Oldham wait for try-scoring aces

OLDHAM Roughyeds are hoping that Lucas Onyango and new-boy Mick Fogerty can overcome injury concerns to continue their head-to-head battle to be the club’s top try scorer.

Onyango has scored nine tries in ten league and cup game from the right wing so far, while local lad Fogerty has touched down eight times from left centre.

Coach Tony Benson is hoping the pair can shake off injury worries in time for Sunday’s fourth-round Challenge Cup tie at Hunslet Hawks.

Fogerty, whose passion for the game has been rekindled by his move this season to his home-town club at the age of 29, has been on the scoresheet in six games out of the ten and has scored in each of the last three.

Onyango, who was 29 last Monday, has failed to score in only three of the ten, the net result being that Roughyeds have still to play a game this season in which either one of them hasn’t planted the ball over the opposition’s goal line.

Not that scoring tries for the Roughyeds is anything new to Onyango, who has totalled 52 in 69 games going back to the 2007 season when he first burst on to the Oldham scene.

With Sunday’s important cup-tie looming - and an opportunity for both Oldham and Hunslet to earn a lucrative tie against Super League opposition in round five - there was a scare for the Roughyeds when Fogerty fell awkwardly in a tackle in the game at South Wales Scorpions and his head and neck were driven into a hard ground.

He was motionless for a time and a stretcher was summoned but happily he recovered quickly after treatment on the field and was able to finish the game.

He has since been having treatment to a sore neck while Onyango has been treated for knocks to knee and ankle.

There are high hopes that both will be fit for weekend, but it is touch and go whether scrum-half Matty Ashe will make it after a groin injury.

When Oldham beat the Hawks 29-16 away in the league last month, Ashe kicked four goals and scored two tries.