wroteforluck87

Shot-putter Arthur Rowe was a giant of a man in more ways than one. His massive 187 cm and 100kg frame made him stand out wherever he went, and on the athletics-track he was a giant in the world of shot-putting. A blacksmith since leaving school, Rowe was ironically born in the Barnsley suburb of Smithies, and between 1959-62 was a dominant force in the shot both in Britain and around the world. He only took up the discipline as a 17-year-old when he was playing cricket and awaiting his turn to bat. He saw some youths practicing the shot in an adjacent field. He asked if he could “have a go” and out-threw them by 10-feet. Their coach suggested Rowe gave up cricket and took up the shot instead. The rest is, as they say, history. A promising football career with Rotherham United also took a back seat to athletics. Rowe became a leading personality in British athletics, and shot-putting in particular, in the late-1950s/early-1960s as he established records that were not to be broken until the Geoff Capes era of the mid-1970s. The man responsible for turning Rowe from a good shot putter into an outstanding one was national coach Geoff Dyson. After finishing third in the AAA Championship in 1956, Rowe won the first of five consecutive titles the following year. Capes also won five consecutive but could not better Rowe´s record. In 1958 Rowe was a double gold medal winner on the international stage, winning both the British Empire and Commonwealth Games gold at Cardiff and the European title in Stockholm. Sadly, an Olympic medal eluded Rowe when a combination of the heat, a stomach illness, and probably nerves got the better of him at Roma in 1960. He failed to qualify for the final after finishing 17th in the qualifying round, with only the top 15 going through to the final. Rowe set the first of many British records shortly after his first AAA title in 1957, and such was his presence in British athletics that he became first field event athlete to become the AAA’s “UK Athlete of the Year”. Having steadily pushed up the British record close to the 60-foot (18.3 m) mark, Rowe eventually reached that milestone in an international against Poland in 1959. Despite his failure at the Olympics, Rowe recovered and was undefeated throughout the 1961 season. On 7 August that year, Rowe broke his last British record when he threw 19.56 (64 ft 2 in) at the National Coal Board Sports at Mansfield for a British and European record. Rowe got to No.2 in the world but, in 1962, he quit amateur athletics to take up a lucrative professional Rugby League career with Oldham RLFC. After four matches in just over three months, however, he handed in his resignation. Rowe returned to athletics, but not as an amateur. He joined the professional ranks and took part in many of the physical throwing events on the Scottish Highland Games circuit. He was very successful both in terms of results and financially. Despite having to borrow a kilt for his first Highland gathering, he went on to become a favourite “North of the Border”. At the famous Braemar Highland Games in 1963, he broke four records in the one day. Rowe also won professional hammer throwing titles and, at Aberdeen in 1968, became the world caber tossing champion, a title he retained the following year. After the 1970 season Rowe retired and concentrated on the Barnsley building firm he had set up after his short-lived rugby League career. In 1955 Rowe became a television celebrity before he became an athletics celebrity. He appeared on the popular BBC television programme “What´s My Line” whereby a panel of celebrities had to guess the occupation of a member of the public who had to give a mime describing their job, and also reply to a series of questions with only a” yes” or “no” answer. Rowe´s job as “Blacksmith´s striker” at the time beat the panellists and he was awarded a certificate for doing so. Not as impressive as an AAA title or Commonwealth Games gold, but probably equally satisfying to the Yorkshireman at the time.

How much do sky pay for all the full fixtures currently?

Very interested to see how squads across the championship will look next season under the new wage cap.. Might be wrong here but are you Arthur who's just done the coast to coast challenge?

My misses has booked us in for a meal at the ivy and booked a hotel for our anniversary date night. She looked proud as punch when she told me we've saved a fortune on the hotel cause she's booked it for a Sunday instead of Saturday.. didn't have the heart to tell her am missing the biggest game of the season for this

Well done Killer Totally onboard with this decision to keep on unbeaten run going as long as he did under the uncertainty and circumstances that were around he fully deserves to be the man to build a squad and take us in to 2027.

Sad news about Bill wish him a speedy recovery and would like to thank him for his efforts and the good times we've had during this tenure. Very concerned for the future of the club, it's no secret that Quinn was underwriting the costs of this squad, number one priority now is making sure we can pay the players and staff for the rest of the season. BP/BF is all a debate for later now.

Is that on the cards or just wishful thinking

Again your totally missing what I'm saying and twisting it to make it appear is if I am against Quinn being in charge of this club.. which I am not.. im not an idiot and I'm fully aware if Quinn would walk tomorrow that we would be up #### creek without a paddle and like I've said on numerous occasions I'm very thankful for the large majority of what Quinn has done for ORLFC and long may it continue, I'm also an advocate for staying at Bower Fold long term if that's the best for the club aswell.. However all that being said I am allowed to form some opinions on where I think this club could improve and Quinns professionalism on videos that go on social media is one area and it's not just limited to the video before the fans forum on almost every video he puts out there are moments where he lets his emotions get the better of him and he blurts out something that's unnecessary and it takes the gloss of all the positivity in the video. At first I was of the opinion that is just the kind of man he his, he can be brash at times but he wears his heart on his sleeve and you get what you see with him but in reality how many other professional / semi professional clubs have owners on social media acting in this manner? You also have to question if this characteristic is why we are in,was in or have so many legal cases pending? No I'm not going to go down that avenue with you as you can't believe my mate was telling me the truth at Midlands and separate that form the Gordon incident, if it is inconceivable for you to accept that two people may of approached Quinn at Midlands then I don't hold much hope in you accepting that the law of averages would state that "Mr Approachable" might be at fault for just one of the numerous legal cases around the club recently.

My idea of professionalism would not to be on videos antagonizing fans, latics fans, ex employees and board members of Oldham Athletic. My experience from Midlands was returned from a getting a pint and being told that BQ had a loud exchange of words with another supporter but you don't want to believe me on that. BQ doesn't seem to an approachable person from what I've seen of him Simon maybe but again it's only a small issue I'm happy with 99.9% of what BQ does for ORLFC.

I think you'll find the large majority of my posts about Quinn have been positive I just wish would act in a more professional manner. You've called me a lier twice maybe three times because you don't believe my experience from Midlands away

I'm only saying what I got told.. so it's not Gordon who he "tore a strip" then it was someone else.. I think you'll find I never said it was Gordon in the first place..don't see why I come back from a pint and be told a lie from a friend.. It's like the cult of Quinn on here at times

I'm not sure who Gordon is.. I went for a pint and when I got back was told that BQ and a fan had a exchange of words considering we was in the next set of temp seats it would of had to of been a fairly loud exchange of words to be heard, a few days later I was informed that BQ had a told a fan to walk to Staylebridge as they looked as if they could do with the exercise. I don't want to come across as I'm in the Anti Quinn camp, Im thankfully for the majority of what he does I just wish he would carry himself in a more professional manor at times and I don't think that is a radical position to have.

So he didn't tell anyone to walk to Staylebridge cause they could do with the exercise

You mean like the fella did at midlands and get torn a strip for doing so

If there was a statement put out tomorrow saying that we've secured a 975 year lease of BF and we found to improve x y and z and we are doing to try and improve community relationships within Oldham & Tameside id be over the moon.

Totally agree my only gripe is the lack of professionalism at times, I can't think of another pro/semi pro sports club that has an owner doing videos goading fans, former employees and board members of other clubs. Bill Quinn has done a lot of good for ORLFC and I hope he will continue to do so for a long time yet but the attention is never focused on that and instead is focused on all of the circus around everything else. The easiest step to achieving this professional approach is letting Simon Winnard to do written statements instead Bill Quinns videos.

the worse thing that has come with the boundary park fall out is this us and them mentality amongst "some" supporters of both clubs. Im a life long latics fan who's recently fell in to following the yeds and as a consequence of it now attends more yeds games than latics games. I will say on the whole the yeds lot have been a welcoming bunch to a RL newbie but the sooner the pockets of animosity from both camps goes away the better in my opinion. We need to give people a reason to come not a reason to stay away.

What makes you think returning to BP is a possibility? Everything I've seen suggests it is not

If we can sign a 975 year lease on Bower Fold we need to start laying community foundations in Oldham and Tameside, you can't double you catchment area and not utilize it.

Anita... Does your season start next week now? Asking for a friend

Alot easier to get a pint there as well even if the barmaid forgot I was waiting for her to finish the second pour on my Guinness

Im going to try and shy away from the Ford/BP fall out and focus solely on Bower Fold. Barring its location with a few tweaks it would be ideal for us. 1400 in there on Friday created a good atmosphere and felt like it could work. Lots of talk about buying it and improving it to what we need which doesn't strike me as an "in the meantime" solution, so if we do buy it and do improve it we are they're for the foreseeable. My question would be given the talks of sustainability what would be the number of bums of seats to break even? Another than it's locality if Bower Fold can offer us sustainability and security we should do it. Unless there's similar deal to be made with Avro or Chaddy FC etc but if imagine if that was the case that would of been mentioned at the forum, you would like to think that every possibility of playing in Oldham would be looked at before agreeing a permanent move outside of the borough.

Made problems for ourselves in parts of that game, gotta away with it twice in first half with Rochdale having tries disallowed however we fully deserved the win. Nice to see the attendance over 1000+ hopefully we can put this boundary park business behind us now and just get on with following the lads.

Got absolutely soaked watching my lad playing footy on Sunday and decided against the Rugby and regretted once I saw the result.. 110% going to the game Friday, if the weather holds out I'll go standard cup first.

If anyone could post any key takeaways from the evening I would massively appreciate it.. couldnt get there myself