Oldham RU get 2024 off to a winning start

Oldham RUFC got 2024 off to a winning start when they saw off Hoylake 39-27 at Manor Park.

Conditions were near perfect and even with the loss to Littleborough before Christmas, Oldham had the chance to move up the league table with a victory.

Oldham started off well and it took around ten minutes for them to get on the board.

Isaac Dobbs made an initial break and then passed to Nick Hackman who then flicked a lovely pass out of the back of his left hand to give Sean Carter space to work in and he went over from the Hoylake 22 metre line.

Alex Jobson missed the conversion, but minutes later added a penalty goal to give Oldham an early 8-0 lead.

Hoylake then showed why they have taken some big scalps in the league by responding well.

This was slightly disappointing as these came from Oldham’s lack of control of possession.

Firstly with a penalty goal and then after losing Hackman to a sin bin for continued ruck infringements a converted try under the posts giving Hoylake a 10-8 lead.

Oldham needed to answer back and they did following a scrum on the Hoylake 10 metre line where Tom Davies put Ryan Pickles through a hole in the Hoylake centre.

Pickles got in behind the Hoylake defence and beat a number of defenders to score under the posts, converted by Jobson to put Oldham back in front at 15-10.

Oldham added another when being back up to 15 with Hackman returning to the pitch.

Oldham won a scrum against the head and Cam Wood picked up and barged over, with Jobson again converting as the referee blew for half time with Oldham 22-10 in front.

Oldham again started the better of the two teams after the break having made two changes at half time.

Tom Fereday and the returning Phil Conroy were injected to add more pace and guile.

A scrum on the Hoylake line led to Stuart Brennan picking and going from the base to go over with Jobson again converting to push the score to 29-10.

A Froggatt break led into the Hoylake 22 and following some other forward carries, Pickles went over for another Jobson converted try to make it 36-10.

Oldham seemed to go off the boil with 15 minutes to go.

They lost Jordan McEwan to another sin bin and Hoylake who never gave in the whole game hit back with a converted try.

Oldham managed a scrum penalty giving Jobson an easy kickable penalty to make it 39-17 still with 10 minutes left.

Two further unconverted tries from Hoylake gave them a try bonus point, but with the final score and a bonus point win Oldham were the victors at 39-27.

There were some pleasing performances from the three colts in Tom Fereday, Sean Carter and Cory Kelly, who all played well.

Rhys Jones was exceptional with 100% lineout efficiency.

Froggatt and Brennan carried for numerous yards going forward, but with his brace of tries and strong running, Pickles took the man of the match award.

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