Featherstone semi-final will kindle cup memories in Wembley bid

THIS great club of ours can make rugby league history tomorrow (Sunday, 2pm start) if they beat Featherstone Rovers in the AB Sundecks 1895 Cup semi-final at Boundary Park and thus get through to Wembley for the first time in the club's 149-year lifetime.

Oldham R Club (1876) Ltd is one of about ten senior clubs with a rich backdrop never to have had the experience of displaying their skills in our national stadium and that huge void is all the more remarkable when considering that Roughyeds had a team of all talents in the 1950s. They were a brilliant, captivating side back then, winning the Rugby League Championship by beating Hull at Odsal in 1957, reaching the final at Maine Road in 1954 and winning the Lancashire Cup in 1956, 1957 and 1958.

The Challenge Cup Final, the only way of reaching Wembley in those days, always proved a game too far, however — remember that infamous third-round defeat by Leigh at Kirkhall Lane? — and that great loose-forward Derek 'Rocky' Turner once told me: "We would have turned Wembley inside out, and back again with the quality of our high brand of football, but for some reason we never made it."

I covered five semi-finals for the now long-gone Oldham Evening Chronicle — and we lost the lot. They were against Hull KR at Headingley, Station Road and Fartown (three games); Castleford at Wigan; Warrington at Wigan; Wigan at Burnden Park, Bolton; and Wigan at Huddersfield.

From memory, we were well beaten twice by Wigan, but at the very least there was some talking point or some serious point of argument, in which Oldham came off worst, in the losses to Hull KR, to Castleford and to Warrington.

Nothing seemed to go Oldham's way in those three semi-finals and I vividly recall Hull KR coach Colin Hutton telling me after Geoff Robinson's try put Oldham in front in extra time at Swinton — the tie was later abandoned because of bad light: "Oldham must be the only side to win a semi but to miss out on Wembley."

Bob Beardmore was clearly over the dead-ball line when he scored a crucial try for classy Cas and then we had the controversy surrounding the disallowed Paul Lord try, off Mike Ford' kick, in the Warrington game.

I didn't disagree with all the decisions that went against Oldham in those three semis, but I think it's fair to conclude that Roughyeds were at least unlucky to suffer as they did across the three ties.

Now, we are only 80 minutes from Wembley once again and interest is such that Featherstone is expected to bring a huge following and I will be in a party of 27 from Littleborough that includes my three sons, two of their wives, half a dozen New Zealanders who are over here on holiday, people from North Wales and several Rochdale Hornets fans who are intrigued by all the razmataz.

Two of my sons were Oldham mascots in their youth, One of them, from Kent, will be here with his wife and the other will be here from new Zealand with his wife, a Kiwi.

He will even come back to England on a special mission if Oldham can break their Wembley duck. He has already made a provisional booking for three nights in London in the event of Oldham making it.

That's what this match means to rugby league people everywhere.