The first bit you leave out is that if not abused, I will not return fire. The second bit is that what I generally aim in your direction is a few home truths (which you refuse to accept), and contempt for your motives (which include an obsessive need to upset fans of our club by making endless posts expressing repeated and manifest glee at the troubles our club is in. The sort of things you should, if you feel that way, either send directly to the past or previous owners if your satisfaction at their demise is really aimed at them not the fans, or else at least qualify your remarks or even couch them in such a way that it is clear your mission is not just to pour salt on the wounds of Bulls fans on the Bulls forum.


As this is our own forum, (where decent guests are very welcome) we are able to discuss the whole history of the club, and how it has come to this, and what anyone may have done or not done, and anyone but the absolutely most dense already knows that it has come to where we are now through an extremely complex, convoluted route, involving numerous parties. It is reasonable to talk about them and indeed nobody can begin to understand the end result without knowing the background. Many, many people are to blame in varying degrees.

It is the early 2000s. 2014 is only a little over 1.4% through the 2000s. Or even 14%, if you were referring to this century. Either way, that's pretty early. And anyway, one of the major seeds in our self-destruction was planted in 2004 (Harrisgate). Key players we lost then are still playing (eg Leon Pryce, and most notably, Jamie Peacock) so even your grasp on history is tenuous at best.


The Bradford club always was and always will be a big club to most of its peers. (If it exists at all). But I follow it because it is my hometown club, and the question of whether it is a "big club" is irrelevant. It is the club I love, and many regulars on here love. Which is one of many reasons why your continued fan baiting and derision is as appropriate in here as a fart in a spacesuit. But crack on, as it clearly amuses you.


And there manifests another major difference between me and you. I don't despise and belittle clubs like Sheffield or Halifax. I look on them as part of the fabric of the game. I also know it is irrelevant to you, as you think 2004 is ancient history, but I well remember Halifax's first division and Super League days, and the many years of very fierce and very enjoyable rivalry that existed between our respective clubs. It may surprise you to know that Sheffield used to be in the top flight as well. So misguided trolls like you don't upset me in the slightest with about "playing Sheffield or Halifax". I love those places. If my team is playing, then I'll be there, the league doesn't matter.

Such clubs are part of my history and rugby league soul too. I have great memories of many of them. I remember Bradford winning the title at a game at the Don Valley. I remember many freezing and snowy Boxing Day games up at Thrum Hall. When Fax were in trouble "way back in the early 2000s" I was only too happy to support them and contribute to the fund. In fact, only this week I took delivery of an excellent little book, "Featherstone Rovers Rugby League Club" by Ron Bailey which is literally crammed with evocative photos. I'm probably in some of them. Featherstone remains one of my favourite grounds to visit.

So as I say, if it makes you happy, crack on throwing your jibes. You may now just have a better understanding why apart from a feeling of sadness, I treat the drivel and baiting of idiots like you with the contempt those postings deserve.

Now crawl back under your rock, and don't bother coming out unless you have something to say worth saying.

Has this come as some kind of revelation?
Posters have been booed off here for suggesting the same for two years.
Of course you are correct, the RFL are so spineless it is untrue and anything that highlights any gap in their grip on the game is quickly hidden away, covered up or made right as quickly as possible.
The problem is with this, is that the more answers that are sought, the more questions it raises.
I have no qualm with the honest run of the mill bulls fans, we are all the same in reality and wish you no ill, but this will all end in one big fudge up to cover up the galimaufry of other fudge ups theyve made.
I reckon it'll all work out well in the end down at Odsal, you wait and see.

Is the club more viable in SL or Championship? Either way it’s a loss maker. If the future is the championship there is still the matter of getting through this season!

Watching a club being deliberately turned into a championship side in 2014 and getting stuffed every week isn’t going to pull in the fans or the sponsors. Why would anyone take the club over and take that course of action? They could attempt to cut costs by selling some players or letting them go but this would probably weaken the team which would mean fewer people come to watch which would mean less income. That could see the club doing down the pan pretty quick yet again maybe even before the season is out unless new owners were prepared to cover all the losses to see the season out then downsize.

Makes you wonder if they’d be better spending money on keeping the club up.

Would a championship club really be a more viable operation than a SL club? Not sure. Overheads for the ground would be the same and they’ve been crippling the club since 2003. There’d be a lower salary cap but it’d cost the same to open the ground and you’d obviously get lower gates and sponsorship.

IMO the club loses money whatever league it’s in, wherever it plays.

Are the special measures in question effectively barring the Bulls from signing players (loan or otherwise) that they can't afford to pay in the near term?

Sounds fairly reasonable to me?

There's a lot of talk regarding 'cutting the cloth', but without seeing any evidence, I'm not convinced the lack of cash from the new (old) owners was the problem.

Who's to say the BB2014 didn't have the funds to make it through the season, as a result the hiring/loaning of players would have been okay.

From the statements made by MM this week, the board provided the business plan which included cash flow statistics, but the RFL refused to look through as they had already made their mind up as to the penalties that would be imposed on the club.

There was a statement made by the RFL that the club required another £500,000 to make it to the end of the season, this figure is not recent, but has just been brought up to give the decision makers at Red Hall a little more credibility.

I suppose no-one will ever know the whole truths, but all this talk about needing to cut cloth is pointless, without knowing what funds BB2014 had in place.

At first glance. Meanwhile other clubs could swoop for our existing players and we could be left with 17 players. What would the club do if there were injuries? What about duty of care? I expect the players union might have something to say about that. Would you put 16/17 year olds into a SL game totally unprepared? Is that safe?

I don’t have a problem with stopping clubs signing players if they can’t afford them. However I’d hope the measures allow clubs to replace players they lose if they’re on lower incomes? I’ve no idea what the rules are.

Anyway I think the dispute over special measures from the latest set of would be owners was that they thought they had the finance but the RFL didn’t ask for their latest set of numbers.

I can’t see any new owner buying the club yet accepting special measures so they’ll have to have some money to put in. If no such owner is found it’ll be liquidation.

With respect, I believe your 'common sense' take on this is flawed. From what I understand from the information that exists in the public domain only short term loan signings would be allowed - now if all things remained equal, that in itself maybe manageable... however, as stated, if other teams (as widely reported) take our present players away, and players receive injuries (Gaskell for example) within a very short period of time our very ability to field a team would be compromised. To that end, imho, is the reason why 'special measures' is the fatal blow in all of this as it stands.

As ever this is another reasoned post.
I totally agree that players shouldn't be picked over unless the club cannot afford them, i guess this will be down to the administrator to decide.
The common sense aspect of the sanctions are to stop clubs doing the opposite which is to recruit more players they cannot afford to replace ones they have had to sell.
A lot of this comes down to honesty, evidence and transparancy, three things that have been missing from this situation since day one.

Really???

“At a meeting with the club’s directors on February 7 they informed the RFL that they needed a further £500,000 of investment or advances of broadcast monies in order to continue to trade." RFL Statement

Really? So, who are you saying has been dishonest, BB2014, RFL or both?

What's your Day One? (My personal Day One is the day we signed Harris, but there's a few to choose from).

As for evidence and transparency, I like to be as informed as the next man, but realise that commercial dealings and discussions are never nor ever will be public or transparent. And as a Bulls fan, I am now accustomed to never being told not only the whole story, but whenever parts of a story come out, then two minutes later one of the many other parties comes out and denies it whilst giving their own slant. Through Caisley, Hood, and the rest, transparency as to why we are where we are is one thing that we'll never have. Opacity? Got that in spades.

Let's just float another hypothetical scenario (and that is all it is, because I really have no idea what the hell is actually going on):

Let's say there WAS some new party, that approached the RFL with proposals such that they felt it was best all round to effectively stymie the BB2014 takeover? Lets say newnewnewnewco (I lose track of which iteration of Newco we are up to now) buys the club off the administrator, pumps in loads of money, and sorts the creditors out such that the RFL has no option but to rescind the points deduction? And then the revitalised club goes on to easily avoid relegation. And Wakey go down instead? Just a hypothetical scenario, since I'd expect squadrons of flying pigs to be seen doing areobatics over Odsal before that happened, as it looks right now. But let's just say?

What would some of our Wakey friends say then? Would they scream at the RFL for yet again intervening to prefer the Bulls? By effectively vetoing a done commercial deal so someone more able to save the club was able to step in? I suspect that, should such an unlikely set of circumstances come to pass, they would go totally apoplectic?

Personally, the priority for me is that SOMEONE takes over the club, with enough resources firstly to save it, and secondly to avoid relegation if at all possible since I believe relegation would kill it. Who that party might be is secondary, and I guess within reason is far less important?

It isn't "down to the administrator" though, is it ?

It is universally accepted that unsettled players are best 'let go', for obvious reasons, but this just means that other clubs/agents have a free hand to 'unsettle' players. Especially, given the governing body's inaction over the facts which came out of the Mason V Hudds case. It clearly shows the RFL seem to bother more over some rules than others.

And less than 2 weeks after that it was decided their offer to take control of the Bulls was the best one

So who's telling porkies???

What an utter shock. None of the other SL clubs need any money whatsoever to continue to trade, yet the Bulls do. That's remarkable. Why can't we just trade on zero income like you think everyone else does?

If any club was asked what money it needed to continue to trade, the figure would be similar. One major difference is they wouldn't need to factor in a) half the money other clubs get b) paying off the previous administration's debts/liabilities c) zero money in the bank from season ticket sales, to name but three. One thing each other club could factor in is a nice little extra being their slice of the Bulls' distribution.

The money you need to trade going forward is called "a budget". Neither you nor I have seen it so can't know the details but it is absolutely normal for SL clubs to ask for advances of money from the SL, the Bulls are absolutely not unique, it's normal, whereas the special circumstances why the new administration BB2014 had severely restricted immediate income are obvious and well documented.

The question isn't anyway what they asked for. The question is, what was the RFL's response? It clearly wasn't, "No, fukk off, not a penny" because if it had been then the would have quickly hit the fan. So I question why the RFL has chosen to make that comment 3 weeks later.

What I do know is that until very recently, the RFL were cool with all of this, and were friends with BB2014 and both were playing nicely. It seems to me 100% certain that something we don't (yet) know about has changed the game.

were the RFL just waiting to see how much new money BB2014 were going to bring to the table with new sponsors and directors investments before they did what they did...was the buyout solely relying on the RFL funds to continue..??

"Which again raises the question about as to why a six point penalty has been imposed now? The RFL are going to look utterly clueless it they end up reducing it after a different bid. Which makes me think they won't, so why would any new investor want to take it on? God only knows.
The whole thing seems to be managed by incompetents."

My point exactly debaser, if the new owners have the money in place to pay of a large portion of the debt, and the RFL say "well done but you are still getting the -6" what message does that send out and where would the incentive to pay of creditors be, if the rules they have set out means you get a reduced sentence for paying of creditors and debts then they MUST give back 2-4 of those deducted points.

Things seemed to change FA when Lambs consortium came out wishing to buy, when there was only one offer from BB2014 it was all fine and dandy but a southern businessman with possible contacts in the RFU (guessing as he did corporate for a union team or 2) seems to have turned the heads of the RFL but his model was offed in favour of BB2014 by the admin and since it does seem like they did not like that decision one bit, especially with the PR blaming BB2014 and trying to absolve themselves. IF correct MM, calvert et al have always been in talks with the RFL and i believe did everything they asked then to be slapped with "special measures" meaning we are the walking wounded killed off their risk v reward ratio and they told the RFL to stick it, maybe detremount to the Bulls but more damage has been done to the face of the RFL, and has shown them to be mostly incompetant and i think the game as a whole does require some new leadership from top to bottom.

wouldn't all that have been submitted in the financial forecast they must have sent to the RFL during one of their many meetings, seems odd that they would suddenly spring it on them when the takeover has been completed.

this is the RFL we are talking about.......

I would say that the RFL are doing their job.

Was it? By who?

An interesting read FA, and one which should touch the spot with many RL fans, about their clubs and the game.
The likes of the antagonists, with their antagonistic nature shared with those posters who criticise and castigate anyone who is their superior in terms of the empathy they are prepared to show to their fellow supporters, no matter what problems they are facing. They will always be lurking under a stone somewhere to come out and dish up their brand of caustic wit, which as we know if it was "SH. T" they would certainly be full of it!

Thanks for a good read.

Please can we stay on topic. Attacks on other posters will just be deleted as they add nothing to the debate. If anyone's got a problem with that they can take it up with me via PM.

Thanks

Channeling ire. Now, there's a concept.

How do I channel ire at Caisley for signing Harris?

The thing is, though I have enough ire reserves to meet all my ire needs, both historical and present. If I did find a way to channel a proportion at Caisley, it would not leave me ire-deficient to deal with day-to-day requirements. So in my case at least, your suggestion is superfluous.

Shut up, or I may channel some ire at you

Well said. Bullseye and I want earnestly to be able to moderate this forum with fairness. But if our own fans are using inappropriate language and getting away with it, it sends entirely the wrong message to fans of other clubs about what is acceptable.

Bullseye and I are one. We are Borg.