Leeds Rhinos legend Keith Senior joins new club after Sheffield exit

Leeds Rhinos legend Keith Senior has joined a Championship rival after leaving Sheffield Eagles at the end of the 2024 season.

Senior had served as an assistant coach to Mark Aston since 2015 but has called time at the club at the end of the recent campaign. He’s quickly been snapped up by one of the Eagles’ Championship rivals.

The former Leeds Rhinos man has actually joined one of his playing rivals by making a move to join the staff at Bradford Bulls, who are now coached by Brian Noble.

Noble was re-appointed as Bulls head coach 18 years after last holding the job following the exit of Eamon O’Carroll, who has since joined St Helens.

Senior has now been announced as the latest member of the staff at Odsal with Bradford Bulls officially confirming the 48-year-old had joined on a ‘consultancy’ basis for the 2025 season.

Leeds Rhinos legend takes on ‘consultancy’ role with Bradford Bulls

Bradford, who have built an incredibly strong side for the upcoming season, announced Senior’s arrival with a statement shared to the club website.

It read: “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 and Noble have a strong connection from the former Leeds Rhinos man’s playing days given that he was one of just three players to represent Great Britain in each of Noble’s 14 games in charge of the Lions.

Speaking on the move, Noble 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.”

He confirmed that the club’s big goal of returning to Super League is one that he instantly bought into.

“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.”

Noble added: “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!”