West Bowling
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West Bowling
Amateur Rugby League Football Club
West Bowling ARLFC was formed in December 1950 by a group of rugby league enthusiasts and played friendlies for the remainder of the 1950-51 season , before joining the Bradford & District ARL at the commencement of the 1951-52 season .
The club has put together a history of which they have every right to be proud since then and re-joined the Pennine League Premier Division when Summer rugby was introduced and also moving to its current headquarters at Cue Gardens .
Except for one season since re- joining the Pennine League , the first team has remained in the Premier division ; being crowned champions in 2014-15 season , Pennine Cup finalist 2014-15 , Bradford ARL Cup winners 2014-15 , Pennine Cup Premier division runner ’ s up by a few points difference 2015-16 .
Over these last few seasons the juniors have gone from strength to strength with teams ranging from U7 ’ s to U15 ’ s along with a girls team being formed two years ago and this season has seen the introduction of the club ’ s youngest ever junior team , being known as West Bowling Nipper ’ s aged 3-6 year olds .
When the Pennine League winter season was completed in April 2016 , the club ’ s two open age teams switched to playing in the Yorkshire Men ’ s League , which is a summer based league run by the RFL ; the second team played in the entry league and the 1st team played in the Premier division and were crowned league champions and went onto win the YML premier division grand Final play off .
Rugby Club Magazine was keen to gain an insight into the success the club has achieved and with this in mind we caught up with Club Chairman Michael Gorman . He told us , “ I have been involved with the club for over thirty five years ; I was introduced to the club by my dad . I started with the under 15 ’ s and progressed through the junior section culminating in becoming 1st team captain . I am now the current club chairman .”
The Role
“ The most challenging aspects are the on-going efforts to improve our facilities in order to facilitate all teams , fortunately I have support from committed members of our committee who like me give up endless hours of our free time in order to achieve our goals . The most rewarding
36 Issue 73