Nines failed to live up to expectation in Blackpool

THE NORTHERN Rail Nines was not a positive exercise for us as a group.

One of the problems was that the tournament wasn’t what we expected it to be.

The pitches were sized in proportion to the numbers, which meant it turned out to be a scaled-down version of 13-a-side — yet we weren’t equipped for that with the squad we had selected.

I don’t really know why it was the case that the pitches were reduced in size — it hasn’t been in the nines competitions I have been involved with in the past — but we were caught out by it, as were a number of other clubs.

We were set up to throw it around and didn’t have many props in our squad.

Another thing I am not sure about is the advantage of holding the event over two days.

Playing it all on one day is ideal and to be honest, after the long lay-off of three weeks we had between full 13-a-side matches recently, there is a danger that we may now lose some of the momentum we gained by winning so convincingly up at Workington.

On the upside, the tournament was played in a good spirit and the referees joined in with that. Overall, it was very well organised and the fans seemed to enjoy themselves.

For us, though, the second day was a bit of a debacle.

We turned up expecting to play Gateshead at 11am but after the warm-up we were told we would, in fact, instead be playing half-an-hour later on the other pitch.

We went down there and ended up waiting a full 45 minutes before we could start the game against Rochdale, due to the fact that the officials for our game were coming over from a game that had gone into extra-time.

While we were waiting we were stood around talking to the Rochdale players, which certainly doesn’t put you in the right frame of mind to play against them.

At the same time, what we produced in that game wasn’t good enough and I have to apologise to the supporters for that. I was embarrassed with it.

We have got Keighley now this weekend in the league, back at Boundary Park, and I am now just focused on getting the team ready and prepared for that game.

Finally, I would like to thanks all the fans who came and supported us in Blackpool on behalf of both myself and the team. We all really appreciated it.

tonybenson@oldham-chronicle.co.uk