Must try harder.

Bolton travelled to Oldham with the hope of beating Oldham at home, which they have not done so for a few years now. Unfortunately they didn’t do it on Saturday either.
Oldham opened the scoring after two minutes when their fullback ran around the outside of Bolton’s defence to score in the corner. Bolton replied three minutes later with a penalty by Rhys Pritchard. Bolton were starting to play some good rugby and two beautiful inside passes from James Singleton saw Louis Critchlow score in the ninth minute. The game ebbed and flowed until the Oldham fullback again found space on the outside and scored a second try in the sixteenth minute. Bolton were not really pressured by Oldham at this stage of the game so Niall Murphy, Ryan McClusky and Louis Critchlow had some storming runs causing a lot of panic in the Oldham defence. In the twenty fifth minute Rhys Pritchard kicked a penalty. The first half ended with Bolton giving away an easy try to Oldham and therefore Oldham went into the break leading 19 – 11.
The second half was very much as the first half where Bolton didn’t find any pattern to their play and this caused them problems. In the forty-ninth minute Will Bate made a good break and Alex Waddicar manged to hold on to a difficult pass to score with Rhys Pritchard converting the try. Within minutes Oldham had a penalty but the kicker missed. All the Bolton players thought the ball was going over the dead ball line however it didn’t, allowing an Oldham player to follow up and score the easiest of tries. Bolton came back into the game with a lot of possession off the lineout and scrums but were not able to retain the ball. This allowed Oldham back in the game on numerous occasions. Bolton’s kicking game was good but on quite a few occasions the ball was kicked when it should have been kept in hand. Oldham’s dogged defence kept them in the game at this stage. In the seventy-fifth minute Jonnie Stansfield was slipped a pass from Louis Critchlow to score. There was a chance for Bolton to win the match at this stage but an interception by Oldham led to a try in the seventy-eighth minute and this sealed Bolton’s defeat.
The game could have gone to either team. Oldham took all their chances and on reflection narrowly deserved to win. Bolton will have to put this defeat behind them because all the players know they can play better than they did. The Man of the Match for Bolton was Ryan McClusky.