It was a rather grey and gloomy, but nevertheless an unseasonably warm, Saturday as we make another journey down the M62 to face West Park St Helens. West Park sit one place above us in the ADM premier league but are on a run of three successive league victories and their only reversal was at the hands of runaway league leaders Didsbury Toc H, so a tough challenge lay ahead unquestionably.

We are still struggling to return our pre-pandemic playing numbers and it would appear that other clubs are similarly affected with fixtures being cancelled. A few years ago we regularly turned out four teams at Oldham Rufc .......we are currently down to two. This has a serious impact on your ability to survive as a viable organisation as less players means less money coming in over your bar. You would have thought that people would have been desperate to spend time doing the things that were withheld from us for such a long period. Perhaps they have all taken up other activities apart from brutal outdoor sport. They may have become knitters or artists or authors or spend their time doing yoga or meditation. However, they need to remember what Saturday afternoon is really all about and that is getting your kit on, getting outside in the fresh air and being part of that fantastic tradition of mass participation in sport.

We have lost a seriously talented group of players, some as a result of migration to less attractive parts of the country, no accounting for taste, or as a result of long term injuries. Turning out a stable team is proving very difficult and is a real challenge to our new coach. For this week’s encounter Tom Davies with a broken clavicle was added to this seasons injury list of John Souter, Cameron Wood, Jamie Dalloway, Josh Watson, Martin Meggison Simon Gardener, Stuart Brennan, Ryan Arundale; Louis Townsend, Ryan Pickles, Alex Kurkiewicz were unavailable and Dean McEwan and Ryan North couldn’t make it on the day. That’s a ridiculous amount when you think about it. Fortunately a couple who are nursing injuries bailed us out, Adam Taquila made a very welcome return and Wayne Hadfield made his first team debut. We are immensely grateful to the 18 who turned up.

Oldham received the kick off and had the better of the first 20 minutes. The forwards dominated and controlled the game with Rob Froggatt, Tom Hannon and Nick Hackman proving hard to handle. Phil Whitham at scrum half was bringing them onto the ball at pace and we looked in good shape. A catch and drive from the 22 saw Oldham march towards the try line. The ball was recycled a couple of times and Froggatt looked as if he must score but was stopped agonisingly short. However, Hannon gathered and dived over for the opening try. A difficult conversion from the wrong side by Froggatt made the score 0-7. Not long after Froggatt nailed a penalty from the 10 m line with plenty to spare and Oldham led 0-10.
West Park were clearly rattled and played their trump card which in truth changed the game. They brought on former St Helens rugby league player Maurie Faasavalu at No8. He gave them some go forward and instilled confidence and belief in his team mates. Oldham were further undermined when Whitham was shown a yellow card for a late tackle and in the ten minutes before half time West Park scored three converted and unanswered tries to lead 21-10 at the break.

Despite the score line, there were some really promising spells of rugby in the first half from Oldham, particularly in the first 20 minutes when they dominated proceedings in both attack and defence. Hannon, Chris Brown, Jack Sayle and Paul Wardle were having an even tussle at scrum time and Rhys Jones and Jack Taylor were mainly secure at the lineout. Nick Wright worked tirelessly around the pitch. Louis Fitton, Martin Kenny and Owen Hewson had their work cut out containing the opposition midfield but often gained ground when in possession. West Park is a big pitch and Phil Conroy Taquila and Jordan McEwan had a lot of ground to cover but supported each other well. We started conceding penalties the end of the half and therefore spent long periods without the ball in our own half. The game tends to be a bit easier at this level when you are in possession.

Oldham needed a fast start to the second half and were camped in the West Park 22 for a while. A poor clearance kick seemed to offer Oldham a chance to attack but two jumped for the same ball, it went to ground and a kick chase and a bit of scrambling resulted in West Park converting a penalty in the Oldham 22 to lead 24-10 which shortly after became 31-10 following a converted try and the game was affectively over. Froggatt scored a powerful solo effort and there was a magical moment when debutant Wayne Hadfield, making his first team debut after 15 years at the club, reacted first to a sliced clearance kick. He had no right to gather it but was the most committed and stepped inside from the touchline to dot down near the corner flag........we won’t hear the last of that! These were deserved consolation tries and as Oldham threw caution to the wind to try to secure a losing bonus point, West Park ran in further tries against the tiring boys for a 52-20 win.

West Park are a young fit side with some powerful individuals who you have to hit low and early. If you wait for them, they are going to do some damage. The experience, power and steadying hand of Faasavalu made sure that they kept their heads and composure when Oldham were dominating proceedings early on and as their confidence grew, Oldham struggled to cover the big field and too often had the wrong body in the wrong defensive position.

There were so many positives for this makeshift Oldham team. You could not fault the effort or endeavour throughout the 80 minutes and there were some impressive individual performances with Froggatt leading impressively in attack and defence, supported superbly by Taylor Hannon and Hackman. It is so difficult to organise a makeshift outfit to deal with a well drilled athletic outfit. Defence is as much about organisation as it is about tackling. It relies more on organisation and trust than on big shots. Now I enjoy a big shot as much as the next man but there is a time and a place and you can only defend successfully as a unit. The art and indeed the science of defence is about maintaining your discipline, retaining your structure, trusting your team mates and most importantly perhaps communication. That takes time to put in place and is almost impossible when you have a different set of backs every week. Often, not tackling is just as important as tackling.
The world is in a much better place with the departure of Donald, although those poor souls in Afghanistan might have a different view, but I'm sure that we secretly all miss the mad world in which only he existed. But our own much cheaper, duller and dumber version continues to provide misery and mirth in equal quantities and despite all his lack of achievement seems to be more popular than ever. You can already see the shortages appearing on supermarket shelves. You don’t know how much you need or enjoy certain things until you deprived of them so stay alert!!

We have Widnes at Manor Park next week. They have been worthy champions over the last couple of years so another stern test awaits.

Dave Roscoe