Widnes Vikings, announce signing of Fozard for 2022.

Seeing a theme developing here. My guess Aston to Sheffield and Richards to Newcastle. Curran retire and back to Aus and other northern players we have will be off to Leigh as per standard practice.
My guess we’ll keep pretty much all of our southern players. Possibly Sammut will go around one more year.

I'd be astonished if the club is still going in 2922!

I won't commit myself to that opinion! lol, but I know I will not be here haha

Well not sure many will want to join Widnes at present, except for staying in the Championship, except for returning home, Leigh have done quite a lot of recruiting as it, even a few Aussies! No one really knows what next season holds? until teams know what League they will be in, it's tough, I would have taken Louis back for a season, but even at 35, he had signed a 12 month extension to Saints.

As I understand it.Clubs have yet to be informed of their allocation of TV money from the RFL. All the clubs know is that there will be a severe reduction.
Budgeting is obviously difficult in that situation and this is making recruitment plans difficult.

I think that’s right Victor but the difficulty is, as with this season, all our competitors seem to be going out and buying anyway. On the face of that is the height of fiscal irresponsibility but yet none have gone bust and most except York have improved. Difficult in these circumstances to break the vicious circle of expensive ground and training facilities/weak and small squad/ drop in match day income/ drop in success. Gawd knows what’s going to happen.

Thanks for depressing me more than I already was.

So we are happy to spunk loads of money on multiple venues/training grounds etc, but we wont sign players as we are unsure on finances???

Indeed, the priorties are very odd. Having a competitive team is essential to rebuilding the fan base. An ambititous club might see the current situation as an opportunity to strengthen.

I would say that the move to Wimbledon leaves the club at the " Last chance saloon. "
If the move fails to bring in a major increase in attendance and the club must wean itself off of David Hughes money.
Then the club is probably finished.

Unless significant changes are made I would suggest the club are more 'up creek without a paddle' than 'last chance saloon'.

Interestingly, AFC don't seem to have announced attendance figures for any of their home games this season as far as I can see.

True.
No one is going to want to see us turned over by mid table teams in a 95% empty stadium. Albeit a nice looking one.

Richards confirmed to HKR https://londonbroncosrl.com/2021/09/08/ ... ext-season

Richards confirmed to HKR https://londonbroncosrl.com/2021/09/08/ ... ext-season

Maybe the club could raise money by running a sweep on the last of this year's squad to sign elsewhere.

No surprise with Richards leaving. No doubt he wants to stay fulltime.

Perhaps this thread should be renamed Broncos Outs 2022?

I’d worked out all our northern pros would leave but assumed all southern Academy products would stay but the more I think about it I’m not sure that’s right. Surely PT only really works if you are a student have some kind of itinerant job or run your own company. Older players who know the ropes can probably run 2 careers in tandem but young guys will need to put time and effort into developing their primary long term career. I can’t see how if you are starting out as a teacher or work as an estate agent or some such that constantly sloping off to training to end a few extra quid will actually work. Not all players want to be casual labourers or fitness instructors. Does PT really work outside the heartlands?

I guess it works for plentty of union sides and football teams but will be a big change for the Broncos. However, I'm sure the club have thought it all through and have a briiliant plan in place.

If you are a part time player with a trade. Moving to London may have appeal. The money that can be earned in London is enormous when compared to say Yorkshire.
It is for the club to have contacts to get these players jobs.

Yes I can see how that might work. As you say there are lots of jobs in London but we do need to have ins. I have a nasty feeling we don’t.

Bit short on ins at the moment

Maybe looking at aus or nz lower leagues ?

Currently we have no ins as we are specialising in outs.

Can't speak for Aussie, but anyone leaving NZ at the moment faces an enormous struggle getting back into this country whilst we are insisting on 2 weeks managed isolation.
12,000 KMs to get a job in a bar and play for a hundred quid a week....."yeah nah bro" as they say in these parts.