Kent Ravens
 |
|
| Club information | |
|---|---|
| Full name | Kent Ravens Rugby League Football |
| Founded | 2004 |
| Current details | |
| Ground(s) | |
| Competition | Rugby League Conference. |
The Kent Ravens are a defunct amateur rugby league club from Eltham in south-east London, founded in 2004. They played at Princes Park.
The club won 10 titles in the two seasons since its creation on 12 June 2004, including the women’s London league runners up, the under-11s overall London championship and the men’s London League Plate grand final.
The first rugby league club in Kent was a professional outfit, called Kent Invicta. Invicta were formed by Paul Faires and were admitted to the Rugby League on 6 April 1983. Southend United Football Club then approached Invicta and in late 1984 became Southend Invicta but they were struck from the 1985-86 fixtures by the Rugby League only days before the commencement of the new season because they were considered not to have formed a team. They went into liquidation soon afterwards.
There have been many other small amateur teams that played rugby league in Kent, such as Bexleyheath RLFC who won the London League Second division in 1987/1988 and Ashford Bears (1991-1993) who were made up of construction workers from the North of England.
On Saturday 12 June 2004 Kent Ravens juniors beat Brixton Bulls in a friendly at South London Storm's ground in Croydon. Two weeks later came the start of the Kent Ravens men’s team when they entered the London League and played a strong Bedford Tigers side.
But for the Eltham-based club any thoughts of the 2004 season were miles away when the 2005 season started with new ambitions and four new teams within the club including the first ever Kent based women’s rugby league team.
The 2005 season was dedicated to the memory of Adam Donnelly. The under-9s won one festival, women's team were runners up in the London League, the under-13s won the plate at the Mitcham festival and the under-11s won six titles including the overall London Broncos 'Half time Heroes' title for 2004. The men's team won their first piece of silverware when they beat Feltham Eagles 30-18 in the London League plate final and the under-15s had some good results including a 108-6 win over Mitcham Bulls.
...
Wikipedia