Sale Sharks

Sale Sharks is an English professional rugby union club who play in the Aviva Premiership.

The club is an offshoot of amateur club Sale FC, still based at Heywood Road in Sale, while the Sharks share the A.J. Bell Stadium with Salford Red Devils rugby league club.

Their junior team, the Jets, has developed players including Steve Hanley, Mark Cueto, Dean Schofield, Chris Jones, Andy Titterrell and Charlie Hodgson.

History

The club was founded in 1861 and is one of the oldest clubs in English rugby. Throughout their history they have been one of the leading rugby union clubs in the North of England. Sale moved into Heywood Road in 1905 and would remain there until 2003.

Sale were unbeaten in 26 matches, winning 24 and drawing two in 1911.

Although Pat Davies is counted as Sale's first international, having been picked to play for England in 1927, it was G.A.M. Isherwood who was Sale's first representative in an international Test match, when he played in all three tests of the 1910 British tour to South Africa at scrum-half. The club has consistently provided international players and, during the 1930s, had one of its most dominant periods, fielding players of the calibre of Hal Sever (England), Claude Davey and Wilf Wooller (Wales) and Ken Fyfe (Scotland). It came as little surprise when they took out the 1936 Middlesex Sevens.