THE Roughyeds’ medical staff will be working overtime at training tonight when at least eight players will be in for treatment, five of whom picked up knocks in the defeat at Batley on Saturday.

Next up is London Broncos away this coming Saturday, a Betfred Championship clash that starts at 2pm and will again be streamed live on Our League.

Oldham currently sit eighth in the division with a 50 per cent win record, having beaten Swinton Lions at home before losing at Batley Bulldogs.

Broncos, a full-time outfit, are bottom of the pile, having been beaten 47-14 at Halifax and then forfeiting their game at Toulouse Olympique which amounts to two defeats from two in terms of the league table.

They played at Halifax without first-choice half-backs Jarrod Sammut and Cory Aston, but they are both expected to be back for the Oldham game having caused Roughyeds plenty of problems in the past.

The Roughyeds’ side, much depleted at Batley, will depend to a large degree on how a lot of players respond to treatment this week.

Frontline forwards Shaun Pick, Phil Joy, Martyn Reilly and Liam Kirk all missed the Batley game and coach Matt Diskin will be hoping at least some of the four will be ready for the trip south.

Half-back James Barran, groin, was also out of the equation for the Batley game, having been injured in the Challenge Cup defeat at Swinton three weeks earlier.

Utility back Kyran Johnson, who hasn’t played yet this season, was in the provisional 21-man squad for Batley, but he didn’t make the cut and his progress after back trouble will continue to be monitored.

The five who were hurt at the Fox’s Biscuits Stadium, on a day when nothing went right, were Danny Bridge, knee, Ben Heaton, ankle, Dan Abram, leg, Ryan Ince, two dead legs, and captain Gareth Owen, knee.

The club will know more about the weekend’s prospects for each of these players after treatment and assessments tonight.

Prop Joy, virtually an automatic choice on the open side of the front-row for the last few seasons, has been struggling with strained and pulled hamstrings since the first friendly at Featherstone five weeks ago.

He said: “Hamstring problems can take a while and mine are no exception.

“I thought I had a chance to play at Batley, but I suffered a little setback in training last week.”

Broncos have had two consecutive blank weekends and a break like that can either help with rest and injured players or be a hindrance because the lack of match practice.

Broncos skipper Will Lovell said: “The break has given us time to get some bodies back on the field and plenty of training in the legs as well as the time to address issues from the heavy defeat at Halifax.

“We made too many errors, gifted cheap penalties and the game got on top of us. The Championship is a tough division and no points can be taken for granted.”

Oldham haven’t played the Londoners since 2017 when Broncos romped to a 74-12 win at home, but were lucky to win 20-18 at Bower Fold thanks to a last-minute runaway try by Welsh winger Rhys Williams, who is now at Salford.