Thommo try leaves Oldham relieved

HELD UP: Oldham’s Miles Greenwood is tackled

Egremont 14, Oldham 22
ALEX Thompson's first senior try for Oldham clinched Roughyeds' passage into round four of rugby league's most prestigious knock-out competition.

Trailing only 14-16, Egremont's lively young amateurs were fancying their chances when Thompson came off the bench with 10 minutes left.

Picking up the ball at the back of the scrum, he set off for the sticks, beat two defenders en route and survived an ankle tap to scramble to the line at the Kells end of the ground.

It was a magical moment for the 21-year-old former Warrington Wolves youngster.

For a split second it looked as though referee Joe Cobb was going to rule that Thommo had grounded short, then he pointed to the try to break Egremont hearts and to effectively end their mighty effort to become giant-killers.

Jamie Dallimore converted for an eight-point lead and with only a few minutes left Oldham were home and dry.

Make no mistake, though. They were given one mighty fright by a young and talented Egremont side, whose coaches had done their homework.

A key element of their plan was to stifle the threat of Roughyeds half-backs Neil Roden and Dallimore — a job they did very well indeed.

Egremont are unlikely to play as well as this again all season, but they deserve the highest praise for producing a performance that was a credit to their club, the NCL and the amateur game as a whole.

Roughyeds had their work cut out to come out on top. They scored four tries to their opponents' two, but it's a measure of how well the amateurs defended to record that two of them were from dummy half close to the line and the decisive one was Thompson's super solo.

Only once all game did the visitors manage to crack open a cast-iron defence.





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