I would have thought Langley would be just the sort of player we need to keep.

Yes, I'd say so.

No, Walkers tackling has convinced him he's more valuable to the team than Langley.

Apparently Walker buys into and leads the culture of the club.

Having someone who has given everything for the bulls, stuck with us through thick and thin and has said he wants to be a one club man must not be the sort of player Cummins wants at this club.

It must feel like a right stab in the back for Langers.

I doubt Walkers contract is anything like Langleys so it is pointless comparing them. Does Langley offer value for money anymore, IMO no, as said he has been shifted from the back-row due to our young players, and is now a make-shift prop who is missing a lot of games again.

What would you rather spend the chunk of your playing budget on, a make-shift prop who will play 3/4's of the season if we're lucky, or in a position we are severely struggling in like centre?

But we haven't even offered Langley anything. Surely he deserves at least an offer, you can't get much more loyal than Langley

How can you know whether they offer value for money or not. We have no idea what they're on. I'd rather pay top dollar for a player that can tackle than pay peanuts and get a journeyman anyway.

Michael Worrincy would probably be cheap, why not ship Bateman off to Wire and get him back? There's probably plenty of nearly retired rhinos who'll be available though. FC will probably be giving Senior a ring about our centre problems you just mentioned.

Really disappointed with this, really wanted Langley to see out his career with us. You don't get more loyal that Langley and he's a solid player, we ARE a better team with him on the field.

We are better with Langley on the field but FC has difficult choices and has to spend the little he has carefully.

The danger is the 1 year offer to Donno may not be enough and we end up losing both of them. I hope FC knows what he's doing.

Im starting to think none of them do

Interestingly, Ryan Whitcut is quoted in the T&A as saying the full cap "of £1.95 million is available to the coach", which I confess is both a big surprise and very welcome news, given that the reduction in TV money has been confirmed for next season. Someone, somewhere is doing something right in the back office if they've brought in enough money to cover that loss, though I guess it could be Omar who has put the money in. I just hope it's not one of those 'mysterious' deposits which just turn up in accounts and have to be repaid....

In the case of Langers, I'd have thought that if we have the full cap to spend then he'd have been offered something - if only for his loyalty over the years. I guess that, the only way to judge the recruitment objectively though, is to wait and see all the other ins and outs and look at what kind of balance we have in the squad when it's all done and dusted. To be fair, it's pretty difficult to judge someone's decisions in an isolated instance when the success of the policy depends on the overall blend; ie the squad as a whole next year.

They said that last year though too, and its blatantly obvious looking at squad assembled that we didnt spend much more than 1-1.2million of player budget. excuse used last year was that there want anyone left worth signing by time we able to start offering contracts. Think we were all expecting reduced budget to apply this year too due to reduced sky money and it was understandable. Cant help thinking Ryans put his foot in his mouth with this comment, especially if we dont now see several new signings materialising.

Can't for the life of me understand Whitcut's comments if taken at face value. I suspect there's more to it.

take the bull by the horns and put some money in to cover the shortfall. There would be a fair bit of fairly pragmatic business sense behind that with some short term speculation hopefully securing long term profitability.

Got to admit it's hard to square Ryan's statement with Franny's earlier one about no "marqee" players, though I do realise you can spend the cap without getting any single big earners.

FC mentions no marquee players, Ryan mentions a much larger squad than what we currently have but still spending a significant amount. Those statements back each other up in my book.
Trouble is, all that's left to bolster our squad is a load of guff.

Well, if that's true, then we'll be OK, as nobody else will be able to sign owt but this load of guff either.

Why is it being reduced to 12? What is the reason for the change?

Ok if we kept Langley, who would you put at centre?

I would like to keep Langley, but I think we a strong in the back row and he isn't really a prop. I would look at improving out back line instead which is what Franny is doing.

I am very concerned why he has only offered Donno a 1 year deal. Cannot see he logic in that at all.

only reason I can think of is if there are still concerns over his injuries long term. Presumably clubs medical staff will know a lot more than us on here about his fitness and how he recovers after games and any ongoing niggles. Possibly they want him to prove himself over a full pre-season (which he missed last year) and early part of next season before comitting to a long term deal. Other clubs offering him a longer deal are taking a bit of a gamble, albeit a lesser one than we took retaining him last year.

Well, yeah, "guff" or not, we're at least in the mix to sign some of the better"guff" this time round so we must be better off.....I hope!

I've been watching Bradford for a fair few years, and many of the very best signings we ever made were "guff". I remember Big L es playing at Wakey and their fans chanting "What a waste of money"



Oh for a man-motivator like the great Peter Fox, who signed up loads of over-the-hill guff which turned out to be some of the best players we (or anyone) ever had.

Also, out there somewhere are the stars of tomorrow, who are not guff at all. A chap called Escare would have been no doubt described in the guff category until recently - "Why do we want a small Frenchie who's only ever played semi-pro in the ty French leagues, if he's not made past St. Esteve at age 20 he must be crap", it would have gone, or something like that.

You rightly say that we do not have the information about the players that the coaching staff have.
They train and test the players on a daily basis & are aware of their physical and mental application.
Decisions about retention or term of contract will be for them to make. That's their job.
We must rely on them to make the right decisions for the club.

Further we do not know the salaries of each player nor their expectations at the Bulls or offers from elsewhere.
We do not know for sure what the playing budget was for this year nor know what it will be in 2014, 2015
Whatever it is then management must work within this constraint to do its best in recruiting players. That's their job.
We must rely on OK to create finances to put a competitive team on the field and make the right decisions on how money is spent.

Don't see why Langley is linked to who plays centre, especially after todays claim that we have full cap available.

How do you know FC is looking at improving the back line? We've signed 2 forwards and we have Potentially up to 4 departures in the backs.

Sorry if I'm sounding like ME lately, but with Donno getting a 1 year offer and Langley getting no offer it looks to me as if FC doesn't know what he's doing. I'll give him a fair chance next season with his own squad, but I will be very sad if Langley or Donno go, never mind both.

Possibly done to suggest to the supporters you tried to keep him,as i believe he is heading over to Hull.

Not one I've heard yet, but I'll be disappointed wherever he ends up if he's not staying with us.

You don't sound like me he thinks langley's crap