So you've produced what 4 players in 10 years? If you took the Matt Orford money, and invested it in youth development - dont you think that number might be higher?

Well he lists 6 but in any case he didn't say Bradford have only produced the above mentioned players. Of the young lads coming from the junior set-up, those are the highest profile people to move on.

But in any case we were losing young uns even when we were doing ok. I can think of Chris Bridge, Ryan Atkins etc off the top of my head as fairly young lads that have moved on and done good. And now Warrington are being kind enough to lend us back some of theirs in our hours of need.

According to wiki George burgess never played for Bradford, I (wrongly) assumed it was the same case for Tom, turns out I was wrong, taking the count to 5



It's still an interesting point, had you produced more/ retained better the top youth players, would the crowds have come as if they were the marquee signings apparently required to validate the Bradford business plan?

How many marquee signings do you need to sacrifice for a first rate youth production line? Would it of saved Bradford? Or would it have merely turned you into a selling club? Surviving on transfer fees for the production of more players to sell

I like how you've deliberately conflated Grade B and the finances. The financial element of the licencing process was only one part of it. The report even noted that there were some challenges, but the club, overall, was a B based on that, as one of a number of criteria.

The licencing process overall was not a financial audit, nor anything like a financial audit. It was an assessment of who were the 14 best clubs based on a bunch of criteria. Even with financial challenges, few doubted then that the Bulls were one of the top 14 - or, indeed, the top 10. Hell, I'd probably still make that analysis today given the dross and drivel, to borrow a phrase, cluttering up the bottom of the league.

Whitcuts office has been cleared out and they found these.....

...explains a lot!

Well I tend to find myself looking at Leeds for inspiration #cough, splutter#. They have a fantastic youth structure and it seems that once that structure reaches a critical mass, it not only populates your first team but actually generates a surplus. Leeds can now offload young talent that many of us would be delighted with (Mcshane etc?).

We were years behind Wigan, Saints and Leeds in terms of creating these youth set-ups but I did think we were beginning the catch-up. Sadly upheaval at the club tends to set this back because staff are diverted or made redundant and local amateurs look elsewhere for security.

It is hardly 'conflating' as a substantial part of the license process is an evaluation of finances. It has been both times and also the time the Bulls were checked half way through 2013. That is one of the reasons that KPMG are involved.

Unfortunately the RFL and their assistants have been dire when checking club finances.

Getting a license in July 2012 and then seeking several sky advances from Sept shows the rfl checks were inept. Buying a ground In January and then having the sole tenant begging for £1m in March also shows the RFL to be severely lacking.

Finances were but one of five criteria - and not the deciding one by any means.

A firm like KPMG is able to independently review both financial and non-financial information - their review was not for the finance side alone. Given you seem to think that, if financially in trouble, a club wouldn't get a licence, I can see how you can misunderstand the Bulls' subsequent problems as being indicative of a failure of the licencing system.

You do know that Bradford weren't the only club to receive an advance that offseason don't you?

I disagree. There's no point being bloody minded and forcing a club over the edge, for the sake of not giving them a couple of weeks advance. But they went beyond that.

If the governing body of this country helped out Sainsbury's, then Tesco, Asda and Mick and Ange who run the little local convenience shop would play merry hell. If you help one, you have to help them all or you're distorting the system.

Also ultimately their efforts failed. Or rather were wasted. Fair enough, Bradford made it through the season and have lived to fight another day, which is great. But as a newco, so buying the Odsal lease and all the fundraising was for naught. Now to have made it clear they'd accept a newco earlier would have been controversial, and this is being wise with hindsight, but it'd have avoided a lot of wasted cash and effort. Plus we've had to bin off licensing. [uWith[/u [uhindsight[/u they made an enormous of it all and it has been a great advert for a less interventionist approach, moving forward.

but they were the only one to receive it and then return begging for more, then more again still without cutting their cloth accordingly.

At least in soccer Leeds United got it over and done with quickly.....if the Bulls were real Bulls, the RSPCA would have stepped in with a shotgun by now

Barman and now Bedboy are no longer the saviours of Bradford Bulls!
[urlhttp://www.thetelegraphandargus.co.uk/sport/10920109.Moore____no_longer_a_director____at_Bradford_Bulls/[/url

So, removing Moore and Whitcut will in some way placate OK and his desire for re-payment? This farce has a few months to run yet methinx

The government assists certain businesses and industries regularly. Either through tax breaks or government grants to incentivise the behaviour they want to see, or through direct assistance when a significant company is in dire need.

YEAH...and to a man here we call the government s for doing so and the recipients s!
What does that make the RFL and the Bulls?

So we agree that finances were considered an important part of the licensing process.



I have never once, not once, claimed that finance is a deciding criterion.

I agree that KPMG - were paid a substantial fee - to work closely with RFL senior management to scrutinise financial and non financial information.

Please show me the post where I have said a club in financial trouble would not get a license. Otherwise it looks like you are making up what I write, very poor form.

The facts are there. Bulls have financial checks and get a license in July 2012. By winter 2012 they have had advanced sky payments (loans) over and above their regular sky payments of somewhere around £500-700K ! The bubbling RFL then buy Odsal at the end on January to paper over huge financial cracks. Yet 2 months later Hood has the begging bowl out for (drum roll) £1000,000. We have then had another farcical series of events since the RFL gave OK the green light after the review in May. I think this shows ineptitude and incompetence while you appear to see little wrong with it.....we differ

Oh, sorry, it's just when you said, "Unfortunately the RFL and their assistants have been dire when checking club finances" I assumed you actually meant it - when, in fact, you have no idea what the assessment of the finances was, or if it was dire, because that was only one part of a larger whole.

Anyway, this discussion is going nowhere - it's evident you're almost as much of a troll as gutterfax.

why?
Because we both think Bradford have been extended line after line of credit they didn't deserve?
Because we think that Bradford's abject failure to accept their plight and refusal to cut their cloth is unacceptable?

Getting tired of the troll moniker if I'm honest, but I refuse to agree with s and their opinions to make it stop......

There are prostitutes in France with less regular customers than Bradford have had owners since 2011......and the analogy works well here

Erm no. Bradford weren't. You do need to check the time line of what happened again.

Leeds got it over and done with Quickly? They slipped to the third tier, went in to admin twice, lost their stadium, training ground, and haven't got anywhere near to recovering 10 years later. And you want us to think you aren't trolling........

If you are getting tired of the troll moniker, there is an obvious solution. Stop being a troll

That many bail outs it gets confusing




and?
Leeds spent what they didn't have based on predictions...went to the floor and guess what, the GAME survived.......goodbye Bradford and don't let the door hit you on the on the way out!


ah...troll!
Like London being blamed for the global recession (yes all of them), global warming, JFK and Bobbie's assassination, not forgetting MLK, Thatcher closing the pits, the secret millions squirreled in brown envelopes in M1 service stations and employing the entire NSW AND Queensland squads to avoid relegation (Although we'd never have gone down anyway...the RFL wouldn't have allowed it) ABSOLUTE BOLLOX that is perfectly acceptable posting on here?

I disagree with you.......that doesn't make me a troll, it puts me in the majority!

Smarter than most Kiwis then if that's what they really do, though I doubt it. I think your ego has just swelled so that you now talk for a whole nation


Government intervention happens all the time in varying ways and when disasters that could seriously affect the nation happen they don't just sit there and say "meh they deserved it", if possible they try to find a way to keep that important business or industry going.

It's like this, when you clearly and obviously contradict yourself. You spent months up and down these boards posting diatribes full of made up figures and nonsense explaining how big RU is, you don't do this to troll, oh no, not to get a reaction on an RL board but simply to highlight how silly the comparison is. Yet you have just (because you read on here i was a Leeds Utd fan) compared RL to fsking football of all things! You may aswell have compared us to cheese. And you want to pretend you aren't a troll........

And I think you are looking to wrong target regards London. Though I'm pretty sure those who give those type of comments re London aren't trolls for the most part they really are that stupid

And that's the problem right there. To RL a Leeds United style downfall is a disaster whereas to football it's merely an interesting story.
Leeds United were 1 of 92 fully pro football clubs.
Bradford were 1 of 14/15/16? fully pro RL clubs and some of those can barely be described as pro clubs.

Football can afford to have clubs go to the wall, RL can't to anywhere near the same extent.

You are clearly hard of thinking. The RFL and their assistants have been dire.

If you took time to get hold of license criteria you would know what is being assessed. I have, why don't you?



The RFL + KPMG in July 2012 gave a club a green light yet by Sept - Dec 2012 had given advances of 500k + and then tried to cover this cock up by buying the stadium

Some posters on here see at best incompetence. You appear to think it is all hunky dory...as I said..we differ.

The. RFL, it has to be remembered didn't lose money because of Bradford. So none of the games money was wasted.

And I think your analogy highlights a big difference in how we see the game. I don't see the clubs as the Asda, tesco sainsburys fighting for dominance and the little corner shop being left behind. I see the game as the Tesco, and football and cricket and RU as you asdas, waitrose and sainsburys. I don't think it's logical to think we should treat our superstores as we do our tesco expresses