York fightback stuns Oldham

Oldham's Paul O'Connor reaches for the line.

Oldham 24, York 37 
A FLURRY of second-half points from York turned dreams into nightmares for Oldham at Boundary Park.

Despite leading 14-0 up until four minutes before half-time, an unanswered 33-point burst by the visitors tore up what had been an immaculately rehearsed script from Tony Benson’s side.

Top quality tries in the opening quarter from Lucas Onyango and Thomas Coyle, plus three well-struck Chris Baines goals, represented the fruit of a simple, error-free performance from the Roughyeds which had the Knights constantly on the back foot.

Even the response of a converted try four minutes before the break didn’t sound too many alarm bells in a fixture which was a must-win if Oldham were to retain hopes of a second-place finish in Co-operative Championship One.

What was needed above all else was a strong, positive start to the second period. What occurred was anything but.

Inspired by replacement stand-off Loz Wildbore, who came off the bench to great effect to torment the home team with a precise kicking game and a series of strong, intelligent runs, York’s fresh injection of enthusiasm proved too much for an error-ridden and over-run Roughyeds side to cope with.

However, even the sequence of six tries, two conversions, a penalty and a drop-goal from the away team could – and perhaps should – have been mitigated by a Paul O’Connor try at a crucial stage of the game.

After Jordan Ross’s 43rd-minute effort, on the back of one of a number of Wildbore bombs Oldham failed badly to deal with, the home team appeared to have increased their advantage back to eight points with a simple conversion to come.

However, French referee Mohammed Drizza ruled that in sliding under the posts, O’Connor had performed an illegal double-movement and disallowed the try. It seemed a tough call, but to the referee’s credit he was only a matter of a couple of feet away from the incident.

Wildbore then rubbed salt into the wound by creating an opening with a powerful burst, which ended with a grubber kick that O’Connor couldn’t deal with well enough. Gareth Moore pounced on the loose ball with Lee Waterman adding the conversion to put York ahead – an advantage they never relinquished.

Three minutes later, Wildbore stole in from dummy half past static defence, Waterman again converting, while shortly after the hour Sean Hesketh slid home at the left corner for a 26–14 lead.

A Wildbore drop goal and a Ratcliffe penalty were then followed by Waterman sliding over as York continued to dominate, before letting off the gas to allow responses from Coyle, skating around the defensive line before darting in at the right corner, and Littler, off the back of a superb sharp Coyle pass that released the impressive-again Chris Baines.

It was too little, too late for anything other than a bonus point but even that consolation disappeared when Phil Joseph spilled the restart kick, which was then swept up by the alert Hesketh at the death.

After a late injury scare had affected Neil Roden, who came through a fitness test despite a sore back, Oldham started the game in positive fashion.

The first try came after four minutes. As the ball was thrown to the right wing on the last tackle, it looked a hopeless cause when Craig Littler was confronted by a well-set defence. But the centre managed to throw a pass over the top of his head under pressure which found Lucas Onyango and the winger ran straight through Ratcliffe.

Baines landed the goal from way out on the touchline to put the finishing touch to a perfect opening.

Coyle then showed no ill-effects from a difficult afternoon at Blackpool the previous week by dummying and slipping through the line on the angle for a clever individual effort which Baines again did well to improve.

The lead increased to 14 points when Wildbore’s interference in the tackle on Wayne Kerr on 25 minutes gave Baines a simple chance in front of the posts.

At this stage it was one-way traffic in every aspect of the game, but the Knights managed to creep into the contest as the half wore on and gained reward for their efforts four minutes before the break.

A penalty for an offence at the ruck gave York good field position and Oldham couldn’t quite hold on as Luke Ambler powered over the line from short range, just managing to squeeze the ball down under pressure with Ratcliffe converting.