Nothing but the upmost respect for the man and what he's did for us.

All the very best in whatever you do next Mr Potter.

I get the feeling we are going down

:/

I dunno but I imagine we're on a shoestring next year. I had heard he'd gone on Monday and I suspect the board knew his plans before then.

It aint over til big Nige sings.

Think Mick has done a great job. But would like to see franny given ago defo

will big nige make the decision with his RFL hat on or will he be wearing his old Blue sox hat........

It'll need to be a big hat to cover that massive swede of his.

no decision until after Nige has finished his breakfast.....could be a long wait

Potter has done a great job no question but we're on a budget now so it will be interesting to see who turns up.

I'm sure quite a few of us would like to see the return of Stevie Mac. I bet he'd like a second chance to prove the naysayers wrong and I think we'll all agree that during his time as England manager he has demonstrated his contacts and ability to attract players from Australia and New Zealand (Cummins won't be able to do this personally but I'd keep him as assistant - we all know thats why Macca failed in the first place because he had poor assistants).

I'm sure Macca will bring the return of sexy rugby and with a bit of wonga to play with it won't be long before we see the likes of Nero, Wagga, Lovegroove and Amour strutting their bits in a Bulls outfit

Pretty much agree with that.

One thing I'm not too sure of it about is more of the squad leaving weakening FC's position. Whenever everything is sorted (yesterday would have been nice), whatever is left of the current 2013/4 contractees are going to form the senior players (assuming SL) for next season, for the simple reason that virtually all of the better players who might have been out there are now long ago, signed, sealed and delivered elsewhere. So they will form an influential part of the set up and probably the bulk of the 'leadership group' within the squad and, as such, will largely set the tone for what goes on. So whilst it [imay[/i weaken the influence very slightly I think it will be far from any 'tipping point'.

I hope the decision about the coach is already provisionally made and ready to be announced, if so, the stability that represents should itself hopefully persuade any possible tupe refusniks to reconsider and commit to the club.

Incidentally, the board was mentioned - do you, or anyone else, actually know who is currently on the board? GS is chairman, OK, Gary Tasker??

Indeed. Back in his more youthful days in Buttershaw he wasn't known as Tanker, for nothing

Thanks for everything Mick.

You have shown yourself to be an outstanding coach, and a top bloke. We will never forget the efforts you have put in this year and I'm sure you have the best wishes of every Bulls fan going forward.

In the t&a article khan and sutcliffe say they hope to announce a new coach early next week. I would think they and any coach first need to know the comp we'll be in before any offers can be made or signed, but it reads like they already have someone lined up.

To be honest at this moment I'd be happy with either Noble or FC for different reasons, but if it was my choice I'd go with FC. Khan might have said we'll have full cap available (I'l wait to see on that) but the player pool available to us is tiny and shrinking day by day. So a fair proportion of our 2013 team will be youngsters out of neccessity I'd guess, whichever league we're in, so FC already being in our system with a lot of these youngsters could be a big plus.

Often when a coach leaves the number two would leave or make a statement pretty quickly, I'd guess if we don't hear from FC then he's the one lined up, but nothing can be announced or agreed until we see the white smoke from red hall.

I liked & admired MP before his tenure at Bradford, that has grown immeasurably these last few years. There are certain players who strike you as good coaching material during their playing careers & those that don't. Cummins is in the latter. He wasn't mentally strong enough as a player IMO & that will transmit to the older players. He hasn't the international reputation to attract top talent either or young guns, if there are alternatives. apaprt from Noble there are very few examples of promotion from within being successful.

Exactly. Potter would have had to dismantle the squad of players contracted for 2013/14. I have heard the spend would be the lowest in SL. We will only 'know' for sure if the Bulls are in SL and we see the squad put together.

All the best Mick, you've gone the extra mile for the club and you'll be sadly missed by all connected with the Bulls. Thank you very much RFL, now we've lost our Coach, have we had enough punishment yet or do you think we need a bit more?

I wonder when Noble will be announced as successor?

Really sorry to read this news, however I wish Mick the very best as he returns back to Australia.

Gained a lot of respect across the rugby circles for how he stayed with the Bulls on no pay reportedly(and all the staff) while you had the troubles, not many coaches would have I suspect.

Yes he was a school friend of my brother and they used to play cricket in the passage between the houses until "Tanker" go too big to fit in it!

Though please note that I am not suggesting, implying or in any other way indicating that his fondness for 2nd breakfast in any way impacts his ability to make the correct decisions for the RFL!

I think the difficulty with 'promotion from within' is far more pronounced when it's a former player of a club who takes over as coach; the transition from mate to boss isn't easy to cross and many don't manage it. Cummins though was never a player at Bradford so I'm not really sure it applies quite as much, though there is also the point that a managing duo may use the 'good cop - bad cop' approach, with the second in command being usually 'good cop', if he then assumes to top role he may find it hard to take on the mantle of 'bad cop' and the obvious changes in relationships involved.

The flaw in that is that I can't imagine MP ever being the 'bad cop', it seems out of character, to be honest. Alsdo at the end of the day Franny came with a good reputation and chances are he is looking for a head coach job, so if he doesn't get the job at Odsal he may well be off to pastures new. Do we want to lose both coaches? Maybe the new guy will come with a ready made no.2? Maybe.....

I noticed that bit as well. Maybe an indication that a decision re: SL status is imminent if their talking about announcing coach next week?

Thank you Mick. A remarkable job under unbelievable conditions. Absolute respect for what you have done for the Bulls.

I think some of the player's he's dropped recently might disagree.

Its almost impossible for fans to gauge how good an assistant coach is. Really you're just going on comments made by their ex boss or a few players. Everyone thought MacNamara would make a great Head Coach.

That was my thinking, I just hope its not actually new owners putting too much faith in rfl timings!

"end of this week" was mentioned by the rfl for outlining the process of picking our fate, so unless its a quick process (how unlikely!?)....or a done deal (either way)....its hard to see how we could announce a coach next week. [iUnless [/ithe new coach is wiling to work in any league for us, just to get a head coach position? With the final renumeration to be determined once we know our fate.