Keith Senior joins the Bulls

Bradford Bulls are delighted to announce the addition of Keith Senior to the club’s coaching staff on a consultancy basis for the 2025 season

The 48-year-old enjoyed a stellar playing career that spanned 18 years, initially representing Sheffield Eagles before a trophy-laden 12 years at Leeds Rhinos.

Senior also represented England and Great Britain on the international stage, making 43 appearances and scoring 14 tries. Having hung up his boots in 2011, Senior moved into his first coaching role in 2015 as Assistant Coach to Mark Aston at Sheffield Eagles before departing at the end of the 2024 season.

The opportunity would’ve been ‘daft to turn down’ according to Senior, who has paid tribute to the vision of the club and its Board of Directors.

Keith Senior said:

“After leaving Sheffield, I was in a bit of a predicament as I wasn’t really looking to get back into Rugby, literally from finishing playing I’ve stayed in the rugby environment so I have never had holiday’s in the summer, I have always been involved working and training, never had weekends so I thought it might be just a little bit of time for me to reflect and see what the next stage was.

“I had a brief conversation with Nobby when I told him I would be leaving Sheffield, didn’t think anything of it but having seen him take the head coach role, I just asked him out of the blue if there was any opportunities to join him as an assistant and the opportunity arose so I was very excited.

“The club wants to go in the right direction and when you’re a coach you want to be part of that success just like as a player. I know the vision of the club is to get back to Super League and I know personally how important that is for the game of Rugby League. To have the Leeds-Bradford derby back would be huge not only for the game but for the game in West Yorkshire.

“The big thing is the vision. They’ve sold the vision to me and when you’re in the Championship it’s a dogfight and nobody knows what the future holds. With Nigel Wood, Brian and the rest of the board, their vision is to get Bradford back into Super League and when there’s a job like that available, it seems a bit daft to turn it down, especially when throughout my playing career it was all about success. It was all about being the best, working as a team in the best team environments and if I can bring some of that experience and be part of that then I think I can be a very valuable asset.

“It’s important the players want the success as well and that’s probably the most important element of it. The players have got to want it, it’s all right saying it as a coaching staff and as backroom board members. If it’s not something that the players want to achieve, then it’s a non starter but you can see success is something that the players are driven towards and want.”

Bradford Bulls Head Coach Brian Noble said:

“Keith brings a wealth of experience at the highest level, he was an outstanding Super League and International player and he has a real depth of knowledge at this level too having worked at Sheffield for the last nine years.

“He is a competent coach who can deliver the things that will need delivering throughout the year, as a Bradfordian one thing I had to get over was his Leeds connections but I think we can manage to live with that!

“Keith is really excited to be joining us and understands we are an enthusiastic, progressive club that wants to improve and he will help us prepare all the different types of players we have got in our squad with his skill set.

“I know Keith well and I know what he will bring and I know what he is capable of achieving. We have a bigger squad that will need a lot of attention and in essence, coaching, to the way we want myself and Lee Greenwood to go with.

“We want to change some things and now we have an extra pair of hands to add to what we have already got which augurs well.”