WHILE acknowledging his guilt and accepting that he must work on his discipline, Oldham Rugby League Club has extended the arm of sympathy to young forward Callum Cameron and has re-signed him for 2023 despite his eight-match ban from the start of next season.
Although he’s only 21, the local boy, who was formerly at Waterhead, then Huddersfield Giants, then back at Waterhead before first signing for his home-town club, played in 14 of the Roughyeds’ 22 games last season, mainly in the second row.
In the last of those games, a play-off match at Rochdale, he was involved in a bust-up and subsequently got an eight-match ban after the RFL disciplinary panel accepted his guilty plea and then considered his previous record.
Head coach Stu Littler said: “He’s a young Oldhamer who developed a lot during his first season with us. It will be a frustrating start to next year for him because of his long ban, but he is a very honest lad and he accepts that, as far as the incident at Rochdale was concerned, he didn’t get it right.
“He and we just have to cop the punishment on the chin and get on with it. We need to work on his aggression and how he reacts to certain things that happen in a game.
“He is very proud to wear the Oldham shirt, as are his family, and that counts for a lot.”
Oldham have so far re-signed five players for next season – Emmerson Whittel, Joe Hartley, Sean Slater, Kian Morgan and Cameron.