Salford graduate reflects on emotional journey with rugby league titans Wigan Warriors

The journey started before Vic arrived at Salford, with the 24-year-old taking a Creative Media course at college as she was keen to develop a career in media. She chose the University of Salford after being won over by the MediaCity campus.

“I didn’t look at any others because of where the Salford campus was and the connections it had in the area. Something just really drew me to it and it ended up living up to the billing,” she said.

Her time at Salford was punctuated however by the COVID-19 pandemic meaning her time on campus was limited over the three years.

Vic said: “Unfortunately, COVID-19 was a big factor. The pandemic happened during my second year and the vast majority of my third year. It meant I had little time on campus over the last two years. When I was there, it was great, and I would have definitely loved to have been there more.”

The opportunity at Wigan came during the course’s Professional Practices module – a compulsory module where students are asked to undertake placements to equip with them with industry experience.

“I remember Lyndon [Saunders, Senior Lecturer] saying that it was quite competitive to get the experience and that we needed to think outside of the box.

“I thought about Wigan TV originally [Wigan Warriors’ in-house media channel] and did a bit of scouring. I then found Stewart [Frodsham, Head of Media and Marketing] on LinkedIn, came in for a chat and never left.”

Vic initially spent a year doing unpaid work within the Warriors media set-up where she spent time gathering content for the club’s channels at the training base and match days at the Brick Community Stadium.

Due to the pandemic, a majority of the games in the first year were played behind closed doors, so it wasn’t until the 2021 season, when Vic was in her final year at Salford, that she started covering every home match day and spending two to three days a week with the club.

This coincided with Vic also carrying out a paid role within Wigan Warriors Community Foundation. where she worked with the dedicated team that runs rugby league events and sessions in schools across the Wigan area.

Vic explains: “I learnt so much from just being there. I was there for so long and because I wasn’t able to have a lot of hands-on time at university, my time there was more than making up for it and ultimately, I was proving to them that I could do the job.”

After graduating in the summer of 2021, Vic was then offered a full-time role at the Warriors and over the last four years, has risen to the post of Video Content Producer.

“It really is my dream job. It is very busy during the season but then we have a great team. We are all very close knit, and we make sure that each of us has the right work life balance and that we’re flexible with our time as well,” she said.

The last year proved to be monumentally successful for the Warriors as they claimed all four available trophies, the Super League, the League Leader’s Shield, the Challenge Cup and the World Club Challenge. This was only the fourth time in the sport’s summer era that a club has claimed all four trophies and the 2024 Warriors side also picked up the BBC Sports Team of the Year Award.

Reflecting on the year, Vic said: “It was an amazing experience. At each big moment, we didn’t want to get ahead of ourselves. The players were very confident, but the backroom staff were more reserved. Matt Peet [Head Coach, Wigan Warriors] had the mentality of treating every semi-final like the final and the players bought into that.

“The vibes around the club were something else. I’ve never experienced anything quite like it.

“I think when it came to Old Trafford, when we won the Grand Final, it didn’t sink in right away because we were just processing it. But then afterwards, when we had all the trophies together, it was like ‘what we have done?’

“When I think back to it, being a part of it was just absolutely unreal.”