The club had been founded in 1902 by cousins Harold Willey and Billy Gray and hadplayed at a number of grounds in the city in the early years of its existence. The first was at Sandygate and this was followed by spells at Tinsley, Millhouses and Handsworth.

In 1911 the Sheffield Amateur Sports Club came into existence. This was at the instigation of Robert Hargreaves, a member of Sheffield Hockey Club, who proposed a loose organisation of the leading amateur sports clubs in the area to pursue their mutual interests and in particular to find a ground upon which they could all play. The clubs involved were Sheffield RUFC, Sheffield Hockey Club, Sheffield Collegiate Cricket club and Sheffield Football club. The new organisation bought some land at Handsworth but bringing the ground up to the required standard was much more expensive than had been thought and the ground was little used.

In the autumn of 1919 the SASC found a piece of land at Dore, part of the Abbeydale Park estate, that was ideal for its purposes. 21 acres of this land were to be auctioned on 18th November and a meeting was hurriedly convened to decide whether or not a bid was possible. It was agreed that the opportunity was too good to miss and that Hargreaves could bid £5000.As it was a bid of £4500 was accepted by the vendor, one Ebenezer Hall.

A lot of work was necessary to bring the grounds up to the required standard and this came at a considerable cost. The funds for this and the purchase came from the sale of the ground at Handsworth, and an issue of shares which yielded £6300 in the first two months. The following summer the board was able to buy a further 13 acres of the estate and Abbeydale Hall itself. The SRUFC contribution to this was easily the biggest of the clubs involved, their members contributing nearly twice as much as the next section ( football ). In addition the original deposit was provided wholly by the rugby club from the sale of the ground at Tinsley years previously.

The first game was against Leicester Westleigh, who later amalgamated with Wigston in 1999 to form the current National League team, Leicester Lions. It did not, unfortunately, match the occasion as a strong wind made open play difficult and a scrappy game was decided by the only try, by J.S. Gordon to give Sheffield their first Abbeydale home win, 3-0.
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Since then we have played here another 1392 times ! The club and the ground are unrecognisable now from 100 years ago. SRUFC have multiple teams instead of just one and provide rugby for all ages and abilities for both sexes, whilst remaining competitive at first team level.

Perhaps the biggest change for the ground is that the main pitch has been flat since 1993, after about 70 years of the infamous ‘ slope ‘ when the bottom touchline was just above the the level of the hockey pitch