We deserved win — Benson

ROUGHYEDS coach Tony Benson felt his side were deserving of the late comeback which snatched three points against underdogs London Skolars at Boundary Park last night.

Bookmakers had given the side from the capital a half-century point start on the handicap coupon prior to proceedings, but Jermaine Coleman’s men made a mockery of that verdict and would have won the game but for two tries in the final five minutes from Thomas Coyle and Lee Greenwood.

Though slipshod Oldham failed to click into gear until the latter stages, the Roughyeds coach was simply pleased that his side — now second in Co-operative Championship One, ahead of York — found the resolve to win the game. Report on Page 35.

“We deserved it and there was no fluke in the tries we scored,” said Benson, who coached the Skolars last season.

“We defended particularly well and we had to, because Skolars turned up to attack us.

“They played a particularly good game and put us under the pump from the start. We lost a lot of ball in the first half and ended up doing a lot of tackling.

“I thought our defence was great, but there was just far too much of it and the boys were busted when they went in at half-time.

“It is self-defeating. Once you get tired and you are doing more tackling, you do tend to lose more ball.

“The thing I am happy about is that we had the character as a team to get out of that because once you are in it, it keeps compounding on you.

“We got back to our game in the last quarter and our completion rate there was much better.”

Benson, who now focuses on a game away at Blackpool a week on Sunday, paid tribute to the way the visitors went about their business in their first ever appearance in front of the cameras.

“They played really well in all aspects of the game,” he added. “They looked a very good side and I knew that was going to happen.

“Skolars are a different side to what people imagine and a lot more credit deserves to go their way than is doing so at the moment.”