Coyle an ever-present

WHEN the Grand Final got underway at the weekend, James Coyle completed a record of playing in every single competitive game in the season.

The 22-year-old scrum-half turned out in all 37 matches for Oldham in 2008, with only one of those — when barely half-fit away at Swinton, amid an injury crisis — coming from off the bench.

The statistic shows just how reliant the Roughyeds have been on the former Wigan Warriors prospect to guide the team around the park, a task he never shirked from even when not at his best.

Coyle was one of 11 players to rack up 30 appearances or more during the season, compared to just two — Neil Roden and Richard Mervill — last year. That, though, can be put largely down to the fact that high-profile new signings changed the make-up of the team from mid-season onwards in 2007.

The son of Bernard, Wigan scrum-half of the 1970s, Coyle also ended up on top in the try scoring stakes.

He touched down 21 times in total, including an early-seaon purple patch in which he managed 10 in just seven games.