‘Monster’ task to lift Titans to celebrity position

“I HAVE an instinct about this monster, monster rugby club.”

Eric Hall could sell sun lotion in a snow storm, so promoting Rotherham Titans should be a doddle.

The cigar-smoking, catchphrase-toting cockney has landed at Clifton Lane – though from which planet is still unknown – to help raise the profile of the Yorkshire team, their sport and the club’s players.

Rotherham have been sauntering along nicely since their days of Premiership heartache a decade ago, having stabilised in union’s second tier.

Money is tight, ambitions are modest – making a conversation with the garralous and colourful Hall in the club’s empty and dated clubhouse on a bitingly cold midweek afternoon all the more surreal.

“This is a similar situation to the one I had with Wimbledon FC many years back,” begins Hall, reflecting on his days with Dennis Wise, Vinnie Jones, John Fashanu and the gang he helped make crazy.

“The ground was awful at Plough Lane, but two, three years later you pick up a paper and you start to see John Fashanu doing this spread, that spread, and Vinnie Jones, pre-movie days, doing ballet.

“I found out Wimbledon had a ballet dancer as a fan, and an opera singer, so I got the three of them together, Vinnie, the ballet dancer and the opera singer and did a ballet thing for the papers.

“Wimbledon were a non-league club, and then they got in the league and suddenly they were in the First Division and in a final playing and beating Liverpool at Wembley.

“I get the same buzz here, I don’t know why, it’s just an instinct about this monster, monster rugby club.

“I met some of the players and it was like going back 20 years, I was looking around thinking that’s the John Fashanu of the club, that’s the Dennis Wise.

“These guys are a talented team and with the right management, which they have, and with me purely on the PR side, I can help. I’m not here to tell ’em how to play rugby, I’ve got no idea.

“I wouldn’t know a scrum-half from half-time.

“Somebody said to me the other day ‘you know nothing about rugby’, but I don’t need to know anything about rugby.

“You don’t need to be an opera singer to know about Pavarotti. I’m here because I like to get involved and promote, like I did for many years in the record business and football world.”

Hall’s association with the Titans, which is on an as-and-when basis, came about through his interest in a band called Red Track, promoted by Rotherham businessman Spencer Fearne.

The founder of Life Skills Solutions, Fearne has also owned East Stirling FC in Scotland and was a part of a consortium that tried to buy Sheffield Wednesday before Milan Mandaric nipped in and saved the club from administration.

Hall was on the fringes of the Fearne deal to buy the Owls, which would have made a lot more sense given it is the football world for which he has been associated with for decades.

Yet the man who has worked with pop royalty such as Queen and Cliff Richard has wound up at Rotherham with the likes of Andre Bester, Joe Bedford and Ryan Burrows.

“I’ve learned a bit about rugby, did a bit of homework, or research which is the word now in the business,” says Hall.

“Rotherham have not lost a game at home all season.”

“Well twice,” interrupts Fearne.

To which Hall responds: “I’m not that good at reading. They’d not lost a game the day I was reading about them... it was a Thursday. They kept a monster clean sheet.”

There is a serious side to this double act, well Fearne at least.

The 36-year-old joined the board last November and is working alongside fellow directors Nick Cragg and Martin Jenkinson to help get the club in the Premiership.

They have named Don Valley Stadium and Doncaster Rovers’ Keepmoat Stadium as potential grounds should they win promotion to the Premiership this year, though with Worcester near-certainties to win the play-offs and Rotherham seventh seeds out of eight teams when the post-season begins on Saturday, that is unlikely.

They are also exploring five potential sites as their new ground away from Clifton Lane, as they plan for a more concerted push next term.

The priority this season is to gain experience of the promotion play-offs and speed up improvements to the club’s infrastructure.

“Infrastructure,” chimes up Hall. “I’m a Jewish boy from the east end, I have no idea what infrastructure means. That sounds like a player at Chelsea.

“In all seriousness, I want this challenge. I’m here to do certain events, like a celebrity night, question and answer sessions with old players, and maybe some kind of celebrity rugby matches.

“Going back years ago, I got Steve Perryman, the Tottenham captain and my first football client, on Crackerjack.

“I’m not saying we’re going to get Rotherham Titans players on Crackerjack, but when I got into football I started treating the players like pop stars, and that’s what they are now.

“Rugby is ready for that now, you’ve got rugby players on Strictly Come Dancing.

“It’s started already and I want to take it from the top end to here at Rotherham. I hate to say this but you go over the road and knock on the door and ask have you heard of so and so from Rotherham Titans and they’ve probably never heard of ’em, not even aware of ’em.

“What Spencer and the board are doing is trying to get this team in the Premiership, I’m coming in to try and raise the profile of the club.

“At the moment, what the players have got to do is purely concentrate on their matches, don’t be distracted by him, by me, by you, by her – just win matches and get to the final of the play-offs.

“For me, this is my Wimbledon again, it brings back memories, but it ain’t football, it’s rugby.”

And rugby union had better be ready. Crazy days.