“There’s none so fair as can compare with the Bideford RFC”.

So goes the last line of the local adaptation of a well-known rugby ditty, and few teams have justified the claim more than the 15 lads of the Bideford Chiefs this season.

The Chiefs have rattled up 653 points and conceded only 132. This surpassed the previous club record, set up last season, by the remarkable majority of 341 points. They have also created a new defensive record by having 25 points fewer than last year scored against them.

They have won 31 games, only lost three and drawn three.

They have inflicted defeat on several of Devon and Cornwall’s top teams and, without belittling the fact that it has indeed been a team effort, it must be conceded that many of the victories were based on the immaculate kicking of full-back Mike Grigg.

Mike smashed the individual club record in January when he passed the existing record of 130 points (held by Mervyn Bird) and has since raised it to almost double that. It now rests at 252 points until next season when, if this season’s performance is any guide, he has every opportunity to better it.

Stand-off Bert Smale is this season’s leading try scorer and next in line with the individual points. Incidentally, prop-forward Colin Balsdon has only missed one match with the Chiefs since je joined them in April 1962, and he has now appeared in 97 games in succession.

To cap it all the Chiefs have retained an unbeaten home record since September 1963.

In the photograph – Alan Deacon, Derek Miller, Brian Welford, Dave Daniels, Brian Rickard, Mick Morris, Roger Grigg, Geoff Folland, Colin Balsdon, Roger Geen, Mick Stevens, Bert Smale, Terrence Bird, Trevor Langbridge, Bill Lock, Mike Grigg and Roger Hunkin.

Article dated 7 May 1965