Have the Bulls got any more dodgy barrow boys lined up to take over? Or are they relying on the RFL and the fans to temporarily bail them out again?

But, but, but i thought there were no problems, everything was pretty much hunky dory, and the nay sayers didn't know what they were talking about..........right? Ferocious aardvark??

You managed to dislodge your head from that mountain of sand?

I don't understand how this was allowed to happen, ridiculous. The narcissist Khan spent a year revelling in glory yet behind the scenes he was driving the club into the ground.

Around this time last year I said that the club should not be allowed to operate with essentially a one man board of directors, it is a terrible style of corporate governance. It seems by the time others did come in it was too late.

Yes. That transaction was to redeem the secret £700k unsecured loan which the RFL had foolishly advanced Bradford 4months previously.

The RFL then bricked themselves when they realised the exposure & needed some good "spin" on it when it leaked so offered to buy the Odsal lease(as the council still own the freehold).

They then wrote off the loan and took the only asset of value Bradford had.
6 months later the administrator offered creditors SFA. I've always wondered why he didn't look at the RFL deal which effectively made them preferred creditors to the detriment of the taxpayers & everyone else.

Bottom line, the RFL £700k intervention got Bradford into that season and no more. Then all the about "competition integrity" kicked in.
Bradford lost their main asset.
Bradford built up another 8months of debt, thereby ensuring administration
Bradford went to the fans, and used up all that goodwill.

If the RFL had said no, Bradford would have entered administration in the preseason. With less debt, still holding an asset (so more attractive to investors - maybe a better quality of investor), and still able call on the fans goodwill.

That RFL intervention screwed us completely. Our directors must have made a compelling case. I don't know who to blame more for it. The directors who sold it to the RFL, or the RFL who bought it....

Spot on.

This indeed was how a number of clearer-sighted people at the time saw it. The likes of "Maislebugs" in particular spring to mind.

I will admit it took me a little longer to tread the road to Damascus. I guess when you are told outright lies to your face by three directors and a senior manager (two of whom I since learned were just following orders), it takes a while to see through the lie.

Hes just a total tw@

Merge them with Halifax.

Lots of excuses no doubt, but it really shouldn't be that difficult to run the Bulls as a break even venture. Big city, sympathetic local media, no doubt a preferential rent on a big stadium, good local amateur players/clubs, recent history of success, solid fanbase.

To get into this kind of trouble time and time again is only the fault of the inept people in charge of the club. Nobody else.

Truly pathetic.

the Bulls will be OK as they have one thing that the Broncos don't, a rent book for an Iconic stadium that the is a millstone round the neck of the RFL

It makes me sad that the Bulls are in this state. Not knowing what went wrong I can't grasp the problem. But what sits ill with me is that the club I support is taking a share of the Sky money that should be going into the Bulls, that is no way to treat our freinds. I would be proud of our club if they gave back the money we dont deserve (I won't hold my breath).

welcome to Bradford luke george and dale ferguson!

As you seem intent on trying to provoke some sort of reaction by directly flaming me, instead of discussing the thread, I will simply point out that so far as I recall, NOBODY - and certainly not I - EVER said " there were no problems, everything was pretty much hunky dory, and the nay sayers didn't know what they were talking about."

I was and remain grateful to OK for saving the club as without him, there would be no club. How the club was (mis?)managed since he took it over is of course a very fair subject for debate but at the risk of ad nauseam repetition, I support my club, not the board, and what certain idiots consistently fail to grasp is that the management of the Bulls was neither a matter of choice for the fans, nor something over which we could exert any influence. It's not as if there was anyone else to choose to run the club. As for the new guys, the position is precisely the same. Yes they talk and seem like decent enough chaps, but if I disliked them, or mistrusted them, or even hated them, - so what? Euromillions win excepted, what can I do?

Finally, I find your suggestion that [ianyone[/i said there were "no problems" and all was "hunky dory" as bizarre as it is inexplicable. If that is really what you think, then it is your head that must have been buried under a pile of sand of Saharan proportions! The financial hole discussed at the meeting may be bigger than expected, but who could have been in the slightest doubt that times were exceedingly hard given the continued Sky money penalty, low season ticket sales, clear and extremely well-publicised cash-flow problems. Or maybe you are suggesting that when the chairman of a club says he has had to arrange for another £900K to be pumped in to the club, hot on the back of the players wages debacle, so we could just pay our basic way for a few months, that would lead people to think the finances were "hunky dory"?

It is very sad (again).

All the money the Club raised from the supporters appeal - what happened to that anybody?
Was that money given as a gift or lent as an unsecured loan or (as it should have been) used to buy shares in the new company?

Wasn't it used to get Hood et al off the hook as they were guarantors to Bradford's debt?

Why would anyone in their right mind donate to pay off someone's indirect personal debt?

Because it was sold to them as saving their club. It was an outstanding achievement but sadly it wasn't used in the best way possible for the Bulls. That half a million would've possibly plugged the funding gap left by the reduction of the sky money last season. It may have even meant Bradford avoided the sad situation they now find themselves in.

Werent the administrators also club directors?

As was explained ad nauseum at the time, though: no.

There was too little time to do anything other than to raise cash at short order, and certain shareholders seemed more determined to use the crisis to settle scores and remove the (poor) board than to actually try and solve the problem avoiding administration. The half million bought two months more, that was all. The actions of Caisley IMO ensured that administration became inevitable.

You can get stuffed

we are all right on our own thanks

No. That is not allowed.

If your question was "weren't the administrators appointed by Caisley's cabal, who had ousted the previous board, and whose bidding were the administrators doing?" That could have resulted in a different answer.

So where is Caisley now?

I thought the recieved wisdom was that he was wanting to put the Bulls in to admin to swoop in and pick them up for a song and be the white knight. Why not now?

Received wisdom was also that a combination of the actions of the RFL and other clubs, and the very negative reaction to certain actions Gargoyle took which looked to all the world (to some) to be a clear precursor to him riding in, stymied any plans he may have had.

Also, the club is not in administration, and I hope never be, so there is nothing for sale anyway. If in due course that means hiving the business away into a new company, leaving the present company as just a shell owing money to OK represented by retained losses that is then wound up in a CVL, well so be it.

Im sure we all (well most of us) hope Bradford avoid admin, but the actions of the board right now don’t shout a company which doesn’t need a white knight. I know Caisley is hardly a bastion of virtue but desperate times and all that…….

If he had a plan/investment, Is there no space for some hatchet burying?

"So be it" is too blase an attitude to that possibility.

What is suggested there is a club walking away from its debts.

For the integrity of the sport of Rugby League, the RFL imposes penalties to deter directors of clubs taking that sort of action.

If an entity owning a club wants to transfer a club to a new entity, the RFL has to approve it. The RFL will only approve it if the debts of the original entity are paid off. If the original entity in fact suffers an insolvent winding-up, that counts as going bust and the club would suffer relegation anyway.

(Or, as happened ast time, the RFL might waver, as when Bradford said please don't relegate us, we'll accept just half the full Sky money if you let us off).

Those debts are directors loans aren’t they?

Also immediate relegation isn’t/wasn’t been the punishment for going bust. A points deduction was.