My Bedford team could have made it in the Prem
RUDI STRAEULI used to have a saying, ‘Bedford players, friends for life’ and that’s been true for every Blues team I’ve been involved in, from the moment I joined from Ely RFC in 1991 to my last season in 2004/5. I had an enjoyable spell with London Irish in between but it’s fair to say Bedford is ‘my team’, and fortunately I am still involved to this day as a fan and also as the go-between in recruitment, dealing with agents on Mike Rayer’s and the club’s behalf.
My move to Bedford all came about when I was 21 and Ely were playing Cambridge in the County Cup. The Bedford physio, Roy Carter, was watching the game and he asked me afterwards to come down to Goldington Road for a trial. Back then, Bedford were in the Courage League Third Division but it was still a big step up. Mike Rafter came in to coach us not long after I joined, and we started to push for promotion, which we eventually achieved in the 1994/95 season, beating Richmond on the final day to go up as champions. A couple of guys from Northampton came over, John Thame and Peter Moss, one a centre and one a full-back, and they made a big difference to me, as did the superb Mark Renell and Mark Howe in the forwards, also we had Andy Finney at flyhalf who could play a bit and was a very good kicker. It was the best of the amateur era, with guys that played hard and partied hard and the changing room was full of characters like Pete Garrett, Mark Sharpe, Jimbo Chandler, Steve Harris and Leigh Mansell, who is now one of the directors of the club.
When Frank Warren came in, I was one of the few members of the existing squad that was kept on. I’d played for the Midlands in the 1995 Divisional Championship, scoring what turned out to be the last-ever try in the competition in a highscoring defeat to the North at Nottingham, and was also in the Midlands side that beat Samoa 40-19 at Welford Road. Matt Dawson and Paul Grayson were outstanding that day and won their first England caps against the Samoan Test XV the following weekend.
It was a magic time, that first year under Frank. We had superstars turning up, people who you’d seen on TV were playing for us, and we had huge crowds and won loads of games. It was us, Coventry, Richmond and Newcastle who were known as the money boys. My favourite day at Goldington Road was when we beat Newcastle in front of a 6,500-capacity crowd, live on
Sky. I think the Lions had been picked to go to South Africa on the Wednesday of that week and seven Newcastle players were in the squad. But we beat them and I scored a try, so it was a great day all round – for us, anyway. The party started and lasted for a couple of days but we were brought back down to earth by Moseley the following week. Even so, anyone who was at the ground holds very fond memories of that Newcastle match.
When the game first went professional, there was the mentality that you were being paid to be at the club so you would be at the club, whether it was necessary or not. Monday morning training was 10 o’clock football followed by basketball. So, as you can imagine, Sunday became a big all-day drinking session because we knew we didn’t have much to survive the following day. Halfway through that first season, Rudi came in and Monday morning football became a 7am gym session. A character like that was never going to take a back seat and let things drift along.
We still managed to retain the same Bedford ethos in those days even though the playing personnel was very different. Martin Offiah was there for the first year and Rory (Underwood) came in when he left. Offiah was electric, and I learnt so much from him, even in training. When we were doing team runs, he would always go through the whole process of touching the ball down over the line; it was just second-nature to him. The good thing about having Offiah on the wing was that it created a lot more space for me. The opposition were far more worried about what he might do than what Ben Whetstone might do! I was fortunate in the professional years to play with some phenomenal players, like Paul Turner, Mike Rayer and Junior Paramore. If you ran a line, they’d put you through a hole. What a signing Mike was. He had a way of finding space and creating space. His dummy was bought by pretty much everybody.
When Frank ran into problems with Don King, the club suffered some dark times and was very nearly sold to Coventry. Bounced pay cheques were bad but nothing compared to the thought of the club going out of business. By that stage, I’d moved on to London Irish. It’s a real shame that Bedford team broke up. We got to backto-back Cheltenham & Gloucester Cup Finals in the late 90s, and had a load of supporters cheering us on as the games were at Franklin’s Gardens, but lost to Gloucester on both occasions. Had that team stayed together, I believe we’d have gone on to establish ourselves in the Premiership.
Dick Best signed me at London Irish and was a ton of fun; he and Andy Keast were brilliant guys. We had a great Tetley’s Cup run, and got to the semi-final. We lost to Northampton at the Madejski in a double header, I think Wasps played against Bristol in the first match, and we also got to the semi-final of the European
Challenge Cup.
While I was at Irish, Geoff Irvine and a couple of other local businessmen, Dave Ledsom and David Gunner, came in and steadied the ship at Bedford. When the opportunity to go back there came up, it was an easy decision to make.
Bedford is just an awesome place. It is a rugby town, and everybody gets rugby. Unfortunately, I snapped my Achilles in the last season under Rudi, and that was me done. It was just before Mike came back as coach. It would have been good to have played under him. I’ve no doubt it would have been a lot of fun.
“Rudi came in and Monday morning football became a 7am gym session”