Luke George? He's in the squad isn't he? Pretty much guarantees him some game time I think.

Oops my mistake lost his name in amongst them all, is it just me or would any one else like to see Sammut at hooker?

As much as you need a little explosivity at times (is that even a word?), I think you need a steady head at hooker too. Sammut is too unpredictable for 9 IMO. Dummy Half is essentially the man choosing the direction of the play every tackle, so you don't want someone who doesn't know himself what he's going to do, nevermind his teammates. If we were to move any half to hooker, I'd prefer Gale.

That's not to say I don't want Sammut going in at dummy half occasionally to mix things up. Just not 4 or 5 times in a set.

Isn't he banned as a result of his WC punishment?

Said in t&a that he had a knock but your correct he misses a friendly for World Cup ban. Think it counts towards ban even though he's injured.

Is pay on gate available for Sunday?. Pretty certain it was mentioned on website originally but all recent press releases have just mentioned tickets still being available. Imagine that's just club trying to get money in ASAP.

I'm sure it will be. If it's not, they'll lose out on a lot of money, so it would be crazy not to.

If you go on the ticket website, you can only buy tickets for the middle sections of the stand. Suggests they are reserved pre-bought tickets, whereas the outer sections are for unreserved pay-on-the-day.

Cant wait for Sunday, in my book the rl season starts this weekend. Its back to the emotional roller-coaster of supporting the club. Having spent the last couple of months watching numerous hidings in the ashes, the odd bit of football and various other trash over xmas (the darts was belting though!) i really need my rl fix.

Lets hope Sunday is the start of us getting the club back on track !!

A good game with no injuries will do me

Also what a refreshing change there has been no bad news coming out of Odsal this week.Really looking forward to going to the game tomorrow and having a couple of pints

Any predictions for today?. Think once were into season proper were pretty evenly matched with hull. That said think theyll benefit from hit out last week and be a bit more match fit so hull by 12

Not too fussed about the result really, and I am never sure what to expect from Hull. I'll be glad if we come through it with no injuries and the debutants get their hands on the ball plenty.

24 - 0 to Bulls HT

24-0 to the Bulls at half time

Sounds like a good game.

30-18 to Bulls FT they pulled 3 trys back in the last 15 minutes or so. Good first outing in my opinion.

The last 10 minutes were a disappointment in terms of not giving a full 80 minute performance (which is something Bradford have been guilty of for a long time) but there were a lot more positives than negatives from that run out.

If the team can build on this performance through the pre-season into the start of the season proper then I think we're in for a good year at Odsal.


And yes, I know what I've just said is analogous to saying "This'll be the best Christmas Walford's ever had"

What an unexpectedly enjoyable afternoon!

Teh bulls looked way ahead of Hull, and really dominated the game almost from start to finish, keeping Hull pinned inside their half and invariably Hull were having to start from inside their own 10. The defence in particular looked extremely organised and solid, but we did put together some great stuff on attack and all in all played to a much higher level than you might expect from a friendly.

Hull deserved about 6 for effort, but were very undercooked and we dominated them. The ref or a linesman spoiled what would have been the try of the game for a brilliant pass by Sammutt which was criminally called forward.

Hard to judge the attendance as only the stand was open, it holds around 5000 and I reckon it was bout half full. Nice to be back, and not bad weather either.

How can anyone expect Hull to try with the ridiculous new league structure? It's a joke & a disgrace.

Is there any news on any injuries? Scruton went off after 5 minutes and never returned.

Decent hit out and for a friendly the quality and continuity of rugby was pretty good. I was impressed with our scrambling defence and I lost count how many times we held Hull up over our line.

Franny will be pretty pleased with that first hit out I would have thought.

Also thoughts are with the spectator carried out on a stretcher, hopefully it was precaution rather than anything too serious.

You are right Tigertot. Nobody is going to try this year because of the new system so that means the Bulls will finish top and win every trophy going. What a plonker!

Think stand holds 6k. Don't know what it was like in middle but round us their were very few empty seats. I'd have guessed 4.5k plus for attendance. Expect club to announce a much lower figure for obvious reasons.

Very pleased with performance last five minutes apart when we put cue back on rack. Defense looked solid and some good moves in attack. Think we got a lot more positives out of that game than hull who looked generally disorganised.

Frustrating that substitutions weren't announced, but overall a very enjoyable afternoon.
Carvell is a beast, by far and away the best prop on the pitch, making yards for fun and offloading at will.
Gale, Sammutt and Gaskell all looked a threat with the ball. Donaldson was very impressive, solid defense and also got some clever offloads away. Addy and Olbison looked comfortable at 2nd row, again making great yards with ball in hand.
Hell, even Purtell went well, solid in defense and backed up well for his try. The little flick passes between him and Foster during the 50 yard break right on half time were great to watch.

Only concern was Scrutes going off, but he looked ok at full time. Hopefully nothing serious.

Hull, in contrast, looked utter garbage. Scoring only in the last 4 minutes when 80% of our side were academy players. Oh dear.