Oldham 28 Hunslet Hawks 22: Hunslet suffer surprise defeat to leave March with work to carry out

Defeat stunned Hunslet player-coach Paul March, who will be keen to bounce back in next week’s clash with Batley.

March said: “A week isn’t long in rugby league. And we need to take a good look at ourselves now. Oldham played the conditions better than we did, and they were also smarter than us, particularly when we went down to 12 men.”

That happened on the half hour when David March was sin-binned for a challenge on Oldham winger Lucas Onyango. While he was off Roughyeds scored three tries either side of half time.

Hawks stormed into a 12-0 lead with tries by Stuart Kain and Tommy Haughey, both improved by David March.

Oldham pulled back an unconverted try by Jack Bradbury – and when David March was shown the yellow card the home side turned the game on its head with quick tries by John Clough and Mick Diveney, both goaled by Diveney, to lead 16-12 at half-time.

They quickly increased their lead to 22-12 with a try by John Gillam, after which the teams traded further tries with David Clayton and Andrew Yates crossing for the Hawks and Bradbury adding his second try for Oldham. David March kicked three Hawks goals.

Oldham: Heaton; Onyango, Wood, Bradbury, Gillam; N Roden, Diveney; Sutton, M Roden, Ellison, Isherwood, Noone, Clarke. Substitutes: Bentley, Clough, Wood-Hulme, Boults.

Hunslet: Kain; Pryce, Clayton, Haughey, Barnett; Grimshaw, P March; Sullivan, Haigh, Houston, Kelly, Blakeway, D March. Substitutes: McLocklan, Woodcock, Oakes, Yates.

Referee: T Alibert (France).