If the club gets the lease then it'll have to share the maintenance costs with the stock car bods but without the RFL contribution.

Remember from 1986-1996 the club had all maintenance costs covered by the council and even with that and the contribution from speedway and stock cars they still struggled for money.

The only way out of this is to build a new ground but that's not happening.

That would be for the best. The RFL have been damaged as much as we have by them being our landlords. If we can pay them enough for them to save face and depart that would be best for all involved. Then just the council and the Bulls in the direct freehold/leasehold relationship - see if there is a chance for any investment from any of the prospective owners that the RFL have binned off over the past 8 years. With the stockcars paying a small rental to the Bulls.

Isn't it the rates that's the biggest outgoing? Owning the long leasehold won't change anything about that.

I know I'm finding myself becoming a little fixated with the corners of the pitch. But it feels like a visual reminder of how god awful we are as an entity that we have gone back to that farcical situation. I wonder if technology is better to reinstate them in a competent way on game day. Seems to me that Bradford fans have retained their emotional ties to Odsal when mine have long gone. I've said it before I want the club to come out and say what their vision is for where we play. Do they want Odsal as our permanent home? If so what will they do to it to make it fit for this century? And if its a stop-gap what other options are being looked at. It's the almost complete silence from the owners that is peeing me off.

I can see your concerns. Is there a single stadium in this country that shares football/RU team with a stockcar track? We know what the compromises are - corners, fans being about an additional 12m away from the pitch. Apart from getting some rental money are there any advantages?
In an ideal world the council gives Odsal to the stockcars permanently and Bulls have a purpose built stadium over the road to themselves.
Third option is Horsfall - but again the fans are further away from the pitch, access and parking are poor, would need more stands.

With some players looking like they play in the 1980s it's only right the stadium looks like it's from that era too.

Rfl didn’t contribute to maintenance costs. They paid the peppercorn rent and got commercial rent from us and we were still responsible for maintenance costs. At least we’re sharing those costs with the stock cars now, likewise you would expect Rates bill to be split between both users as well.

I'm sure I saw a press release from the stock car people saying the renovation costs had been split between then, us and the RFL. Oh well.

I was talking about the maintenance costs under our lease with RFL. Afaik RFL are contributing towards the the renovation costs. Haven't heard anything as to whether they will contribute towards maintenance going forwards.

Right so the millstone remains around the neck...

This feels like the last season for me.

Paid more for a family season ticket than I would have at St Helen's to sit in a hole, watching a mid table team still living off past glories with about as much chance of getting back to the promised land as Vic Rangers...

Giants charge £99 don’t they for an adult ST? What’s the club meant to do, reduce from this pro rate in line with quality of rugby?

Other clubs have backers or other income streams that allow subsidised tickets, we don’t and either lose money playing at dewsbury from corporate or lost supporters or move back to odsal and accept it comes with some cost. People still keep saying we need a brand spanking new stadium but everyone knows this but there isn’t one and one is unlikely so do we throw the towel in or keep trying?

What do you honestly expect the club to do?. A new Stadium ain't going to happen we aren't as lucky as other clubs who have had council support.

The club tried the cheap ticket option and is one of the reasons we are where we are. We don't have a rich backer, you don't get Halifax,Fev fans complaining about the situation they are in, they get on with it, why should we be any different?

Agree with all that but there are huge issues with the eventual ownership of the club and how that came to be. This season is utterly crucial and as a fanbase we would need to see some significant investment in time/money/other resources in moving the club forward on and off the field for any of it to make sense. It boils down to one simple question; Why is Nigel Wood here?

but hopefully now a smaller millstone if its shared with stock cars.

someone mentioned earlier in thread that club are trying to buy lease back from RFL. Guess that would classify as significant investment but not sure what benefit would be as would just mean we wouldn't be paying commercial rent to RFL ( but instead shelling out approx 10yrs rent in one hit) and instead be back paying peppercorn rent to council. Either there's some long term plan or we're back to someone wanting to get their hands on odsal for some unspecified payoff which seems unlikely as the Stockcar lot wouldn't have invested amount they have without having a longer term lease agreed.

The whole mystery around the ground, and the lack of any kind of proper engagement from Nigel Wood is the main "turn off" for me. There are so many important unanswered questions that are fundamental to the future of the club (not to mention those questions about how we got here) yet nobody is prepared to front up. We're just expected to pay our admission and pretend none of this other stuff matters. I want to get behind the team but I can't help but feel it will all fall apart again under the current regime. The best we can hope for is just to plod along. Hardly inspiring.

Workington is the only one which springs to mind.

To be honest, much as I like both Stock cars and speedway, it doesn't look quite like I imagined 21st century RL would look like. As a rugby club we're going backwards imo and it's hard not to feel a bit dispirited by it.

The ground is no different to what it was in the mid 80s (parts of it are actually worse) and it wasn't good enough then. That's an indictment of all parties involved.

Be honest would be good. Why are we charging more than most SL clubs but seeing phuq-all return for it?

We were lucky but Morrison's screwed that completely (proud to say I no longer shop there nor will I ever) but how long am I expected to stump up BMW money on an Austin Maxi just because we are told the MIA salesperson is gonna put go faster stripes on it?

It's taken a very long time to wear me down but tell me we have to go to Dewsbury or we are finished and I am fine with that but not so much with the immediate 180.

Honesty. Nige.... Where are you and what's the plan?????

Fev wiped the bloody floor with us last weekend, Fax have more or less admitted they have no ambition for SL any more, if that's the case for us then tell us and lets get a suitable ground share in place, lets drop the pretense and charge/act like a permanent Championship club like Dewsbury and Batley who are still streets ahead of us in plans and ground ownership

Nigel doesn't do communication with us plebs. I suspect we are going to be run as a permanent championship club but to come out and acknowledge that publicly would lose those supporters that kid themselves that we still have aspirations. The SL application was made because we had to seen to be making it.

Some good points being made here. There does feel to be a lack of direction and leadership atm. Presumably there is some kind of plan, but its a well kept secret.
I went to Dewsbury for the few games last year and was made to feel very welcome. Ive no problem with them at all, and indeed Im grateful for what they've done, However, its a bit of a trek for a lot of people, and at the end of the day we should be in Bradford. Which brings us to Odsal.
Chalmers took us out of there, due to, he said {yeah I know} to exorbitant costs. So whats significantly changed? Are the Stock Cars paying half {or more} of the rent, maintenance, rates etc? Are the council and RFL investing anything at all? It may all be hunky dory but it would be reassuring to hear some details.
Who leads the club? Mark Sawyer is CEO and seems a sound guy, but he is only temporary and is, understandably, keen to return full time to Dewsbury. Since the departure of Eric Perez, there has been no Chairman. Nigel Wood would appear to be calling the shots but has no official role and rarely says anything in public.
Bradford Bulls 2017 have two directors and a company secretary. BBBBB Ltd have the same two directors and a different company secretary. They also have 10 shareholders, mainly the Wood and Sawyer families, plus Adam Fogerty and a chap called Graham Swain. Nobody though, jumps out as a leader and visionary.
Its not unusual for us to be at a crossroads, we've spent more time there than Meg Richardson {one for the kids}, but this year really does seem that way for a lot of us.

After reading the last few pages its hard not to feel dispirited. I've got kids that I thought I would have taken to a match by now, I haven't and there are other reasons for that. If I was to take them to a game, it would probably be at Leeds now (and going back 5,10,15 years I cannot imagine saying that)

If the club is being run in safe mode with zero aspiration to be in Super League then it sounds to me like Bradford needs a new club in Wimbledon/FC United of Manchester/Salford City type guise

And Vic Rangers are no longer, didn't know prices were higher than top SL clubs!

I could really get behind the club if I genuinely thought they were aspiring to improve. I look at York and see a happy, open, vibrant, professional, forward thinking setup that is making genuine progress on and off the field. They're making friends across the game. That could be us (it was in 1995-96). Whenever we appear to make progress we make a backward step, always because of the incompetent owners.

Now Nigel is more or less officially in charge we have a really divisive figure pulling the strings who provokes very strong opinions (99% negative) across the sport. He's done nothing to engage with Bulls supporters many of whom I suspect are suspicious of how deeply he was involved in the sale of the Odsal lease in 2012 that brought the club down, the selection of potential new owners in 2013, 2015 and 2017 and how he has now become owner himself. That whole period is very murky. We're now expected to "move on" and anyone that criticises gets both barrels - remember the recent press releases and comments from Eric Perez?

Can you imagine if that had happened to a premier league football team - the chairman of the sport's governing body is involved with the transfer of lease of e.g. Old Trafford to the governing body - then is able to have decide who is to take over the reins at MUFC before giving the ok to a close personal friend who then hands it over to him. The press would have a field day.

I can empathise with the issue of taking your kids to the match. I've thought of taking relations and friends along but have baulked at it because of the state of the place.

I'm glad it's getting a lick of paint but it's not a sustainable future to play there and that worries me.