The dog-fight starts here — Oldham v Bradford, Sunday July 11

OUR crucial mini-season of TEN remaining Betfred Championship games in the dog-fight at the bottom of the league table starts under a new coach with the visit of high-flying Bradford Bulls to Bower Fold on Sunday week, July 11 at 3pm.

With a possible 20 league points at stake, there’s still lots to play for and it promises to be an exciting two-and-a-half months as the new boss introduces his own stamp on how we should best tackle the huge task of climbing out of the bottom two.

It all starts on July 11 with the visit of John Kear’s fourth-placed Bulls to Bower Fold (3pm) and we are asking Roughyeds fans to buy into the big task ahead and our fight to avoid relegation, all built around the sub-headings of “new start”, “mini league”, “dog-fight” etc.

We need fans to get behind the team home and away, wherever possible in fact, to help us and the new team boss to get us over the line — and what kudos awaits the new man in charge if he can pull it off.

Online tickets for the Bulls game will go on sale at 11am on Tuesday (July 6) to BOTH sets of fans and we are asking the Roughyeds faithful to buy early to make sure they have their tickets to hand as soon as possible.

Season-ticket holders have all had emails from the club asking them to confirm attendance. Anyone who hasn’t received an email is asked to check if it has gone into trash, junk-mail etc.

Replies are needed please by 9am on Sunday so we can get an idea of numbers for purposes of social-distancing.

It naturally follows that for a game like this, when we both need and expect a good turn-out, it is all the more important that our fans generally buy early and that season-ticket holders co-operate with us with regard to the 9am Sunday deadline for confirming attendance.

We hope ALL fans will realise what a difference it makes to the players when home crowds out-shout and out-support the visitors — and then act accordingly.

For those who can’t get to the game, though, it will be streamed live on OuRLeague — another measure of its importance and significance to both clubs.

Our League will stream coverage of six matches over the next two weekends, including this Sunday’s Betfred League 1 clash between Barrow Raiders and Doncaster, the top two teams in the table.

The other five games are from the Betfred Championship, starting with York City Knights versus Newcastle Thunder.

Both clubs will also feature next Sunday (July 11) – Newcastle’s home game against Dewsbury Rams, and York’s trip to London Broncos.

The Our League cameras will also cover high-flying Featherstone Rovers making a tricky trip to Widnes Vikings, and Oldham’s home game against Bradford Bulls.

All six games kick off at 3pm, and are available for the usual Our League pay per view prices of £4.95 Early Bird or £10 on the day – with full replays of all matches also available.