Having accumulated 15 points from a possible 18 in the first half of the Betfred League One campaign, Roughyeds are gearing up for a terrific scrap at the top end of the table across the remaining nine games.
It promises to be a thrilling June, July and August with Stuart Littler’s men one of several teams who will fancy their chances of winning promotion to the Championship, writes ROGER HALSTEAD.
The team finishing top, currently a strong Dewsbury Rams outfit whose only dropped point came in the draw with a victory-deserving Oldham, goes up automatically, but a few clubs, especially Doncaster and Oldham, will be thirsting for more points so as to stay with the Rams and be in a position to take advantage should the leaders slip up.
With nine games to go, anything can happen yet, but most fans will expect any two from the current top three — Dewsbury, Doncaster and Oldham — to go up as champions and to finish second, thus having the best possible chance of going up through the five-team play-offs.
So where exactly do Oldham stand in all this? They went second when beating fourth-placed Hunslet 40-20, but 24 hours later Doncaster won easily down in Birmingham , so it was back to third spot for the Roughyeds, who have two crucial games later this month when they play Doncaster at home and Dewsbury away with only four days in between.
That week in mid-June (they play Doncaster here on Sunday, June 18 at 3pm and Dewsbury away on Friday, June 23 at 7.30pm) will define Oldham’s season and given how well Oldham played in the Vestacare thrillers against Dewsbury and Hunslet recently, we can look forward to a couple of humdingers in these top-three clashes, the first of which should have enough crowd-appeal to attract a full house at the Vestacare.
Doncaster, you will recall, have beaten Littler’s lads twice already this season; first in the Challenge Cup and again in the league. In both cases, however, Roughyeds could easily have won. Indeed, many Oldham fans were of the view that Roughyeds would have become the first side to beat Richard Horne’s men this season in the league had the game gone on for another ten minutes.
Of the nine games left, Oldham have four at home and five away. The four home games are against Doncaster (June 18), Workington Town (July 2), North Wales Crusaders (July 9) and Midlands Hurricanes (August 27).
