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Boss salutes Roughyeds’ character

3/ 5/2006

OLDHAM coach Steve Deakin hailed his side's display despite watching them go down 44-12 to Leigh Centurions.

Against a full-time side and with injuries restricting Deakin's choice, the Roughyeds produced a battling performance against many experts' tip for automatic promotion back to Super League.

Suffering from a case of the flu, Deakin admitted he had been looking at fielding substitute Wayne Corcoran during the game.

Although he was not fully fit, events forced him to be named on the bench, but circumstances dictated that he was not used.

Deakin said: "If we felt we needed to play him, then we'd have played him. It was 10-6 after 35 minutes and I thought that if we could get them to half-time, we'd have 10 minutes' rest for Chris Hough, put Wayne on and then put Chris back on for the last 20.

"They scored two late tries in the first half though and another early in the second half which changed my thoughts - if it was a 50/50 game we'd have taken the chance.

"I'm very proud of the players, they came up with a great effort because we went into the game with five trialists - we had more players signed on who weren't playing than were out there on the field.

"It hampers your preparation but what we could do we did very well.

"The disappointing thing for the players is that people are getting too much field time. For the first 25 minutes, we're in a position where we haven't been blown away and we've competed with the opposition, we've implemented our gameplan, but then the opposition puts subs on that don't dilute their efficiency.

"We aren't in a position to do that - we had no prop on the bench at the weekend."