Exactly a year to the day since he and his family bought Oldham Athletic, Frank Rothwell talked to Oldham Rugby fans at the Roughyeds breakfast for potential sponsors with the ease and confidence with which you would expect a new owner to be sitting in front of his own.

Wearing his trademark flat cap, sitting back and speaking with the authority of a man in charge, Rothwell opened up with: “A stripper usually comes on at this stage!”

What was most apparent was that Roughyeds and Latics are NOT rivals for spectators, lottery customers, volunteers or sponsors, but are firm friends, confidantes, mates and more than ground-share business associates.

How else do you explain Rothwell’s public appearance at a Roughyeds ‘do’ to say nothing of Dave Murgatroyd’s picture of him showing off the Roughyeds’ list of sponsorship packages or his assertion: “This is a new era for both clubs. And it’s exciting.”

As rugby club sponsors gazed out on the new Boundary Park pitch with admiration - and understandable too given that it looked as flat, as green and as well manicured as Wembley - Rothwell added: “That’s down to Oldham Council. We all owe them a huge thank you. We must never forget their huge contribution of the £1m pitch to see all this happening.

“We are close to selling 4,000 season tickets for Athletic this season and I’m sure a lot of our fans, and yours, will do a crossover to enable them to watch both clubs. Who wouldn’t want to come down here on a Sunday afternoon in summer to enjoy our fantastic facilities,

“The facilities here are as good as if not better than any club in the country,”

Rothwell did not say as much this time, but it’s well known locally he and his board regard Boundary Park as a town facility for use by all, hence the Council’s expensive intervention to enable it to happen.

The Latics supremo said: “It’s not just about Latics and Roughyeds. We can play cricket here too.”

Latics and Roughyeds, backed by the council, see themselves as frontrunners in the quest to put the borough back on the sporting map.