Oldham suffer Thornley hammer blow
Oldham centre Iain Thornley has been ruled out for the season after scans confirmed a complete ACL rupture, sustained during a game against Featherstone Rovers. Despite initially playing through the injury, further scans revealed the severity, sidelining him for the rest of 2025.
Iain Thornley’s season is over after scans revealed the Oldham centre has completely ruptured his anterior cruciate ligament.
The 33-year-old initially suffered the injury during Oldham’s Betfred Championship victory against Featherstone Rovers last month but remarkably played through the pain to finish the match. Further examination this week confirmed the devastating diagnosis for Thornley, who joined the club on a two-year deal in November.
“It looks like my season is over. We thought it was a bit of bone bruising but after I tried training and felt a bit uneasy under foot we had a scan and it has come back as a complete rupture of my ACL,” Thornley told Roughyeds TV. “I think I have done it in the Featherstone game, we thought it was bruising and I finished the game somehow. Then I had a week off, got through some training but in the team run I felt my knee slip a bit in warm up so we knew something wasn’t quite right so I had a scan and unfortunately they told us the worst had happened.”
Head coach Sean Long expressed his devastation at losing one of his key players and leaders. “I’m absolutely gutted for Iain who is a big player for us and one of our leaders on and off the pitch. We have had a really bad run with injuries already this year and this one really stings. Luckily Jumah Sambou is now available after suspension so we hope that Jumah can hit the ground running and find the form that he was showing at the start of the season. But we will miss Iain massively, of that there is no doubt. We wish him all the very best with his recovery.”
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