Well i hope you are correct as the club moving out of Wakefield would kill it stone dead. But i have a feeling that bank will now actively pursue a sale rather than accept a lower rent and that will be that. Sad day.

I doubt MC will be going into this without a plan B, which he may be keeping quiet for now to tempt more support from the council for our new stadium?

Paying £120k a year in the Championship will kill it stone dead too mate, so you are stuck between a rock and a hard-place! As for the sale then the site is not worth what you think it is, trust me on that, and also who will they sell it to?

I have no idea what it is worth and neither do i particularly care. Given it has planning permission for housing then i would guess that sector might have an interest.

They have plans B, C and possibly even D and E!

Plan A is to remain at Belle Vue, until Newmarket is built, but paying a fair rent for the current stadium set-up and not the current unfair over-inflated rent.

Plans B, C etc are paying a fair rent at another stadium, to suit the current league status of the club, until Newmarket is built.

All the other options are not viable unless you have a few £m burning a hole in your pocket?



It is that simple really!

Not until you build a stadium at Newmarket you don't.... planning condition 38!

That's my take on it.

IA, you and I both know conditions can be got around. Yorkcourt certainly know they can.

If Trinity actively pursue an alternative how does that affect any conditions safe guarding BV until a suitable option has been sought?

Problem is now we have served notice to leave with a willingness to move out of the area. So when the planning permission becomes up for renewal (soon i believe?) then it strengthens the case to have it removed. And the council are oh so helpful aren't they, especially with a new stadium for Cas on its way ten minutes down the road from Newmarket? Then you get your sale. Can just see it coming.

Indeed they can but it would take time and money and would not happen overnight! So, the bank are not only now having to shell out £5k a month in rates and 24hr security, they have to pay a nice tidy sum to get the planning condition lifted... it has failed once and they didn't appeal because they would have lost and they know it! The land is not worth what you might think, as we found out, so actually you are better off taking some rent and then selling the site a couple of years down the line because that is the option that costs the BOI the least money!

Have some very happy memories of BV, usually when we've beaten you back in the day (sorry). Also had some great times in the hospitality there. Be very sad to see it go.

This could of course be your chairman playing hardball and trying to get a better deal, although the word on Station Lane is that you'll be playing in WF7 next year, should you actually leave BV.

If you do leave, I hope the club announce it before the last game, I'd certainly like to say goodbye to the old girl.

I appreciate that this might be partly brinksmanship, but of course one potential outcome is that this is our last year at Belle Vue. It was a genuine enquiry about the middle 8's. Although it might not turn out to be the end of Belle Vue as a rugby stadium (and as you have alluded to, the decision behind the serving of six months notice is sound) if it is, two months will be too late for people who might find it difficult to get to Belle Vue on the last fixture but would make an extra effort for the "last game". Or even might want to spend longer there on the last day.

So let's say that one of the scenarios is that we leave Belle Vue in six months time, does anyone know when the last game would be, knowing how the middle 8's work? Would hate to be turning up at the Rams stadium next year, for example, because the six months notice had expired and realising that the game against whoever had been the last one at Belle Vue and I'd just mooched out without a second glance.

I don't think there is a willingness to move out of the area, far from it, the club want to stay at Belle Vue but they also just want to pay a fair market rent. We all know that the current rent is massively over-inflated and is killing the club anyway! So you are running the club, and you wake-up this morning knowing that you have made what you consider to be a fair offer on a new lease and they have not responded, you also know that unless you serve notice today then you are stuck paying that same over-inflated rent next year irrespective, or you are in breach of your lease. Also, lets not forget you could have a massively reduce income next year and at this time, you don't know for certain, but it is very possible!

So what do you do?

Genuine question!

Fair point, get it now! And I don't know the answer exactly but will it not be mid-September to early October?

Although it is a gamble, the decision seems right. The club is saying to the bank "stop ripping us off or we're leaving" and to the council "because we're being ripped off, we're leaving, so you better pull your finger out and sort out Newmarket".

The likely outcomes seem to be:
1. Stay at Belle Vue with a reduced rent, making the club more viable, with Newmarket still a possibility.
2. The council take action in relation to Newmarket, so we stay at Belle Vue in the short term, high rent or not.
3. Same as 2, but playing elsewhere in the interim.
4. The bank accepting notice, the council doing little, and we play elsewhere permanently. Until we fold.
5. Withdraw the notice and pay the same rent as we are, with the council doing nothing about Newmarket. Until we fold.

Given that, in my rather simplistic analysis, outcomes 4 and 5 are likely to be the same, it's a sensible gamble.

More likely mid-September for the end of the 8's, but not sure how the home-away ratio works. Our potential last home game, for example, could be before the end of the 8's.

Depends how confident i was of staying up and how confident i was of Newmarket happening.
Moving away = dead.
Staying at BV in championship = dead.
Staying at BV in Superleague = a pulse.
Personally i roll the dice for SL survival and stay as the BV housing planning renewal will have gone through during that time and as we were still there the condition would likely remain in place. And one way or the other we will probably know whether Newmarket will ever happen. But then i ain't an accountant.

We won't know until after the last round of the regular fixtures at the end of next month.

I think we are on the same page!

Well, I understand that the club has made two offers, one is based on being in SL next year and is higher but fair and sustainable, to reflect the higher income, the second is lower but of course based on the lower income, while still being fair and sustainable!

So, lets do your bullet points again!

Stay at Belle Vue in SL paying and over-inflated rent - a very faint pulse, possibly leading to death!
Stay at Belle Vue in Championship paying same over-inflated rent- dead!
Stay at Belle Vue in SL paying a fair sustainable rent - alive!
Stay at Belle Vue in Championship paying a fair sustainable rent - alive!
Move away from Belle Vue but paying a fair rent, based on the league status - a pulse but with the possibility of a full recovery at a later date due to someone building you a new hospital! You might die before they build it, but it is still a chance.

It is not ideal but I think making any other choice than the one the club has made would carry a much higher risk... they have chosen the fair and least risky option... but when all you have all risky choices, you have to make one!

Well I've read all the way through this post and while no body has yet said it it looks like a who blinks first situation.

As regards the last game I would love it to be Cas, Worst possible scenario would be Hull in the last game at B V. It would be a disaster.

If Wakefield are playing rugby somewhere near Wakefield, preferably In Wakefield I'll be paying to watch.

My worry with all that is that our future is in the hands of certain council employees and a group of bankers all of whose best interests aren't likely to include us. I desperately hope it works out but i also desperately fear an Oldham situation. I guess only time will tell if it turns out to be the right choice, fingers crossed.

As an aside and not wishing to cause thread drift or derail this one, I know how people feel and it is unnerving, and even scary, that the club finds itself at this cross-roads through no fault of its own, but it is and decisions have to be made, however hard they might be but... nipping over here and looking at this bunch of (mostly) clueless numpties get all over excited about the merest glimmer and tiniest possibility of the demise of another fellow RL club, makes all the hard work so worth while!



[urlhttp://www.casforum.co.uk/forum/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=27261[/url

Night everyone!

I think posters like you and TRB bring well informed expertise to this topic.

However I do not think Mr Carter et al had a gun to their head when they took over the club. If they did not like the contract with BoI then they did not have take over the club. To accept the contract and then have people whinging about the terms being unfair is infantile. If the rent is too high so be it, try and negotiate it down, but don't whine about unfairness.

BoI are a multi billion euro organisation. Drive around Dublin and other parts of Ireland and you can see multi million euro projects that have been abandoned. several will be BoI financed projects. A few thousand pounds in Wakefield being spent on an empty stadium will not perturb the BoI. Also Richie Boucher the CEO is a tough smart sob who has set the tone for the recovery of the bank. If Mr Carter has plans B,C etc it is safe to assume BoI will also have a variety of plans.

If BoI 'roll over' on a small deal like your stadium it may send the wrong sort of message to people owing far larger amounts of money. They may also conclude that the rents received so far could cover the costs of an empty stadium for a few years.

The 'brinkmanship' is fascinating. Yet it is a dreadful notion that a few senior BoI executives - with no commitment to the area - could meet one afternoon and decide to have an empty stadium and 120 years of tradition comes to a stop.