I .\ V. THE ROAD TO MURRAYFIELD 2002 O l d h a m R L F C v s S t H e l e n s Sunday 10th February 2002 Bower Fold Stalybridge Kick Off 3.30pm OLDHAM at the very heart of the North kJest Oldham continues to take significant strides to be THE desirable place to live, work or visit at the heart of the North West. Massive investment in regeneration and renewal continues apace and Oldham has the region's largest town centre based indoor shopping area. Businesses are benefiting from the new M60 motorway which now puts Oldham less than 25 minutes away from Manchester Airport. Anew bus station and the anticipation of the Metrolink tram system coming to Oldham soon further strengthen the appeal of the town for investment and new opportunities. Add to this superb opportunities for education and training, including anew Business Management School, exciting developments in tourism and the arts like the newly opened Huddersfield Narrow Canal and the soon-to-be opened Art Gallery and the desirability of Oldham becomes even clearer. Enquiries to the Marketing and Communications Unit, PO Box 160, Civic Centre, West Street, Oldham, OL1 1UG. Telephone 0161 911 4707, Fax 0161 911 4936. E-mail [email protected], or visit our website at www.oldham.gov.uk Oldham Rugby League Football HotSeat Club (1997) Limited 64 Union Street O l d h a m 0 L 1 1 D J with Telephone: 0161 628 3677 Fax: 0161 627 5700 Christopher Hamiiton Club Shop: 0161 627 2141 CHAIRMAN WELCOME to our latest ‘Home’ Stalybridge Celtic. Ihave to Christopher Hamilton admit that my joy at being drawn at home to probably the most DIRECTORS successful team since the start of Super League was Christopher Hamiliton, Stewart immediately tempered by the reality of the situation -where do Hardacre, Sean Whitehead we play it? HEAD COACH Quite clearly Ashton United would not have been able to John Harbin cope with agame of this size and we tried to play at Boundary ASSISTANT COACH Park but were unable to do so as Chris Moore was out of the Mark Knight country. Next on the list was Spotland but with the soccer club alliance/academy coach home on the Saturday and the rugby at home on the Sunday Shaun Gartland that was also ano no. ACADEMY MANAGER The RFL byelaws prevent the tie being switched to St. Pete Beswick Helens and we obviously wanted to play as near to Oldham as PHYSIOTHERAPISTS we could so when Stalybridge offered to negotiate with us for Lisa Sharratt &Danni Turner the use of their ground it was the natural choice. CONDITIONER What it does however is underline the problems we face by Andy Proctor not having our own ground and Idon’t know of another club TIMEKEEPER that has to go through what we do at Oldham. Agame that John Barrett should have been adelight to stage has become along and C L U B D O C T O R arduous road with many meetings with Stalybridge officials, Dr Ian Wilkinson Tameside MBC, local Police, Safety Officers etc. STATISTICS Ihope at the end of it all we have asizeable crowd to watch Eddie Barton, Bruce Deadman what many will see as an opportunity to witness first hand one P R O G R A M M E E D I T O R Geoff Cooke of the best teams in the world in St. Helens and one which is renowned for playing attractive rugby. C L U B H O N O U R S This will also be the first time that our new Coach, John AJLavY Cup Winners 1998, Harbin, will have taken full charge of the side and Ihope that 1999/2000 you will join me in wishing John all the best for his tenure at Trans Pennine Cup Finalist 1998 Oldham which we all hope will be along and happy one. John NFP Grand Finalists 2001 will bring his own inimitable style to the job and you can rest assured that we will all be working hard to take the team up the hall of fame MEMBERS table. (SPONSORED BY J. W. LeES, BrEWERS) Our challenge today, however, is for the players to make Joe Ferguson 1899-23, Herman Hilton the 80 minutes as hard as possible for our opponents and for 1913-26, Alan Davies 1950-62, you to get behind the team vocally as much as possible -sport Frank Stirrup 1950-62, Bernard is all about the underdog!! Ganley 1950-61, John Etty 1954-59, Fina!!y !wou!d !ike to thank everybody at Sta!ybridge Derek Turner 1955-59, Bob Irving Ce!tic, Tameside Counci! and al! the staff at our c!ub for their 1964-74, Martin Murphy 1966-82, efforts in making this game possibie. Andy Goodway 1979-85 &1993-94. Enjoy the game. Chris The views expressed in this matchday magazine do not necessarily reflect those of the management and staff of Oldham RLFC (1997) Ltd. We Would Like To Thank The Oldham Evening Chronicle &Rugby League Express For The Use Of Photography 3 H/; ( 2 ^ 0 d ~ i L K - t K ^ »A Ss /0-Kre>ni(L/^ / 'holidays ly the daily choice Si f o r l o c a l N e w s and Sport ry: s ■ ' s - i i . ilWI i x/vrA/vrA/vr. oIdhia m-chi ro nicle.co.uk 4 .with John Harbin Coach’s Comments^ U?a*#iJllSwss' HELLO to all you Oldham fans and let me tell you how much I’m looking forward to the challenge of guiding the team in the NFP. Iwas getting real frustrated sitting behind adesk at Dewsbury and its no disrespect to them to say how great it is to be back in atracksuit and working with the players. From what I’ve seen so far the attitude of the aOldham players is excellent: they want to do well, Bthey want to learn and improve and they’re eminently Bcoachable. With me anyone that shows they can do it Bwill be promoted and, as asign of this, I’ve already "taken three Academy boys into training with the first Iteam squad. If the chance comes to strengthen, Bfinances permitting, we’ll do it but the quality of player Hneededisn’t always around. 1Today’s abig game for you Oldham fans because ^we don’t often get the chance to meet top flight opposition. We’ll be focussing on our own game and looking to eliminate errors. Obviously, I’ll have one or two points to make about St. Helens but we won’t be overcooking it. We’re playing on adecent ground with good facilities and we’ll definitely be giving it ago. Ithought the small core of fans who made the journey to Workington were great. They really got behind the lads which is what we want. Moaning and whingeing never does any good but then Oldham fans are noted for their backing, so if we all pull together we’ll start to get somewhere. The result at Workington was not what we wanted but the players kept their heads, gave agenerally good display and fought back from behind. So there won’t be any heads down or feeling sorry for ourselves this week. We made some basic errors which can be put right and we won’t always have to contend with the weather conditions we encountered in Cumbria. Make your voice heard for us today. John PACKAGING LIMITED MANUFACTURERS OF SPECIALISED CORRUGATED PRODUCTS Packaging Solutions for British Industry Greengate St. Oldham OL4 1DF 0161-284 9000 5 PERSONAL TYRES D E R E K A N T H O N Y L T D . General Sheetmetal Workers & EXHAUSTS & Structural Steel Fabricators U n i t s 4 / 5 ■ Whiteswan Industrial Estate GARAGE SERVICES D e r k e r S t r e e t ■ O l d h a m O L l 3 L Y Tel. 0161 627 4200 !Fax. 0161 627 3616 Puncture Repairs !Wheel Balancing Wish ORLFC every success for 2002 Tracking ■Shockers ■Servicing Clutches ■Brakes ■Welding M.O.T. Repairs ■Exhausts Speedy Hire Centres (Northern) Ltd. O l d h a m D e p o t Tel 0161 626 8111 For all your Plant &Tool Hire Needs B e e v e r S t r e e t ■O l d h a m 0 L 1 S T D Good Fortunes to the Roughyeds Tel: 0161 624 2826 &0161 628 9949 throughout the 2002 Season Fax: 0161 628 9949 Ashton United F.C. Always awarm welcome from your hosts JOHN AND BARBARA Now Open 7Days aWeek LIVE ENTERTAINMENT ERIDAY NIGHTS ❖ W I D E S C R E E N D I G I T A L T V ❖ Free party function room available <! BINGO Monday, Tuesday and Thursday FREE MEMBERS WEEKLY DRAW ❖New members always welcome ❖ Tel: 0161 330 1511 6 rtf I n Y c r F a c e IN welcoming our illustrious visitors St. ❖❖ H e l e n s t h e i r D i r e c t o r s , p l a y e r s a n d supporters we also welcome today our new THE performance of Bradford Bulls in lifting Coach John Harbin. the World Club Championship against the O u r v i s i t o r s t o d a y w i l l n e e d l i t t l e N e w c a s t l e K n i g h t s e m u l a t e s t h e introduction because they are the most achievement of today’s visitors St.