| Oldham coat of arms | |
| Club information | |
|---|---|
| Full name | Oldham Roughyeds Rugby League Football Club |
| Colours | Red and white hooped shirts, blue shorts, red socks |
| Founded | 1876 |
| Website | www.roughyeds.co.uk |
| Current details | |
| Ground(s) | |
| Competition | National League One |
Oldham Roughyeds are a British rugby league club, currently playing in the League Two of the National Leagues. They are based in Oldham in Greater Manchester.
The team strip consists of the traditional red and white hooped shirts, blue shorts and red socks.
They play their home games at Boundary Park, a ground which is best known as the home of Oldham Athletic A.F.C..
They were founded in founded in 1876 as Oldham RLFC. They moved to a ground called The Watersheddings in 1889.
Oldham were one of the twenty-one clubs that left the Rugby Football Union to form the Northern Union.
In the glory days of the 1950s, Oldham won the Championship and a host of other trophies with a side that boasted players such as Alan Davies, John Etty and Bernard Ganley.
When a Rupert Murdoch funded Super League competition was proposed, part of the deal was that some traditional clubs would merge. Oldham were supposed to merge with Salford to form a club to be known as Manchester which would compete in Super League. This was resisted and instead they adopted the name Oldham Bears and were founder members of the new league. Relegation came in the second year of the new summer season, when they finished below Paris St Germain.
In 1997 under Chairman Jim Quinn, they went bankrupt with debts of over £2m. A new team Oldham Roughyeds was then formed in December to play at a lower level. The Roughyeds tag had been a long accepted nickname for the old club.
Mike Ford retired as player-coach of Oldham in 2001 and in January the following year took up a post as defensive co-ordinator with the Irish Rugby Football Union. Oldham put Mark Knight in temporary charge of the first team. After a successful 2001 season, they narrowly missed out on promotion to the Super League, losing to Widnes Vikings 12-24 in the Northern Ford Premiership Grand Final.
During the 2002 season they played at Hurst Cross in the nearby town of Ashton-under-Lyne, due to a dispute with Oldham Athletic over the use of Boundary Park.
Steve Molloy took charge of the Roughyeds after former boss John Harbin left to join Oldham Athletic as fitness conditioner and sports psychologist in July 2002. Under Molloy, Oldham won seven and drew two of their last 14 games, clinching promotion to National League One and reaching the last four of the play-offs.
In March 2005, Oldham entered a creditors' voluntary agreement (CVA) with total debts of £325,000.
In 2007, the excavation and demolition firm The William Quinn Group acquired a 52% stake in the club. Bill Quinn became the club's new chairman, with previous owners Chris Hamilton and Sean Whitehead remaining as directors.[1]
Source: Napit.co.uk Sports Database