The journey to Oldham (to the north-east of Manchester) is about 160 miles.  This is a road journey of around 3 hours 20 minutes.

By Supporters Club Coach.  For full details of Away Travel including pick up times: – look at FGR Away Travel – Forest Green Rovers Supporters Club (fgrsc.com)  For further information, including pickup point locations see Away travel arrangements 24/25 – Forest Green Rovers Supporters Club (fgrsc.com)

Book your coach ticket with your match ticket from FGR (a discount for FGR Supporters Club members) but note that you need to call FGR Reception to get the coach discount (phone 0333 123 1889 Monday to Friday, between 9am and 3pm).  Please try to book early.

By Car – the address is Boundary Park, Furtherwood Road, Oldham, OL1 2PA for sat navs.  Away fans can park at Oldham Hospital (entrance via Westhulme Way OL1 2PH – the cost to park is about £5).  There are street parking options fairly near to the ground.

By Train – It’s an evening kick-off – train travel doesn’t look good.  Returning the same day isn’t possible, the journey time is more than 5 hours each way, and, at the moment it looks like bus replacement services for all or part of the journey.

Wear an extra layer!  Oldham is one of the highest grounds in the country and can be breezy.  Joe Royle once dubbed the ground ‘Ice Station Zebra’ and it is known, anecdotally, for being the coldest ground in the football league.  Away fans occupy one of the stands behind a goal.  It’s covered, seated, and with a pretty good view of the action.

This is the biggest stadium Rovers will play in this season.  Last season’s crowds averaged about 6,600 at Boundary Park.

Boundary Park, from the away end.

Oldham’s mascot – Chaddy the Owl.

Oldham finished 12th in the National League in 2022 and 10th last season.  But there was a spectacular fade from the Latics towards the end of last season – they won only 1 of their final 14 games.

Oldham’s early season results have been a little mixed.  After starting the season with 2 victories, they went on a 6 game winless run (5 draws and 1 defeat) before winning at Woking and at home to Yeovil in their last 2 outings.  These consecutive wins have raised Oldham to 6th in the table, 4 points behind Rovers.

The Latics early season results read – 3-0 home win Braintree, 0-1 away win Wealdstone, 1-1 home draw Fylde, 4-1 away loss Aldershot, 1-1 home draw Gateshead, 1-1 away draw Altrincham, 1-1 home draw Southend, 1-1 away draw Halifax, 3-1 away win Woking, 1-0 home win Yeovil.

Somewhat surprisingly, defender Manny Monthe is among Oldham’s leading scorers with 2 goals.

On 13 October 2023, Micky Mellon was appointed manager of Oldham Athletic on a three-year contract.  You may remember Mellon from his 2 spells in charge at Tranmere between 2016 and 2023.

Giant defender Manny Monthe was with Rovers in the National League and in League 2 between 2016 -18.  He then had spells with Tranmere, Walsall, & Northampton before joining Oldham in July ’24 on a free transfer.

Oldham manager Micky Mellon managed Manny when he was in charge at Tranmere and described him as a huge signing for Oldham.  The 29 year-old Cameroonian has signed on a 2 year deal.

Manny has already scored 2 goals for the Latics this campaign.

Manny Monthe in his FGR days.

34 year-old striker, James Norwood, joined FGR in 2011.  By 2015, he had scored 48 goals, overtaking Jam Klukowski to become FGR’s then all-time leading goalscorer.  Norwood moved on to spend 4 seasons at Tranmere, 3 at Ipswich, & 1 at Barnsley.  He moved to Oldham in 2023, making 40 appearances last season and scoring 17 goals.

James Norwood in his FGR days.

On a hill where you can see the centre of Manchester, Oldham play at Boundary Park, the 3rd highest ground in the EFL. At 160 metres above sea level, only The New Lawn and The Hawthorns are higher. Boundary Park is so-called as it lies on the north-western boundary of Oldham.

Oldham have more local rivals than most. The stadiums of Rochdale Salford City, Huddersfield, Burnley, Bolton, Accrington, Blackburn & (until their expulsion from the league) Bury are all EFL teams within a 20 mile radius. Most Oldham supporters see Rochdale as their chief rivals these days but these rivalries are often eclipsed by hatred of two other teams who play less than 10 miles away – Manchester United and Manchester City.

In their history over the last 100 years Oldham have spent most of their time in the 2nd and 3rd tiers of the EFL. Under the stewardship of two of their longest serving managers, Jimmy Frizzell and Joe Royle, the club’s fortunes peaked with 3 seasons in the Premier League in the early 1990’s.  Joe Royle moved on to manage Everton and, since that time, it’s been mostly downhill.

In 2022 they descended into the 5th tier for the first time in their history (becoming the first former Premier League side to suffer this fate).  This coincided with a tumultuous four-and-a-half-year stint under the ownership of Abdallah Lemsagam.  Trigger-happy Lemsagam (who rattled through 13 managers in little more than 3 years), was at loggerheads with Oldham fans for most of the time, as Latics supporters found more and more inventive ways of protesting against their Moroccan owner.  Paul Scholes lasted just 31 days as manager before leaving, mentioning unwanted interference.

In 2022 local businessman Frank Rothwell completed a takeover of the club, simultaneously buying the club’s ground.

Paul Scholes lasted just 31 days as Oldham manager under their previous owner.

The town of Oldham, at its peak, was the most productive cotton-spinning mill town in the world.  At its peak, 360 mills worked day and night in the town.  But the industry declined during the 20th century and the last mill closed in 1998. Today, its population of over 100,00 is mostly residential.

In 2016, Oldham was ranked the most deprived town in England, an official study by the Office for National Statistics into housing and poverty.  It contained the highest proportion of deprived areas.

Famous Oldhamers (as people from Oldham are called) include presenters Phillip Schofield and Nick Grimshaw, actors Eric Sykes, Christopher Biggins, Bernard Cribbins, Dora Bryan, soap stars Shobna Gulati and Anne Kirkbride, physicist and science educator Brian Cox, and comedy duo Cannon & Ball. The town was also home to the bands Inspiral Carpets, N-Trance and Barclay James Harvest, as well as Take That’s Mark Owen.

Central Oldham.  Boundary Park is about a mile from the centre.