[2][3] The club plays home games at Boundary Park and competes in Championship, the second tier of British rugby league.
In 1876, Oldham Football Club was founded in a meeting at the Prince Albert Hotel, Union Street West, attended by Chairman of the Watch Committee, William Chadwick, Chief Constable Charles Hodgkinson, mill owner Fred Wild, eminent local Quaker and Lord to be Alfred Emmott and three brothers of the Fletcher family.
A playing field was organised at Sugar Meadow, Gartside Street adjacent to Glodwick Spinning Mill and changing facilities were provided by the nearby Shakespeare Inn.
After two seasons they joined Oldham Cricket Club at the new Clarksfield ground before finding a more permanent home in 1889 at Watersheddings.
In the 1950s, Oldham won the Championship and other trophies with a side that included Alan Davies, John Etty, goalkicker Bernard Ganley, Jack Keith, Sid Little, Frank Pitchford, Derek 'Rocky' Turner, Don Vines and Charlie Winslade.
The Australians lost only one of twenty-two club matches in Britain during that tour, but came close to defeat at Oldham, where the Roughyeds held them to a 7–7 draw.
At the end of a disastrous 1969–70 season, when Oldham finished 29th out of 30 clubs in a single division, the committee was voted out of office en bloc and replaced by nine new officials and a new chairman in Arthur Walker.
Tunk's brief was clear: He had to sell most of his first team squad that had been relegated twice in 3 years, help to pay a tax bill of over 1 million pounds and sign promising players from the junior ranks.
Over the next 2 years he got promotion to the top level for all the Oldham teams whilst getting young players like Chris Joynt, Barrie McDermott, David Bradbury, Gary Christie and Tommy Martyn to international level but due to the clubs massive debts run up by the previous management, Tunks was forced to sell his best players.
When a Rupert Murdoch funded Super League competition was proposed, part of the deal was that some traditional clubs would merge.
When Salford visited Oldham for a match on Good Friday, 14 April, supporters of both clubs demonstrated against the unpopular idea by invading the pitch during the interval.
At campaign's end, an attempt was made by chairman Jim Quinn to sell the team for an undisclosed price tag, with debts reportedly between £500,000 and £1,000,000.
Mike Ford retired as player-coach of Oldham in 2001 and in January the following year took up a post as defensive co-ordinator with the Irish Rugby Football Union.
[8] After a successful 2001 season, they narrowly missed out on promotion to the Super League, losing to Widnes 12–24 in the Northern Ford Premiership Grand Final.
During the 2002 season they played at Ashton United's Hurst Cross ground in Ashton-under-Lyne, due to a dispute with Oldham Athletic over the use of Boundary Park.
Steve Molloy took charge of the Roughyeds after former boss John Harbin left to join Oldham Athletic as fitness conditioner and sports psychologist in July 2002.
[10] In doing so Oldham finished high enough to gain entry into National League One when the Northern Ford Premiership was split into two.
Bill Quinn became the club's new chairman, with previous owners Chris Hamilton and Sean Whitehead remaining as directors.
[12] On Friday 4 May 2007, Oldham took part in the first ever National League Two match broadcast live on British television, on Sky Sports.
Oldham finished their most successful season in recent years in 4th place on the National League Two table, they then played and won games against Swinton at home then Barrow away in the play-off to reach the National League Two Grand Final, but the game seemed a step too far for Oldham going down to an inspired Featherstone Rovers team at Headingley.
Northern Rail Cup – Oldham enjoyed reasonable success in the Northern Rail Cup, achieving a win over National League One favourites, Salford at Boundary Park to enable them to make it through the group stage of the competition into the knockout stages where they faced and beat another National League One team in Whitehaven to progress to the quarter finals against Batley at Mount Pleasant, in a see-saw battle Oldham's challenge died thanks to a dubious referee call followed up by a quick fire Batley try.
In the 2022 League 1 season, Oldham finished sixth with a record of 8 wins, 1 draw, 11 losses and lost in the Play Off Q+E (qualification and elimination) round against Rochdale Hornets 38-24.
Head coach Assistant coach Updated: 9 December 2024Source(s): [1] Gains Losses The Law Cup is an annual pre-season friendly match between Oldham and Rochdale Hornets, first contested in 1921 as the Infirmaries Cup and later renamed after the Rochdale MP Alfred Law who had originally donated the trophy.