"BBC Inside Out Yorkshire and Lincolnshire and BBC Inside Out North West, presented by George Riley, will be shown on Monday, 28 January on BBC One at 19:30 GMT. The programme is also available on the BBC iPlayer." Should be interesting viewing tonight. I'll be catching up on iPlayer being in the deep dark south. www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/rugby-league/21211330

"BBC Inside Out Yorkshire and Lincolnshire and BBC Inside Out North West, presented by George Riley, will be shown on Monday, 28 January on BBC One at 19:30 GMT. The programme is also available on the BBC iPlayer." Should be interesting viewing tonight. I'll be catching up on iPlayer being in the deep dark south. www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/rugby-league/21211330

Yep, the new SL season got a mentioned on five live this morning. Unfortunately it was regarding the this programme due to be aired tonight which is about the collective debt of the SL clubs. Although it pales into insignificance when compared to football, the debt is thought to be approx. £60m.

Obviously it’s been done to gain maximum exposure, but it still stinks that they should chose now to air it.

I've just posted something similar on another forum Khlav.
The new season is just a few days away and the game of RL gets a kick in the whatsits.
If they made a similar programme for the round ball game, we would look like a well run cash rich sport.
I.m not aware of RL clubs borrowing against future ST sales etc ?

Like Gary Hetherington sais, every pro sport is hugely in debt, Football, Union, Cricket would all look skint if you wrote the figure on paper.

Nobody is saying RL is in Rude Health , however a large portion of this debt will be owed to incumbent directors:

Premier League Football in in Debt to the tune of 2.4 Billion
[urlhttp://www.mirror.co.uk/sport/football/news/premier-league-clubs-are-24-billion-854183[/url

Spnish Football $4.61 Billion in Debt .

Rugby Union Clubs in the Premiership were running on a combined annual Debt of 10 Million a year in 2007-8 , are they really rolling in money 5 years later , definately not Wasps.
Wasps were staving off administration last April with debts of 1.5m ,[urlhttp://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/rugbyunion/9198640/Wasps-optimistic-a-buyer-will-step-in-to-save-Premiership-club-despite-threat-of-administration.html[/url

Where's the BBC's gripping expose' on these other sports finincial issues , ??

I try not to think it but sometimes it does feel like a conspiricy.

A fair comparison would be to compare the level of monies put into the sport ie tv revenues, sponsorship etc against the debt.

Did I miss the announcement that the BBC is now the RFL's PR agency?

The BBC, as a source of journalism, is doing it's job. This is clearly a topic that will raise interest and the BBC is right to ask questions about the running of organisations that are key parts of their communities. If the SL clubs don't want bad PR, don't give journalists the ammunition to fire at you.

As for the timing, of course they're going to time their content for maximum effect - they're not going to go to that time and expense only to air it at 2am in mid December.

And those who say that the Beeb wouldn't do this for football clearly don't remember the Panorama programme broadcast just before the World Cup bid delegation flew out to Switzerland.

Fair points. I totally understand why the Beeb are doing it and when, my point is that it's a non-story when compared to other sports debts.

Sounds rubbish to me. My team is around 2.2 mill in directors debts, that would suggest the other 9 clubs are sharing around 66mill, bullox I say.

Disagree.

I'll grant you, the numbers in football are much more noteworthy but so is, in many cases, the ability of those clubs to service them.

Manchester United seem to have little trouble servicing a debt of £515m yet Bradford Bulls made national headlines by going into administration with a debt of £1.5m.

It'll be interesting to see if this programme shows which clubs are most in debt but more importantly, as bramleyrhino points out, if the clubs in debt can service that debt or are struggling with it.
For instance Leeds will probably have to incur some kind of debt to build a new South Stand, yet no-one would describe Leeds as a club in financial trouble.

Is 3 million per club really that bad? (quoted in the article) but even if you straight average it, its just shy of 5 million each.
any club bringing in 10000 average gate should really have over that in income every year anyway, so its more than servicable for most, but some of the clubs with smaller incomes will struggle.

What could saints debts be with the cost of building the stadium plus general running costs?

Have clubs taken on extra long term debt in order to build/improve stadia?

Cas Tigers are about 2.5 million in debt owned mainly to directors and mostly Jack Fulton the chief benefactor. This does'nt include 2012's accounts (which I'm expecting to be bad). If 3 clubs are well in the black presumably Wigan, Leeds and Warrington this leaves the other 11 with debt's averaging 6.2 million each. This cannot be right can it ?

And that's the problem. At a quick guess I'd say there's prob only Leeds, Wigan, Hull FC, Wire and Saints who get a 10,000 average. Plus it's the extras the really knock the income up. The corporates, the hospitality, the club sponsors, the merchandising and the non-matchday income. Which is something that a lot of clubs are appalling at bringing in.

most definately - a good example been Wakefield. Losses of 1.2 million for 2011 due mainly to ground improvements.

So not exactly the height of reckless spending then?

Issues I have with article is show us the details, show is how it compares to other sorts for fair comparison of the reality of prof sport and tell us which clubs are at risk due to their debts. But then easier to kick the game, add to the public perception of a failing code and sensationalise the real issues with words like abyss.

No - nothing reckless. The improvements had to be made to satisfy the RFL and the licence.

And Bradford, plus Cats are only a few hundred off.

Super League clubs are facing combined debts of £68.5m, a BBC Inside Out investigation alleges. Compared to the combined debt in Football of £2.4 BILLION, and with annual losses of £130m in the Football championships, £68.5 million is a drop in the ocean. READ MORE ON THIS STORY....

Super League clubs are facing combined debts of £68.5m, a BBC Inside Out investigation alleges. Compared to the combined debt in Football of £2.4 BILLION, and with annual losses of £130m in the Football championships, £68.5 million is a drop in the ocean. READ MORE ON THIS STORY....

Which two sl clubs are charitable trusts ?

[url=http://loverugbyleague.com/blogpost_568-media-s-love-in-with-union-continues-as-bbc-sticks-the-boot-in.htmlOne journalist thinks that the media is once again having a 'love in' with rugby union[/url.



[url=http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b0113f7hLooks like he's forgot this BBC documentary which was favorable towards rugby league and not favorable towards football[/url. This documentary 'Lord Sugar Tackles Football' lasts an hour and was broadcast nationally. Meanwhile 'Inside Out' is on for half an hour and has squashed in one other topic along side our beloved rugby league.



Does the great British public only exist in the Yorkshire, Lincolnshire and the north west regions?

Wonderful [islight consultation[/i eh?



Rugby League does get a very fair crack of the whip. This is very bad journalism from you!