Blunders prove costly again
Date published: 04 April 2011
Photo: Graham Lynch
GOTCHA . . . Roughyeds tacklers Paul Noone and Dave Ellsion get stuck into Keighley ball-carrier Ryan Benjafield at Cougar Park.
KEIGHLEY COUGARS 40, OLDHAM 14
A PAPER-THIN Oldham defence has leaked 25 tries in its last three games . . . a damning statistic if ever there was one.
Workington hit the Roughyeds for six; Swinton declared with a dozen on the board; and Keighley piled on the agony with another seven at Cougar Park yesterday.
Awful defending across the full width of the pitch has little to do with the absence of injured players like Neil Roden, John Gillam, Luke Sutton and Marcus St Hilaire, as good as Roden and St Hilaire are in 'spotting' opposition moves and chopping them down at source.
No, the wishy-washy, half-hearted stuff that Roughyeds are currently trying to pass off as defending stems from a collective shortage of desire and determination.
A willingness to metaphorically roll up sleeves and graft was a Roughyeds' hallmark which last season provided 17 league wins out of 20 games played and earned victories in each of the ten league games played away from home.
Early this year there was a promise of more to come, highlighted by a 28-22 Northern Rail Cup win over newly- promoted Hunslet Hawks.
Since then, Roughyeds have lost six games out of eight in all competitions with their only wins coming against amateurs Hunslet Warriors in the cup and perennial strugglers Gateshead Thunder in the league.
Thirteen of the 17 players used against Hunslet played at Keighley — and of the 10 forwards who blasted the Hawks to defeat only Luke Sutton and Tom Wood-Hulme were absent, replaced by Liam Gilchrist and Ben Wood.
In terms of creativity on attack, Roughyeds were always going to miss Neil Roden, but his absence alone does not fully explain why the side has become such a soft touch in defence.
That, more than any other, is the issue the coaching staff need to address in the two weeks they have now before the next game against London Skolars at the Whitebank Stadium on April 17.
Yesterday, it was ironic that while Oldham struggled to get their attacking game together without stand-off Roden, Keighley relied for their attacking spark on an old-timer who played an identical role — Jason Demetriou.
The Aussie player-coach, Roden's senior by five years, orchestrated the direction of Keighley's attack and was at the source of most of the moves that produced their seven tries.
He had the advantage of playing behind a pack that dominated Oldham's forwards despite the sterling efforts of Jason Boults, Martin Roden and young Chris Clarke.
Oldham lost second-row man Wood with a thumb injury midway through the first half. He didn't return, this reducing Roughyeds to three subs for most of the game.
As a consequence, they had three hookers on the field for much of the second half — Danny Whitmore at stand-off, Martin Roden at loose-forward and John Clough at hooker.
They were never as well balanced as the home side, but they created and then fluffed three good chances in the first half with Mick Diveney to the fore.
Twice he got Mark Brocklehurst away up the right with accurate wide passes only for the centre to fling inside balls which went well forward. Then Dave Ellison's short ball released Diveney up the middle, but the scrum-half had no support.
Keighley finished more purposefully, leading 18-0 at half-time with tries by Luke Helliwell (two) and James Haythornthwaite, all improved by Danny Lawton.
Diveney's use of Brocklehurst was finally rewarded when the centre got up the outside and sent Ben Heaton over for the first of three Oldham tries in the second half.
Diveney was also prominent in the build-up to further tries by Shaun Robinson and Lucas Onyango — while all the time Cougars were adding to their points tally with tries by Richard Jones, Jimmy Feather, Lawton and Oliver Pursglove.
