Brendan Gallagher

Brendan Gallagher: When Bill Oddie dreamt of winning a Blue

Brendan Gallagher recalls the rugby ambitions of comedy legend Bill Oddie, who played as a No.10 for three years in the King Edward’s Birmingham First XV and narrowly missed out on winning a Cambridge Blue.

by
Brendan Gallagher
2 August 2026

Bill Oddie holding the ball with his King Edward’s First XV

For some reason it amuses me that two of the comic geniuses of our times both went to Oxbridge to read English literature with the primary intention of winning a Rugby Blue… but got waylaid by the need to make people laugh.
I have written before about Monty Python founder Terry Jones, a dynamic flanker at RGS Guildford where he played for the First XV for three seasons and captained the team in his final year before heading to Oxford in 1961.
Jones died six years ago and, alas, Bill Oddie left us this week aged 85.
A diminutive livewire No. 10 who modelled himself on his rugby hero Cliff Mo...

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