It is with sadness that the ORLFC Players Association passes on the news of the death of former Oldham and Rochdale Hornets scrum-half Johnnie Hammond, who died on September 12th at the age of 77.
He made his Oldham debut in the Law Cup game on August 10, 1975 against Hornets, no doubt enjoying the 29 – 2 victory for the Roughyeds against his former club. He went on to make four senior appearances for Oldham, his home-town club, as well as captaining the ‘A’ team to a Lancashire Shield triumph in 1975-76 in which they beat Salford 32 – 17 in a two-leg final with the second leg watched by an enthusiastic crowd at Watersheddings.
They reached the final again the following year, ending up as runners up to Wigan.
John lifting the Lancashire Shield in April 1976 and receiving his Heritage Certificate on July 10th 2022.
John recently attended the Oldham v Rochdale game where he received his Oldham Heritage Certificate (number 784) from the Players Association chairman Mike Elliott.
The sincere condolences of the Oldham Rugby League Heritage Trust are sent to John’s family and friends.
The Oldham Rugby League Heritage Trust would like to be associated with the statement issued by the RFL as follows:
On behalf of the RFL and the whole Rugby League family, we express our deepest and most sincere condolences on the passing of Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II.
The whole sport is in deep mourning at this extremely sad news.
Her Majesty presents the RL Challenge Cup to Derek Turner in 1960.
The Rugby League was honoured to have her as our Patron until 2016, and throughout her long reign, Her Majesty’s sense of duty and commitment, her spirit and wisdom has been an example to all of us.
We give grateful thanks for Her Majesty’s constant and positive influence on our communities over many generations.
We send our deepest sympathy and most sincere condolences to the Royal Family including the RFL Patron, HRH The Duchess of Cambridge.
Our clubs and players at all levels will display their respect to Her Majesty wherever Rugby League is played in the coming days.
OLDHAM RL stars of yesteryear, headed by Great Britain internationals and Australian tourists Terry Flanagan and Mick Worrall, will be out in force tomorrow (Sunday 4th September) at our ‘must win’ last game of the regular season against close rivals Hunslet.
A large party from the Players’ Association, including players’ relatives, will figure in Heritage certificate presentations, hopefully on the pitch at half-time.
These are due to include Geoff Munro, Damian Munro, Terry Flanagan, Danny Bridge, Gareth Owen, Phil Joy and Mick Worrall, plus relatives receiving certificates on behalf of late loved ones, such as Dave Rix (on behalf of Syd Rix), Liz Fitzsimons (on behalf of Eric), Tommy Leyland jnr (on behalf of his father), Lynda and Andy Blair (on behalf of John), Diane Flanagan (on behalf of Kevin).
There’s a link between Terry Flanagan, Mick Worrall and Syd Rix in that all three went on GB tours of Australia, Terry and Mick when Oldham had a record five players on tour in 1984 and winger or centre Syd in 1924.
Second only to the legendary Alan Davies in Oldham’s try charts, Syd scored 155 tries in 330 Oldham appearances between 1919 and 1932. Acknowledged as one of the greatest three-quarters ever to play for Oldham, he was one of only four players to play in each of Oldham’s four consecutive Challenge Cup Finals between 1924 and 1927.
Eight new members have joined the Players’ Association recently — Les Chadwick, Martin Hall, Tommy Martyn, Paul Norman, Paul Topping, Wes Rogers, Steve Robinson and Terry Garrett — and paid-up membership now stands at 45 and is increasing all the time.
The Associations’s annual dinner is at St Herbert’s on Broadway on Friday, October 14. Paul Sculthorpe is guest speaker. Anyone wishing to attend is asked to contact Joe Warburton, John Watkins or Ray Hicks as soon as possible and ideally before the Association’s next meeting this Monday, September 5, at 7.45pm at Springhead Sports and Social Club.
There will also be a large Civic presence at the Vestacare Stadium tomorrow, led by The Worshipful the Mayor of Oldham, Councillor Elaine Garry and her Consort, Peter Davis.
Also present will be Council leader, Councillor Amanda Chadderton (Royton South); Councillor Elaine Taylor (Chadderton Central), who holds the portfolio for sport; and four more Councillors, Ros Birch (Waterhead), Colin McLaren (Chadderton Central), Clint Phythian (Royton North) and Diane Williamson (Crompton). They will be hosted by our very own former Oldham councillors Ginny, an ex-Mayor of the borough, and Adrian Alexander, a former Roughyeds player, once an Oldham councillor of many years standing and now proud to be the Roughyeds’ ambassador.
Adrian, or ‘Alex’ as he is known in rugby league circles, will present the match ball to the referee on the pitch before kick-off.
It is with sadness that the Heritage Trust learned the news of the death of former Oldham player Ricky Bibey at the age of 40.
Leigh born Ricky was a no nonsense prop forward who played for Oldham in the 2005 season making 21 appearances. He also played for Wigan, St Helens and Wakefield as well as having three spells with his home town club.
The sincere condolences of everyone at the Oldham Rugby League Heritage Trust are sent out to all of Ricky’s family and friends.
The Heritage Trust has been invited to host a zoom talk about the history of Oldham RLFC by the Oldham Historical Research Group.
Entitled “Then and Now”, the event will take place on Wednesday July 13th at 7pm and to gain access to this free on-line meeting please register in advance by clicking the link below to reserve your place.
Mike Elliott received his Heritage Certificate at the match against Midland Hurricanes on June 12th 2022.
A scorer of 153 tries for the Roughyeds, wingman Mike came up from Blaina in South Wales in 1962 and went on to play 446 matches for Oldham before his retirement in May 1979.
Only Alan Davies (174) and Syd Rix (155) touched down more times for Oldham than the likeable Welshman who maintains his interest in the club and is a regular attendee at home matches.
Left: Mike Elliott receives his Heritage Certificate from the former Mayor of Oldham, Ginny Alexander with Roger Halstead the club media-man in attendance. Right: Mike in his playing days scoring one of those 153 tries.
The Oldham Rugby League Heritage Trust in combination with the Oldham Players Association are pleased to announce that the Heritage Numbers associated with those players who have featured in a first team match for Oldham are now going to be available as a “Heritage Number Certificate”.
Starting with the team who played in Oldham’s first match in the Northern Union, later to become the Rugby League, right up to this 2022 season, every player has been allocated a Heritage Number.
The first recipients of the Heritage Certificates from left to right: MartinMurphy, Scott Ranson, Shane Tupaea, Ray Hicks and Adrian Alexander.
In that first match at Hunslet on September 14th 1895 when the teams were still 15-a-side, the honour of being number 1 has been granted to Arthur Lees.
Arthur went on to play 356 times for the club. This was the most appearances out of the team that day. Likewise number 15 goes to Duncan Lamonby who played a total of just two first team matches for the Roughyeds. From this match onwards the numbers are awarded as the players came into the team, so when Harry Eagland replaced Lamonby for the next match he became number 16.
With the number of players now well over 1400, it does not matter if they came on to the field for half a game, played on loan, as a trialist, or turned out in 300 or more competitive games, they are all considered equal in status and so qualify for their Heritage Number. The most recent, at the time of writing, being Robbie Butterworth (number 1466) who made his debut on June 5th 2022.
If you are interested in further details please contact the Oldham Rugby League Heritage Trust at: oldhamrl1895@gmail.com
The Heritage Trust are sad to report the death of former Oldham player Terry Gorman.
A talented half-back, Leigh born, Terry joined Oldham in October 1972 from Swinton to take over as “A” team coach.
He wasn’t really signed to play in the first team but whenever the club was desperate for a stand-in scrum- half, Terry was drafted in to fill the gap.
This soon happened when Oldham played a Great Britain team in a friendly as part of the World Cup warm up programme on October 18th 1972. No one gave Oldham a chance against a GB side packed with stars such as Paul Charlton, Clive Sullivan, Chris Hesketh, John Atkinson, Mike Stephenson, Phil Lowe and John Holmes but on a dramatic night under the Watersheddings lights, Terry in the backs and Frank Foster in the pack conjured up an incredible victory for the Roughyeds. Terry was indeed the star of the show darting over for two second-half tries in an amazing 18 – 15 success for Oldham.
In all Terry played in ten first team matches for Oldham. He started his career at Huddersfield before having spells at Batley, Huyton and Swinton.
The sincere condolences of the Oldham Rugby League Heritage Trust are offered to all of Terry’s family and friends.
Reg Farrar set the Oldham tries in a season record in 1921-22 registering his 49th touchdown in the “Top-Four” play off win over Huddersfield at Watersheddings on April 22nd 1922. The Roughyeds won 13 – 5 with Reg scoring two tries and two goals.
Reg signed for Oldham from the Halifax Old Boys Rugby Union club, playing his first match against Huddersfield on October 23rd, 1920. He set the trend on his debut by scoring the only try in a 5 – 5 draw against the “Fartowners”. He was selected at centre that day and also for the next few games, but it would be on the wing that he would make his mark. His determined running was supplemented by an ability to leap over would-be tacklers. The following season Reg was installed on the left wing to great effect and his record breaking 49 touchdowns were complemented by 33 goals which meant he topped the Oldham tries and goals list. The club finished at the top of the league table but missed out on the Championship title when losing to Wigan in the Championship final two weeks after Reg had scored his brace against Huddersfield in the “Top-Four” play off.
The rest of his career was greatly disrupted by injury and the next two seasons saw him making only 13 senior appearances. When Jack Corsi was injured early in 1925, Reg was selected to take his place and returned to his old form, helping the club to win through to the Challenge Cup Final. Corsi returned to fitness just in time for the final and this left the committee with a selection dilemma. They chose to keep Farrar and Corsi on the wings and switch Sid Rix to centre, to the exclusion of the unfortunate Albert Woodward. The decision, however, proved to be well founded with Reg being the hero of the final, scoring one try, making two others and kicking two goals from the touchline in the 16 – 3 victory over Hull K.R. at Headingley.
More injuries followed and it looked like his career was over, but after almost two and half years out of the game he made a comeback in 1929, showing the same old style by scoring twelve tries in ten games at the end of the 1928-29 season.
Reg finally called it a day in 1930. Amazingly his career ended exactly as it had begun with him scoring the only Oldham try in a 5- 5 draw ! This time the match was against Leigh at Watersheddings on September 6th, 1930.
A totally emphatic victory by 42 points to nil saw Waterhead lift the BARLA National Cup on April 10th 2022 against Sharlston Rovers.
The match, which was played, more or less, in Sharlston’s back yard at Featherstone’s Millenium Stadium, Post Office Road, was totally dominated by “‘Head” who were accompanied by a wonderful group of enthusiastic supporters who followed them in great numbers over the pennines for the historic success.
