Rhodri Lloyd leads fightback as Widnes Vikings share spoils with Oldham

WIDNES VIKINGS 10 OLDHAM 10
JAMES GORDON, DCBL Stadium, Friday

WIDNES fought back to share the Good Friday spoils with Oldham thanks to two Rhodri Lloyd tries.

Oldham showed intent from the get-go, pinning Widnes inside their own ’10’ off the kick-off and that contributed to them enjoying the better of the opening exchanges.

It took five minutes to open Widnes up, a passing move from deep caught Ryan Ince committing inside and opening things up for Mo Agoro to race away down the right on his return to the field, and he finished acrobatically right in the corner despite the best efforts of Vikings debutant Oli Leyland, the Warrington dual-registration player.

Such was Oldham’s early dominance that it took until the 18th minute for Widnes to have a play-the-ball in Roughyeds’ half of the field, and that came off the back of a timely Matty Fozard 40/20.

Widnes failed to make the most of that first look at the Oldham line; the closest they got on back-to-back sets was when Tom Gilmore was held up over the line.

Gradually it was the Vikings that started to gain control of the match and they soon camped themselves in Oldham territory. Phoenix Laulu-Togagae let a Tom Gilmore kick bounce and they were nearly caught out by Joe Edge, before another Gilmore kick was put dead by Josh Drinkwater for another drop-out.

Rhodri Lloyd caught a Gilmore kick and, when tackled a few metres short, he kicked for the corner, just too far for Mike Butt, who at the other end snuffed out an opportunity in the last few moments of the first half when Jordan Turner couldn’t quite get a pass away to give Jack Johnson a walk-in.

Johnson did get a walk-in eight minutes in to the second half when a nice set move by Oldham saw an inside ball by Drinkwater release Laulu-Togagae, and Turner saw off the covering Widnes defence with the pass to his wing man.

A 50-metre kick return along the touchline from his own line by Leyland got Widnes off the canvas and into Oldham territory for them to get their first try of the match as Lloyd took Joe Lyons’ short ball over the line.

Leyland forced a drop-out as Widnes built pressure, though handling errors in the greasy wet conditions soon became endemic as the game was locked in the middle third of the pitch.

That was until the 75th minute when Lyons and Lloyd linked up again, this time a bit further right and from close range to level the scores. Gilmore missed a tricky conversion from a few yards in from the touchline.

Neither side got close enough for a proper drop-goal attempt. Jack Owens had one from the half-way line fall well short and then, when Riley Dean kicked out on the full with barely seconds left, Widnes had one tackle from 40 metres out, and they saw Gilmore’s one-pointer charged down and so both sides had to settle for a point, which was Oldham’s second draw of the season.

GAMESTAR: Despite their attacking struggles, Rhodri Lloyd found a way over twice to earn Widnes a share of the spoils.

GAMEBREAKER: It was on the edge until the end, though Tom Gilmore’s difficult conversion attempt could have won it with five minutes to play.

MATCHFACTS
VIKINGS
27 Oli Leyland
5 Mike Butt
1 Jack Owens
4 Joe Edge
2 Ryan Ince
6 Joe Lyons
7 Tom Gilmore
8 Dan Murray
14 Matty Fozard
10 Martyn Reilly
11 Rhodri Lloyd
12 Danny Langtree
18 Nick Gregson
Subs (all used)
15 Liam Bent
16 Liam Kirk
28 Ben Hartill
30 Luke Thomas

Tries: Lloyd (56, 75)
Goals: Gilmore 1/2

OLDHAM
1 Phoenix Laulu-Togagae
20 Jack Johnson
6 Danny Craven
3 Jordan Turner
5 Mo Agoro
7 Riley Dean
23 Josh Drinkwater
8 Gil Dudson
14 Bailey Aldridge
19 Ted Chapelhow
35 Lukas Mason
11 Matty Ashurst
13 Adam Milner
Subs (all used)
10 Owen Farnworth
12 Adam Lawton
16 Pat Moran
21 Lewis Baxter