Jamie’s helping hand in bid to get it right

Former New Zealand RL and England RU international Henry Paul offers kicking hints to Oldham players

WHILE Oldham fans were saluting Jamie Dallimore's two-try show in Sunday's derby win against Rochdale, the Roughyeds half-back was beating himself up over his four failed goal kicks.

In two cup games Dally has landed three goals from 10 attempts - a worry for the man who last season made marksmanship look easy.

Now, he's hoping tips from the top will help to put him back on track.

Former dual-code international Henry Paul, once a Bradford Bulls team mate of Oldham boss Scott Naylor, has been at Whitebank at Naylor's invitation to give help and guidance on all aspects of kicking a rugby ball.

Dallimore, Lewis Palfrey, Richard Lepori, Sam Gee, Adam Files and Steven Nield were given a demonstration of field and goal kicking by the man who played for New Zealand at rugby league, England at rugby union and scored nearly 1,000 points for Bradford in 100 games.

"He was happy to give us the benefit of his experience, and who better to do that?" said Naylor, who played alongside the Kiwi stand-off at Odsal between 1999 and 2001.

No-one was more grateful for Henry's help than Dallimore: "He showed us different techniques and how best to kick the ball in general play, how to get more distance, and how to keep it in the field of play with use of back-spin.

"He did a lot of work with us on goalkicking, too, not that it did me much good on Sunday!

"He couldn't have come at a better time because I'm struggling with goalkicking, and I don't know why.

"It's probably more to do with my head than my technique. I'm not aware that I'm doing anything different.”

"Henry told me to stick with my basic technique, but to work on little things and to concentrate for a while on doing the right thing when planting my non-kicking foot. He said that was very important.

"I just hope that with a lot of practice and with Henry's tips I can get back to kicking goals like I used to."