Dewsbury Rams supporter Paul March looking forward to ‘continuing the history’ of hometown club as head coach

Dewsbury fan March took over the role from Dale Ferguson, who resigned last week, and oversaw an encouraging performance in his first game in charge against Toulouse on Saturday.

March, who was born and bred in the town, supported the club growing up before playing at the top level with Huddersfield Giants and Wakefield Giants.

He had player-coaching roles at York, Hunslet and Keighley before taking up the head coach role at local side Shaw Cross Sharks in 2022. He joined the Rams earlier this year as an assistant to Ferguson.

March revealed to the Reporter Series: “It’s my hometown club and I am looking forward to continuing the history of the club and doing well for the Dewsbury people.

“Over the last few weeks, the team is getting there but, collectively, we have still got a lot of work to do. It is my job to make sure we put that work in and we start to get some results.”

Asked if the role meant that little bit more to him due to his connection with the town, he replied:

“It does, yeah. I never got the opportunity to play for my hometown club and I would have loved to have put the shirt on. But this is the next best thing.

“I know a lot of people who support Dewsbury. I was a Dewsbury supporter growing up and I used to go to Crown Flatt, so it does mean a lot to me.

“Hopefully I can get the boys fired up and start playing some entertaining rugby for everyone to come and watch.”

Although Dewsbury were defeated 38-21 against Toulouse last weekend, March insists his side will still be “working hard” despite there being no game this coming weekend.

He said: “Effort-wise from the players was second to none. There are a couple of areas where we can fix up but we lost the energy battle in the end and we were on the wrong end of a 15-5 penalty count which I thought was a bit wrong. That shows that one team was ill-disciplined but I don’t think we were that ill-disciplined to be fair. We worked our socks off but that energy battle took its toll.

“We need to still be working hard and putting things right. The injured players were in on Tuesday and the rest of the squad were back in on Wednesday for a big session. We have then got a closed session with Keighley Cougars on Friday so we will be keeping our match fitness up.”

Asked about the Rams’ start to the season which sees them sit bottom of the Championship table on points difference, March said:

“It was always going to be difficult. Budget-wise we are probably the lowest in the league and all I ask of the players is to have that 100 per cent effort every week and if we do that, and stick to a plan, we will get more wins than losses.

“I am hopeful. It showed on Saturday that we have got something about us and that we can dig deep and hopefully we can get out of this hole.”