Two goals from Chris O’Grady were the difference as Dale came away from Boundary Park with all three points for a second successive Dale win.
It had obviously been a long time since our last trip to Boundary Park for a league game, and as such two or three generations of Dale supporters (at the very least) have grown up oblivious to any history between the two sides. With that in mind, there was certainly an absence of the traditional derby day build up to this game, though that may return if the sides continue to ply their trade in the same division over the next few seasons.
Boundary Park is looking a sorry state these days, and the new Oldham ground that has seemingly been talked about for ten years at the very least cannot come quick enough for them. The recent fire damage doesn’t seem to have had any long term issues for them, but here’s a certain irony about the home side’s Chaddy End being sponsored by a Fire Detection Service in light of what happened earlier in the season.
Dale went into the game with a couple of changes from Saturday’s win over Tranmere. Thompson returned in place of Matty Done, with Bobby Grant given the nod of JLAA. It was a return to pastures of old for Chris O’Grady and Marcus Holness, whilst former Dale loanee Dale Stephens lined up amongst the Latics ranks.
The early minute or so belonged to Dale, as we looked to take the game to the home side, but it didn’t last long as Oldham got to grips with the game, and that was about as good as it got for Dale in a disappointing first half.
We were struggling, with our extra man in midfield offering us no advantage. Oldham seemed better equipped at finding space to work the ball, whilst we were harried into making quick passes which often saw us give the ball straight back to them.
It has to be said that Latics were fully bossing the game during this period, and we seemingly had no outlet at any stage. With O’Grady playing as a lone front man for Dale, they marshalled him brilliantly. They knew enough about him to always have one defender lurking behind him for when he turned his original defender, and it gave him no mileage at all.
It just wasn’t working for Dale, whether that be tactically or down to a number of players underperforming, but by now we couldn’t get out of our half at all and the signs weren’t good. If you were after any sort of positives at this stage, you could at least say that for all their possession and territory, the Latics couldn’t convert this into genuine chances with Holness and Dawson at the top of their game.
Holness in particular was like a man possessed. The 22 year old was clearly conscious of making his mark at a ground where he was considered surplus to requirements without troubling the club statisticians, and he was out to prove a point. He threw himself into every header like it was a 97th minute clearance.
There was the briefest of hopes for Dale in the closing stages as an O’Grady header went wide of the post, but it wasn’t one to cause any fears for the home defence.
The second half kicked off but any hopes of a change in fortune were dashed very quickly as the game continued in exactly the same style that the first half had finished with the home side well on top of things.
However, it would have been easy to have just judged this game as being a case of going through the motions until Oldham scored. As mentioned before, for all the home sides dominance, Lillis’ gloves remained fairly clean thanks to the brilliant efforts of Dawson and Holness, but Latics looked unquestionably more of a threat.
We had the first example of a cluster of corners from the home side and Lillis was called into action for the first real time when a long range effort from Latics’ striker Morais moved in the air, and Lillis needed to punch the ball away whilst airborne to prevent the deadlock being broken.
But two quick subs by Dale had a dramatic impact on the game, and changed the whole direction of the pattern of play. New signing (for the 3rd time) Nicky Adams came on for Joe Thompson and had an immediate influence as he brought pace, ideas and an outlet that had been missing from the Dale team, and Done’s introduction for BBM saw us go 4-4-2 and for the first real time in the game, it gave us something to play with from an attacking point of view, and within a couple of minutes, we grabbed what seemed an unlikely lead.
With what was a rare foray into the Oldham penalty box, we were awarded a penalty when Reuben Hazell bundled over Craig Dawson. Clear foul but from the challenge Dawson ended up outside of the penalty box. Just to avoid any confusion, Dawson, still clutching his head horizontal, polaxed on the floor, rolled back inside the penalty area. As I said, it was just to avoid any confusion.
In front of the travelling support, Gary Jones stepped up in search of his thirteenth goal of the season. It was held up for a while whilst we had numerous interventions from Latics’ Taylor who told the keeper where Jones would be placing the spot kick, and then informed Jones where he would be aiming for.
Whether this had any impact is debatable but Jones struck the ball to the keeper’s right only to see the ball come crashing off the post. Whilst the Dale supporters collectively put their head in their hands, the ball rebounded in the direction of Chris O’Grady who simply fired the ball back over the head of the Oldham keeper to give Dale the lead.
The goal brought some much needed impetus to Dale and we were spared any sort of reaction from Oldham who clearly hadn’t seen a Dale goal as being part of the derby day script. As such, we had Oldham on the back foot for the first team, and there was a sniff of a second Dale goal.
And it was pressure from O’Grady that led to the second and decisive goal of the afternoon. The former Oldham man was all over the back of Reuben Hazell who had gifted us a penalty minutes earlier and under pressure, his attempted back pass proved to be a great ball through for O’Grady.
With Grant looming large in the middle and giving the home side something else that they needed to think about, O’Grady broke the habit of a lifetime and went greedy firing the ball past Brill to double our advantage. I’m sure the opposition played no impact in his decision to do this.
2-0 to Dale and further evidence that Chris O’Grady found his level in League Two. Probably.
With time running away, and a nice “comfortable” 2-0 win in the bag, a spanner was most certainly chucked into the works. With what at the time seemed nothing more than a clumsy tackle by Scott Wiseman saw referee Taylor produce a red card within a split second of the offence taken place. It wasn’t the best tackle by Wiseman, but there were no devilment about it in the slightest, and it was clear there was genuine surprise on all three sides of the ground that a sending off was to take place. With the officiating both sides had to put up with, it should have come as no surprise to anyone.
Our reduction to ten men gave the home side fresh hope and one or two of their supporters decided to delay their departure from the ground as a result. They were rewarded for that moment of hesitation, as within a minute, the Latics were back in it.
A hopeful ball into the Dale box, saw good movement from Oldham’s Furman who fired home from the edge of the box to give them a chance and provide a good few minutes of bricking it for the Dale support with around eight or nine minutes including injury time for Dale to hold out.
Of course, with the game finely balanced at 2-1 with Dale reduced to ten men, it was time for the real way of judging the sides. The game’s attendance was read out, with the Oldham supporters finally finding their voice in reaction to the number of Dale supporters given. As such, Dale were docked all three points for winning the game, with Latics the lucky beneficiaries. I can only assume.
Having infuriated both sets of supporters from pretty much the first whistle, the referee continued in the same manner when he ruled against a penalty shout on Chris O’Grady when he was bundled over in the Latics’ penalty box. You can trot out all the usual clichés of it would have been a free kick anywhere else on the pitch and how you see them given for less, but you got the feeling that the referee didn’t judge the offence on its merits, and mindful at having turned down about dozen half hearted appeals of “Handball” from the home side, and he ruled play on.
The four minutes of additional time that was signalled brought a few discerning voices in the away end, but given three goals, one penalty and a sending off, we were perhaps fortunate that the alleged Premiership referee had restricted it to that.
I’d love to say that the ten men Dale played out the injury time in comfort with the Dale support oléing every touch as we passed the ball around frustrating the home side, but reality was a million miles from that.
The four minutes was spent encamped in our own half, with Oldham chucking everyone including keeper Brill as they had something like 487 corners during this time. We couldn’t get out of our half at all. There were half chances galore to the extent that we were applauding it going out for another corner. At one point, I was happy with the a corner as it gave us the best chance of Lillis getting hold of the ball and allowing us to settle things down for a few wasted seconds.
But the cornerfest couldn’t carry on indefinitely, and by the time referee Taylor put the whistle to his mouth, the celebrations from the away end drowned any noise from the whistle. The celebrations were intensified as rumours swept the away end that the size of away support had no impact on the allocation of the points, though it must be said that at time of writing this is unconfirmed.
Obviously, the Oldham reject Chris O’Grady took the majority of the plaudits for his two goals, though it has to be said he seemed to take it all in his stride, and didn’t look to have the air of someone with a huge smug grin on their face having shoved it back in his former side’s face. Like I’d have done.
Of course, it would be lying to suggest that this had been some sort of perfect performance by Dale, and obviously a great deal of work needs to be done both on the training ground and in the transfer market, but there was certainly a whole host of positives that could be taken from this, and in the those last few minutes when we needed it, every Dale player seemed to turn into Buster Gonad. As was said a few seasons ago, it’s all about kahunas, and we most definitely showed them in them final stages.
And so 2011 continues with a second successive win for Dale, and that even brought whispers of being closer to the Play Offs than the Relegation places. It creates a fantastic platform for Dale in what will be a very busy month for the club, and it can only help the confidence around the place.
But the day belonged to O’Grady. In what couldn’t have been too far off the anniversary of his permanent capture from Oldham, O’Grady did it in the strong silent way that we’ve become accustomed to, allowing his boots and those in the stands to do his talking for him. And boy, we did!