Council sympathetic to Roughyeds plight

OLDHAM Council have told homeless Oldham Roughyeds they are happy to work together to try to find a long-term solution for the club within the borough.

Talks were held earlier this week between council representatives and Roughyeds owner and chairman Chris Hamilton, at which the club’s problems were outlined.

At the meeting, Hamilton produced a paper illustrating the obstacles the Oldham RL club have had to overcome since the sale of the Watersheddings ground by the Oldham Bears, leaving the post-1997 club with no permanent home.

The situation is all the more urgent as Boundary Park will no longer be home to the Roughyeds from 2010 season onwards, following amicable talks between Hamilton and Athletic managing director Simon Corney.

“We are grateful to the council for giving us the opportunity to continue discussing with them the problems surrounding our ground predicament, and possible solutions to those problems,” said Mr Hamilton.

“Supporters can rest assured that this matter is high on our list of priorities and that I will be working hard in the hope of finding a solution.”

Roughyeds have used eight different grounds for home matches since the formation of Oldham RLFC (1997) Ltd.

Full seasons have been played out of town at Spotland (Rochdale) and Hurst Cross (Ashton), in addition to sporadic ‘home’ games at Bower Fold (Stalybridge), Bloomfield Road (Blackpool), Victory Park (Chorley), Sedgley Park (Whitefield) and the Leigh Sports Village.

Following on from Tuesday’s meeting, the Roughyeds’ plight and the club’s plea for council assistance was again raised last night at a meeting to discuss strategic regeneration issues, attended by the four council representatives who met Hamilton on Tuesday, plus council leader Howard Sykes and Mohib Uddin.

The Roughyeds owner was contacted after the meeting and told that the council would be happy to continue its talks with the club.