Oldham on cloud nine

Photo: Chris Sunderland

TOUCH DOWN . . . Kenny Hughes dives in for Oldham’s third try of the afternoon.

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OLDHAM 54, GATESHEAD 16
OLDHAM can’t be classed as home birds just yet.

They’ve still picked up more league points away than at home, but in terms of giving Whitebank fans value for money this was good for starters.

They scored nine tries — more than in any previous game this season; they touched the half-century mark for the first time; and they made it three wins from four games.

Having seen Roughyeds turned over by Rochdale and Oxford in their previous two home games, fans were perhaps getting fidgety when the Tynesiders posted two converted tries in the first eight minutes and were still leading 12-0 with a quarter of the game gone.

The visitors looked good early on. Big and strong in the forwards and with a bit of pace out wide, they stretched Oldham to breaking point on both sides of the field to score their early tries.

Already rattled, Roughyeds suffered the loss with an arm injury of loan halfback Danny Whitmore.

Naylor threw Kenny Hughes in at the deep end, and didn’t he do well!

He looked the part, he played the part and he showed what many have thought for a long time: that he has the skills, the vision and the all-round footballing ability to be just as much at home at half-back as he is at hooker or dummy half.

Oldham are building a reputation as a squad with some of the best young players in the division.

Several of them further enhanced their stature in this game, most notably full-back Richard Lepori, prop Phil Joy, second-row pair Josh Crowley and Danny Langtree, utility forward Michael Ward and the stars of this show, Hughes and two-try Adam Files.

The 20-year-old Files, on season-long loan from Salford, scored two beauties from the back of the play-the-ball to take his total for the season to eight.

His first try on the half hour pulled Roughyeds level and gave a clear indication the home side had finally got the measure of the opposition.

They did exactly that, with a huge contribution from the pacy Lepori, from powerful props Joy and Ward and from Crowley and Langtree wider out.

Hughes’s clever little inside pass sent Lepori through a narrow gap in the build-up to the try by Langtree which sparked the Roughyeds into life.

Files went in next, then two minutes later Hughes did an encore, receiving the ball as a half-back at first receiver, but using his natural instincts as a dummy-half to spot the gap and go through it without a finger laid upon him.

That gave the home side an 18-12 lead, and with use of the slope to come in the second half, the balance of power had swung decisively to the home side. They blitzed the second half, piling up 36 points to Thunder’s six.