Ray French
Raymond James French, MBE (born 23 December 1939) is an English former rugby league and rugby union footballer who played in the 1950s and 1960s. French played at international level in both codes. He won four caps for England in rugby union in 1961 as a lock forward, then moved to rugby league as a second-row and played for his home town club, St. Helens, before going on to play at Widnes.
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| Full name | Raymond James French MBE | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Born | 23 December 1939 St Helens, Lancashire, England | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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| Position | Second-row | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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After training as a school teacher, he taught at Cowley School in St. Helens, Lancashire, where his local counterparts included Brian Ashton who taught at Stonyhurst College.
French was a commentator for the BBC on rugby league on both television and radio, beginning is television career in 1982 following the retirement of Eddie Waring. He is well known for his range of colloquialisms. French is regularly heard on the Rugby League show Try Time each Thursday on BBC Radio Merseyside giving his views on the state of the game in his forthright way. He retired in 2019.
In 2010, French received the Mike Gregory Spirit of Rugby League Award to mark his contribution to the game.
Also President of the St Helens Past Players' Association, French was appointed Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE) in the 2011 New Year Honours for services to rugby league.