Roughyeds boss determined to right wrongs

Roughyeds head coach Stuart Littler

Roughyeds boss Stuart Littler has a steadfast focus on putting things right after his side suffered their fourth defeat of the League One season.

Oldham couldn’t capitalise on early pressure and were punished by Hunslet after they scored two late tries in the first half.

Game plans were thrown out of the window when new man Jamie Ellis pulled up with a hamstring strain late on Friday night in training, which forced a late change with centre Kian Morgan filling in at scrum-half.

After going 18-2 down in the second half, Oldham got an instant response through Connor Carr, but any hopes of a comeback were dashed with Roughyeds having to play with twelve men for the last quarter.

“They did a job on us by slowing our ruck speed down and we have to be better in there and smarter,” admitted the Oldham head coach.

“When we started to change the game in the second half, our discipline got the better of us.

"It was a 6-0 penalty count in Hunslet’s favour as well as two sin-binnings which didn’t help anybody.

“We’ve got a down dressing room, but I have said to the boys we’ve worked very hard this year as a collective and we have to stick together and learn our lessons.

“There are things to work on.

"I thought we were a bit ‘one out’ at times, and we didn’t get the quality in our push which we looked for.

“We weren’t playing front foot rugby and we became too predictable, which allowed them to slow the ruck even more.”

With Oldham’s next game not until next month, Littler believes there is a chance to refresh.

“There were a couple of casualties on our side, so with this break in schedule there is a chance to freshen up and recover right," he added.

“We need to make sure we are ready to go again for a massive push towards the play-offs so we can bounce back out of this dip we are in and come out of it on the other side.”

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