they were borderline, and it was a bit stressful at times.”
Smith is the son of former Gloucester legend and captain Ian, while his grandfather Dick, a fullback, made over 500 appearances for the Cherry & Whites.
Ideally, Hartpury would have led to him signing at Gloucester, where he was in the academy as a 16year-old, but the opportunity never came.
“That was always the
dream,” he said. “I was there in the academy, at 16, but after that, nothing. They have a strong link with Hartpury with them being right next door but I didn’t get a shot.”
Doncaster have revived the careers of many players who’ve either had a brief taste of the Premiership only to be discarded or those, like Smith, who’ve never been given a crack despite their talents.
Last season’s Knights captain, Sam Graham, once of Bristol, swept up at the club’s end-of-season awards and capped a fine season by earning a move to Northampton. It didn’t go unnoticed by Smith.
“A few players moved from Doncaster to the Prem at the end of last season, I think there’s been five or six, all forwards. It’s a good system and they have good connections with the Prem so that helped me make my decision.”
Smith didn’t have a bad season himself, scoring eight tries in 19 league games before being named in the Dream Team, alongside Mark Best in the midfield. Best’s decision to leave Castle Park to pursue other opportunities means the two sadly won’t play together.
“I got a lot of game time last season so that helped massively,” Smith adds. “If you’re not on the pitch, you can’t do much. I was over the moon about getting in the Dream Team, I was telling everyone and anyone. It was a good end to a good season.”