JOSH DRINKWATER rejected moves to Super League to sign for Oldham in a major coup for the Championship side.
Oldham, who were promoted to the second tier following a superb 2024 League One campaign, will go into the 2025 Championship campaign with a 32-year-old Australian who, just five months ago, played for the Warrington Wolves in the Challenge Cup Final loss to Wigan Warriors.
Now Drinkwater will ply his trade with Oldham after turning down moves to Super League and Championship clubs.
No wonder, then, that the Roughyeds’ head coach Sean Long has hailed the signing as an “unbelievable” one.
“It is an unbelievable signing for us, we are made up,” Long told Roughyeds TV.
His record speaks for itself and he has played at the highest level. I know he had a couple of Super League offers but he is happy where he is living and we got it over the line – he is made up too. It is a massive coup for us.
His leadership can bring a calming influence to our attack. Like a quarter-back he will calm us down. He is smart and has a great short kicking game and they are the improvements we wanted to build on from last year. We have Riley Dean and Danny Craven and with Josh coming in everyone will have to up their game. We struggled a little bit when DC was out last season and had to put Matty Wildie in there which I don’t want to do this year.
The strength in depth through our squad is quite impressive. Come round one my job is going to be really difficult.”
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