Mate just mentioned the Broncos are going Part time. Anyone heard anything similar?

If we do thats going to level the playing field...Our full time fitness got us over the finish line on many an occassion....Worrying probabilty!!!!

I could see that going part time might be an option. The way Season 2020 has panned out has thrown even the best laid plans into disarray. 2021 season not being disrupted cannot be ruled out.
David Hughes is not getting any younger and may have decided to reduce his financial commitment to the club.
Herein lies the problem. The future of the The Broncos rely on Davids ability or preparedness to continue to fund the club. Not a good situation to be in.

I don't see how that would work, unless we went with an entirely local squad. It's hard enough to get northerners to move to London anyway, but they'll never do it for a part-time wage and then finding a job alongside it. And despite the great work over the past decade we don't produce enough players locally to make up an entire squad.

Not sure I can see it myself. Would be very disappointing. Does not tie in with what ML said about exciting news

If Broncos go down that route you'd probably find it would be a mainly southern squad with a few northerners included. They would live and train up north. It's not uncommon at lower levels,. It's fairly well known the first Oxford coach recruited iheavily in the Leigh area and the second around Castleford.

The big risk would be that playing RL would be a lot less attractive to Southern teenagers who have to choose RU or RL. How long would we have a decent supply of southern lads for?

Also agree with the above, it would rather contradict club statements in recent weeks. Monkey Lover seems to be doing his best to improve communications, hopefully the club will confirm/deny quickly. If not I suspect what players post on social media will soon give the game away. As such, I'd expect a statement quickly if such a decision has been made..

WQ is your mate reliable ? I find this hard to believe or maybe this is the exciting news ML referred to.

Not quite what I would call exciting!!!

PC I went back to him for confirmation and he said it came from a journalist. I might press him further

What I can confirm is that this is not the exciting news promised!!

Also there has been no decision either way on the make up of the squad next season and as people will be aware we have many contracted players.

As soon as there is anything to report on this, signings and other 'exciting' news I can assure you the club will communicate things to supporters. That is something I promised to supporters and intend to keep it.

We were criticised a little this week for not releasing the Matt Fozard news. It is worth stating that we had absolutely no idea about it and Ottowa just went ahead without even telling us. We cannot legislate for things like this.

If you can get me the name of the journalist WC that would be useful.

Thanks for the info ML. I am a bit confused by one point, would the club not know by now if they were looking to go PT next season? If we are looking ahead (with regards to signings) then we must know, as it would impact on talks with potential players. (Im not trying to be awkward here, honest)

Does anyone have a list of our contracted players for next season (so far)?

We are a club with a squad of full time players, many of which have further years to run on their deal. Discussions have taken place around a whole number of things regarding the future but at the moment whatever this journalist is telling people is a lie and as a club we would like to know which journalist it is because there is a very limited number of people who have even had these discussions so clearly someone is either lying or spreading mis-information.

We would very much like to be the first to tell our own supporters our plans for 2021 and not have to worry that someone is making that difficult by spreading mis-truths and gossip. If we were to decide to go part time our supporters would be informed with a clear and concise statement to ensure reasons and future plans are explained to them but as I have said at the moment there is nothing to report.

There is a pop up on this site which reads "Piers Morgan Confirms Rumours"

Sorted then

I cant help feeling that if we do go PT, or a variance of that, then we are basically putting the white flag up and accepting we are never going to reach SL; joining the rest of the league fillers mode.

I agree PC Plum, but as ML has said, nothing decided. Myself, I would be gutted, as I could not see us getting back in SL.

Yes i agree Honkeytonk. After 40 years there's still a lack of imagination & vision from the RFL driving the game forward.

I'm not sure i will live long enough to see the evolution of intelligent life forms at HQ.

Don't leave the exciting news too long ML don't want to miss that either.

This is The Broncos that we are talking about.

Really? Featherstone looked awesome in the games they played this season before lockdown and have made very clear intentions that they wish to be considered for SL next season by signing NRL players. Being part time does not seem to be stopping them from getting things right on and off the field and been ready to step up if asked.
York are part time yet have serious ambitions alongside moving into their new stadium.
I was a coach at Featherstone when Daryl Powell won the league, it could not have been a more professional set up yet the only full time members of staff were Daryl and 2 players that worked for the community team all day.

As I have said, nothing is decided and this journalist is talking balls but making sensible financial decisions based on the current economic climate does not have to be a negative. Looking at Featherstone this year you might argue it is a positive.

Sorry, but no, Featherstone are really not a good example of anything. They run no academy or reserves. They rely heavily on a DR arrangement with Leeds. They have never played in the top flight in the last few decades. The are based slap bang in the middle of 'heartlands' and probably find it easy to attract players from East and West. They do however have fabulous passionate support and their own ground. I highly doubt we would attract the standard of player to get us into SL on a part time gig - the likes of Ferres and Hall, etc would not come down here. Paint it however you wish but PT or a variance of it, in my eyes, says mediocrity for the near short and medium term.

Id say the difference between us and Fev is that being in London, PT will make it more difficult to recruit any northerners to come down, and I cant really see a PT side in SL, just would not work

I think you would be surprised. Do you know how many players in the North are builders, drivers, personal trainers? If you want to work alongside playing rugby league i would argue there isnt a better place in the country than London given the amount of jobs and industry in the capital. The pay is higher and with subsidised accommodation for example you could earn more playing for the Broncos than for a northern club.

We have had tons of players offered to us both full time and part time and of real quality.

If we went down the part time route it's likely there wouldn't be a part time team in our comp either so a level playing field potentially.

Hmmm, Not sure I would change my view that a PT Broncos would have given up on SL, but i guess time would tell (if it ever happens of course)

Yes but as we know, with notable exceptions like Roy Lester, Danny Purdo & a few others, they dont tend to hang around long some in mid contract too.

Don't know where to start with this, but there are two reasons why Featherstone have never played in the top flight in the last few decades. Firstly, having comfortably earned the retention of their place in the top flight by finishing 11th of 16 in 1994-95, they were unceremoniously dumped out of SL in favour of London, who had finished fourth in the second division that year.

Secondly, they finished top of the table four years in a row from 2010 to 2013, but were denied promotion by the franchising system.

Fev have indeed used a DR arrangement - as have literally every other club in the Championship at various stages, including London. Fev were actually one of the few clubs that opposed DR when it was first mooted, but now seem to get castigated because they use it more effectively than anyone else.

Featherstone ran a reserve team in 2019, as they have at various stages in the last 10 years, but weren't accepted this year.

Featherstone are thriving off the field, have a busy events calendar in the clubhouse, are doing extremely well in terms of sponsorship, and have made signifcant progress in the quest to become self sufficient regardless of what happens with central funding. There is a booming Squad Builder fund which IIRC has about 300 supporters paying £10 per month, a very successful club superstore, and RoversTV continues to pump out product which puts that of some SL clubs to shame, as does the stadium, which features two stands constructed by supporters and is now widely regarded to be a vastly superior stadium to some in SL, notably those of our near neighbours Wakefield and Castleford.

Not saying that everything at the club is always perfect, but not a good example of anything? I beg to differ.