{"id":336767,"date":"2025-08-11T21:53:17","date_gmt":"2025-08-11T21:53:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/336767\/"},"modified":"2025-08-11T21:53:17","modified_gmt":"2025-08-11T21:53:17","slug":"joe-ford-in-perfect-position-as-sale-sharks-tenure-makes-it-a-family-affair","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/336767\/","title":{"rendered":"Joe Ford in ‘perfect position’ as Sale Sharks tenure makes it a family affair"},"content":{"rendered":"

Sale Sharks\u2019 creativity and attacking gameplan will be very much a family affair this season after Joe Ford joined his younger brother George at the club.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Joe, the eldest of three brothers in a rugby-mad family, arrived at Sale this summer to become their new attack coach.<\/p>\n

The 35-year-old former Leeds, Northampton, Sale<\/a> and Leicester fly-half has replaced Paul Deacon, who has rejoined Wigan Warriors\u2019 coaching staff after a decade at the Sharks.<\/p>\n

Ford x2<\/p>\n

There is huge intrigue to Ford\u2019s appointment because he will be working very closely with his 32-year-old sibling George, who recently passed a century of England Test caps.<\/p>\n

Joe will also be taking a step down, in his job title at least, after leaving his role as head coach at Championship side Doncaster Knights to take up the Sale job.<\/p>\n

It is a similar route that his father Mike took after becoming head coach at Saracens before joining England as their defence coach in 2006.<\/p>\n

Mike Ford told Planet Rugby: \u201cJoe is following my path in terms of having become a head coach really early in his career and now stepping back a bit in terms of responsibility but stepping up a level from the Championship to the Premiership<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s had a taste of being a head coach at Doncaster and is now going to get his head down over the next few years and try and become the best attack coach he can be in the top flight.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s only 35 but what an opportunity for him to work at Sale with his brother.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn five or 10 years\u2019 time, Joe can look at becoming a head coach again.<\/p>\n

\u201cI did that after being head coach at Oldham in rugby league and then Saracens in union but I wasn\u2019t quite ready for it, so I went back to being a defence coach.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen I got the top job at Bath a few years later, I\u2019d got all the experience I needed, so Joe is in a perfect position.<\/p>\n

How George Ford put Lions snub behind him to achieve \u2018ultimate goal\u2019 for England he set aged 16<\/b><\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cHe did really well at Doncaster and I think they won the last 12 or 13 games he was involved in there.<\/p>\n

\u201cOne of those was beating Sale in the Premiership Rugby Cup, so that did him no harm!<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m looking forward to seeing George and Joe together at Sale next season.\u201d<\/p>\n

Joe and George run a coffee shop together in their native Oldham area and enjoy a close relationship.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou come to our house at teatime and around the table nothing else is talked about but rugby,\u201d laughs Ford Snr.<\/p>\n

\u201cI remember being at Headingley in November 2009 watching a 16-year-old George make his debut for Leicester against Joe, who was playing for Leeds.<\/p>\n

\u201cGeorge was the youngest ever to play the game and still is, and Joe got man of the match that day.<\/p>\n

\u201cJacob, my youngest son, is back home in Oldham now as well.<\/p>\n

Another Ford<\/p>\n

\u201cHe had coaching roles at Ipswich School and Bury St Edmunds Rugby Club, but he wanted to come home and is currently applying for a few roles in rugby union.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s helping Oldham Roughyeds Rugby League Club out with a bit of analysis at the moment and is very much looking for a job back in rugby union.<\/p>\n

\u201cJacob is just waiting for the right opportunity but, like his two brothers, he is rugby mad and unbelievably driven.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey have been in an environment where they have only known rugby. I\u2019m really proud of all three of them.\u201d<\/p>\n

READ MORE: Henry Pollock one of nine new England players given Elite Player Squad contracts but one of the original 17 loses his deal<\/a><\/b><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Sale Sharks\u2019 creativity and attacking gameplan will be very much a family affair this season after Joe Ford…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":336768,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4102],"tags":[225,12,6875,4151,2384,79,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-336767","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-rugby","8":"tag-home-page","9":"tag-news","10":"tag-premiership","11":"tag-rugby","12":"tag-sale-sharks","13":"tag-sports","14":"tag-uk","15":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115012357557338406","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/336767","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=336767"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/336767\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/336768"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=336767"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=336767"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=336767"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}