A BRADFORD school could soon have its first girls-only rugby league team thanks to some inspiration from a local player who helped smash preconceptions about gender and race.

PE staff at Laisterdyke Business and Enterprise College have set up their first rugby league team, and are being helped by Saima Hussain - the country’s first Asian female rugby league player. They hope to be competing in national competitions in September.

A large number of the school’s pupils are Asian, and with Asian and Muslim females often being under represented in sports, staff decided to bring Saima for inspiration. Along with Keighley Cougars coach Paul March, the pupils have come out of their comfort zone and got involved in the world of rugby.

Keighley resident Saima, a sport development officer for the Bradford Youth Development Partnership, used to play for the Keighley Cats, as well as representing Yorkshire and England. In doing so she became the first Muslim woman to have such a role. Saima, 35, now encourages positive attitudes towards sport through sharing her own story about coming to rugby aged nine, and has been committed to raising the profile of women’s rugby league and encourage more women, including Asian women, to become involved.

In March she won the Sports Award at the Bradford Inspirational Women Awards ceremony for her years of work.

Despite the year seven pupils at Laisterdyke having only been introduced to the sport in January, the school already has enough enthusiastic pupils to start a team. Staff hope they will be competing with other schools by the start of the new academic year.

The 11 and 12 year-olds have been learning the sport during their timetabled PE lessons. When a team is picked, they will start practicing after school.

Lee Allington, faculty leader head of PE at Laisterdyke Business and Enterprise College said the response from the students had exceeded all their expectations. He said: “Our aim is to change perceptions and show people how girls can contribute to this sport. Our pupils have been very enthusiastic, especially meeting the role model Saima who represented England.”

He said the majority of the girls in the team were Asian, and is delighted that so many pupils have signed up. He said: “Loads of pupils wanted to do it, so many that we will actually have to start whittling down the numbers to make a team. There has been a much better response than I had ever thought we’d get. We’ve just had so many wanting to sign up.

“Our goal is to have teams entering the national cup at the start of the next academic year.

“All the girls are completely new to the sport.”

The girls recently attended the Wakefield Wildcats Stadium to watch a year 7 schools final, and Mr Allington said the girls were so into the competition that they were coming up with their own chants to support different teams.

He added: “The girls who have signed up are a real mix between the sets in the school.

“We’ve moved classes outside now and started on tackles, so it is getting a lot more real for those who are involved. It is just something different to anything they have ever done before. It can be hard to get girls to take part in competitive sports, let alone contact sports like rugby, so we’re really happy with how it has gone.”

Plans are already underway to create girls teams at other schools, and Mr Allington is looking forward to when Laisterdyke’s girls can play other local teams.

Although many parents may not be too keen on their daughters taking part in the sport, which is perceived as being one of the toughest, he said the girls’ families have been very supportive of the lessons.

He added: “I’m not pretending we’ll win the national competitions any time soon, but this is a great way to open up another sport to the girls in our school. It is getting them competing that is the main thing we’re aiming for.”