No, just about everything is based on a 3 year average (catchment area being one that's not but that's extremely unlikely to change anyway). I'm not sure why there should be any confusion, as it's clearly stated in the grading handbook.

Just quoting for comparison purposes:-

Fax
Performance 2.39/5
Fandom 3.2/5
Finances 0.55/4.5
Stadium 1.67/3
Community 1.25/2.5

I guess its like what we expected and looking at the grades the club has done well on the Fandom score although I think the reality is that Bradford's score will come down next season in this respect due to reasons that Fev alluded to in their statement. Again though they do get a lot more fans than us which will translate in to clicks so we have done pretty well to be so close to them.
Community as mentioned we can't do anything about this really and this is the most ridiculous pillar in the gradings. Stadium wise it does look like we got the full 1.5 score for the facilities along with the big screen bonus and the rest made up on utilisation.
Leaves us with finances which we have the lowest score that we have seen any club given which is obviously a worry but we could spin it and say that with some investment we have the potential to make a lot of points up here on our competitors.

Overall I know Matt Shaw likes to be a bit of a drama queen at times and in the article calls for Fax fans to get real, I think the majority of Fax fans see ourselves as miles off a SL club but promotion and relegation did at least give us hope, I mean going in to this season I can't have been the only fan who had thought we had a sneaky outside chance of promotion can I. London eventually went up so it shows that it was in fact possible. Now you look at our scores in this system and tell me where we find 4 points from that turns us from a low B to a borderline SL club.

Our scores on performance, fandom, stadium, and community are not so far off been the max that we can achieve due to different restrictions and finances just been in the championship is quite restrictive in itself. You take all that in to consideration and its very clear to see that a team like ours is not supposed to be in the top flight under the new system.

Thanks for confirming, I'm just going over the handbook again and I'd got a little confused as to what was for the full 3 years and what isn't. Like the bonuses for winning cups only counts the current season which seems a tad unfair and a strange way to do things when like you say other things are judged on the full 3 years.

The current board haven’t really had the the time to have an impact on the finances as of yet , they did state that they would try and get more sponsors involved which I’ve heard is going to happen , whether these new sponsors eventually become shareholders remains to be seen but there is potentially exciting times ahead if they do . I believe croads involvement with the club ends at the end of the month with regards the shop etc . I’m on the fence with the img thing but tbh it doesn’t change a great deal , Halifax are a club that could grow with investment but ultimately we’ve been a championship club for sometime. The thing that will be problematic is when for example Wakefield play Widnes/york/fax/ fev in the final even if Wakefield lose they still go up , just looks daft .

Your not supposed to mention the shop.

Whatever you don’t mention who’s names will and won’t be on the new kit.



Although Davies might pretty safe.

It doesn’t really matter what I say on this forum, ultimately it’s not 1987 , we aren’t burning our lips on hot tomato soup in a polystyrene cup , we’re not urinating in two inch of saying get em onside and forrad pass . Rugby league probably belongs on a sketch from back to the future.

Widnes Scores in comparison:-
Performance 1.72/5
Fandom 3.3/5
Finances 2.25/4.5
Stadium 1.9/3
Community 1/2.5

Fax
Performance 2.39/5
Fandom 3.2/5
Finances 0.55/4.5
Stadium 1.67/3
Community 1.25/2.5

Again shows we do pretty well Fandom wise and Widnes only beat us on Stadium because of Primacy of Tenure. The elephant in the room is obviously the finances and I would love to see a breakdown of ours. We obviously score the 0.3 on the Turnover % and presume we don't run at 1m in debt every year so we should get the 0.25 on Adjusted Profit. That leaves a lot of questions on the other sections.

New CEO appointed by the club with among other things IMG in mind. https://halifaxpanthers.co.uk/panthers- ... thers-ceo/

New CEO appointed by the club with among other things IMG in mind. https://halifaxpanthers.co.uk/panthers- ... thers-ceo/

Lets hope his next signing is a wizard accountant because i think he will need one . Wish him luck in his endeavours

According to this article, Championship clubs appear to get just £50k a year central funding: https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/rugby-league/67372408

According to this article, Championship clubs appear to get just £50k a year central funding: https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/rugby-league/67372408

London today decided that they are shutting down their scholorship and academy schemes. If IMG do have a plan I am not sure that was a part of it.

Whatever happens on the pitch next season they will be booted out of super league. Probably be replaced with Bradford. Can’t blame them taking the decision not to throw good money after bad.

Yeah it's easy to see why they have done it, no point developing players for SL teams when it costs them as much as they said.

Personally I think it will be Wakey and Toulouse that replace London and Leigh. The fact that Leigh are in real danger with their CC Final points coming off just highlights for me how daft the system is.

Can you imagine the media backlash if Brentford got relegated from soccer's premiership despite finishing mid-table? RL get away with it because it will always be a 3rd class sport nobody really cares about.

Just a quick update as we now have Fev's IMG scores to compare to ours.

Fax
Performance 2.39/5
Fandom 3.2/5
Finances 0.55/4.5
Stadium 1.67/3
Community 1.25/2.5

Fev
Performance 2.5143 out of 5
Fandom 3.95 out of 5
Finance 2 out of 4.5
Stadium 1.183 out of 3
Community 1 out of 2.5

Bradford
Performance 2.17/5
Fandom 3.95/5
Finances 2.75/4.5
Stadium 0.89/3
Community 2.25/2.5

Our scores compare pretty well against both teams just the fandom and then the finances is the biggie.

IMG and everything they stand for is abhorrent and as far removed from sport as you could possibly envisage. Halifax RLFC's present board of directors voted for IMG's pie in the sky policies and in doing so subjected our club and everyone involved with it to yet more years in the wilderness and in doing so have underlined the club's total lack of ambition. That is how it is and if fans are happy to just have a club, well, they've got their wish.

Apparently Ian uttley owner of stage freight has been bought out by stage truck , what impact that has on the club if any remains to be seen .

The club simply don't have the money to match the ambition that most fans would like them to have and going on the IMG ratings for the financial aspects, it looks like we are closer to not having a club thatn we are to actually been in a position to compete for SL.

Can you explain the financials in laymans terms ie would you score 4.5 for solvency and lower than that for the level of debt or is it 1m x more complicated ? if we have a heavy burden of debt...when is it due and what are we doing to repay it ?

Its pretty straightforward how our score is made up and to give the RFL some credit the finance part for the scoring isn't that complicated.

With us scoring 0.55 points that means we have scored 0.3 points for having between 50 and 70% non cenralised turnover on the average of the last 3 years. The higher percentage you have for this the less reliant you are on the central funding. Again because of the scoring we know that Bradford and Fev both scored the maximum 0.75 points for this.

The other 0.25 we presume has to from the adjusted profit as you get those points as long as you are not running at an average loss of over 1m for the previous 2 years and there is just no way a club of our size could run at that sort of loss. So we can be pretty certain that is how our points are made up.

So for the other sections we miss out on having turnover of over 500k before central funding. I doubt we are anywhere near on this but Bradford should be over it and fev maybe close on this with their crowds. Without either a big uprise in crowds or some major sponsorship we aint scoring.

Next up we have owner investment and anything over 100k on the 3 year average scores 0.25. This one should be the easiest one for us to get points on as long as the new owners fulfill promises that they have seemingly made.

Last one is balance sheet strength where anything over £1 will gain you 0.25 points. It not unusual for sports teams to have negative balance sheets so this really does not tell us much but when taken in to context with the rest of the gradings for the finance section its easy to see why there may be concerns.

Fevs score you can pretty much work out how they have scored but Bradford's score is almost unbelievable for them to score 2.75 points. there is no way that they have a turnover of over 1.25m so they have to fall in to the over 500k region for 0.5 points. We already know they score full on the % variation of that to take them to 1.25 points. Now that means they then have to score full points on the remaining sections which I would be amazed at. They have to have shown a profit of over £1 over the average of 3 years, do we think that has happened? They need owner investment of over 500K in 2 of those 3 seasons as well. This could be possible as its a huge money pit and someone has pumped some cash in to them this season but has it been the same in previous seasons? And the last one they score maximum points on is having a balance sheet of over 100k, I mean really?

I would be amazed if Bradford's score is anywhere near this when things are audited next season.

Fully accepted but there is no way on earth we should have voted to accept the IMG recommendations. A protest vote would at least have shown some contempt for what is happening. P.S. how the hell do Bradford score so highly on finances? It's unbelievable!

For me we should have gone down the Batley route in pushing for winner of our league getting promoted and bottom team relegated as long as both were B grades.

But yeah on Bradford, I know they look like they are pretty close to been in the mix for promotion but I think when push comes to shove and things are investigated this coming season, they have very little wiggle room and are somewhere near the limit of what they can acheive and I would not be surprised if their score reduced rather than increased. Their accounts at companies house make interesting reading, for instance they do actually have a lot of money in the bank but it seems that is as a result of a large loan and I wonder how the RFL will take thins like that in to account as its clear their debts are rising and their money is dropping.

It is crystal clear what is happening regarding Bradford, you only need to look at their published attendances against Fax and the amount of people who actually attended those games. If they can lie, and be believed apparently, about something which is there all to see, how can they be believed about things we can't see?

Ultimately everything IMG are proposing is bol**ks. As all the other licensing ideas were. If a team performs well over a period of time and seasons and do well in their league or get promoted to the next league up more people come and watch which creates more revenue through the gates, sponsorships etc. fans,sponsors, and I believe, players want this. No one really gives a stuff if there isn’t an electronic score board. If your team is putting points on a chalkboard we’re happy because they are winning. In 10 years or whatever it’s when IMG and the RFL have screwed our game up even more we will go back to promotion and relegation given on merit of the best and worse teams of each league.