It's looking increasingly like a write off season once again... so disappointing. A massive blow given all the hard work and positivity in pre season.

Potter should be getting much better performances out of this bunch, but we still have too many ordinary players to compete with the likes of Wire. So depressing once again!

As I said from the outside looking in - your club appears to be in a mess. I fail to see how a new stadium would change that. Odsal isn't that bad - especially on a day like today. You say that all those clubs are bankrolled by rich owners but I think the majority bankroll themselves - obviously the occasional investment on a player (in our case) or infrastructure is a benefit but we aren't reliant on these owners to succeed.



The stadium had nothing to do with Moran. The new stadium has led to a massive increase in revenue through both increased attendances and other events hosted at the stadium. The new stadium as well as the way that the club is now run is the main reason for our upturns in fortunes. Simon Moran has certainly had his part to play but by no means is he the reason for our upturn in fortunes.

Adey you appear to have a good background knowledge of the state of affairs of the Warrington Club, I will add a few more facts to help you out. Firstly I agree havng a 'fan' and major shareholder who is willing to finance the club has helped immensly over the past decade or so but it it hasn't been plain sailing.

Warrington were in financial trouble and if you can remember had to sell 2 of the biggest names in the game literally to survive, these being Harris and Sculthorpe. The proceeds from that helped us out for a while, then we had a loan from Warrington Council of about £250,000, the council now own the ground at Wilderspool. These were bad times at the Wire, we made some high profile signings but still were a mid to lower table team.

The turnaround of course started with the appt of the great late Peter Deakin and Simon Moran. The plans for the new ground took what seemed an eternity especially with the public inquiry, but were successful and as you say benefited from Tesco funding the build of the HJ.

We were fortunate to move into the HJ following our first play off appearence so hopes were high. It didn't happen overnight though we made a few signings (which you could say were due to S Moran) but still were inconsistent. A few play off places came then we had a bad spell leading in Paul Cullen leaving and Jimmy Lowes being appointed head coach. I think the rest is up to date appt of Tony Smith who has now brought success to the club and backroom staff to support him.

As a fan of the wire for nearly 40 years, I have waited a long time for success. Watching in envy at the Bulls/Saints/Wigan and Leeds lift all the trophies over the years. I agree we have been fortunate with the stadium development and to have Simon Moran on board.

Not having full knowledge of your history, can you tell me how your club were financed/backed during your glory years in sl. Didn't you have a wealthy backer? In your opinion where and when did it all start to go wrong at the Bulls?

not too sure why we cant compete with the Warrington players ...


they have the same salary cap as us so our lazy players must be on a similar wage structure to them!

So why cant we go out and get this type of player on contract?

yes i know im being idealistic .. its not a level playing field. Other clubs play it clever .. the foreign clubs London/wales/france basically have a free hand in getting as many quality imports as they want! where we are left with "average squad players/team members!"

This has to be a 3 year plan ... during the 3 years we have to develop our "cheap" juniors until they are at a higher level .. then we can hopefully fill the squad with more expensive and more quality players.

sorry the likes of Sibbet, Sykes, Herbert etc etc are only good enough to be squad members .... if that!

We need to look at the bigger picture .. we are hopefully a developing club .. we've fallen a hell of a long way and recovery its not going to happen over night! We dont and never will know the full facts of the Orford saga and who it stopped us getting

keep the faith .. its a long walk back to being competitive!

ill settle for effort this year .. and hopefully the juniors wont turn out to be "stevo stars of the future"

1st July 2004

I'm sure there's deeper problems at Bradford that their own fans are knowledgable of and I am not.

But from the outside looking in it was evident from the get go that you went for quantity over quality in respect of your recruitment.

What happened then? I would have said when McNamara got hold of the team.

Iestyn Harris.

I could be here for hours on this - people who know me know it to be very much a subject close to my heart. Quick reply - E&OE!

What went wrong?

No rich backer and not enough income to cover costs once other teams (with rich owners/backers) caught up with the Bulls' off-field success.

Leading eventually to massive cost base reductions, including progressive loss of numerous senior skilled managers and inability to retain top-quality (expensive)m players.

Head coach who (backed by former chairman) bought success by spending beyond our means.

Attendances FELL by nearly 2k after the superb 2003 season, when the club budgeted for them to increase. This was a real killer blow - its all very well the fans complaining, but those missing fans left a huge hole in the finances that was never plugged. I know several of them who moaned like hell at the Bulls' demise, but did not like being told they were at least partly to blame.

Chairman who got into a pìssing contest with Hetherington at Leeds, and signed Harris when the latter was contractually obliged to return to Leeds. And in doing so invoked the wrath of Caddick and a £3m plus crazy lawsuit, the consequences of which cannot be understated and are with us financially for a while yet. Probably the single biggest disaster to hit the club since its reformation in the early 1960s. And totally and utterly self-inflicted.

Club running out of money fast, huge lawsuit hanging over us, big strategic review showed only solution was massive cost reductions. Vicious downward spiral from there.

Chairman and head coach went. A lot still to be said about that time, but from the things I hear and saw there is no way I would ever want either back. And go ask yourself why Fielden really went? One day it will come out in the autobiographies.

New administration had to settle with Leeds on undisclosed but clearly expensive terms, and even so eventually arrested most of the losses but at the expense of having sod all to spend on anything. Few fans realise just how close the club came to running out of money, with no sugar daddy to fall back on. Anyone reading the annual accounts and having a modicum of background can piece it all together and see where we were twelve months or so ago. Scary.

New Marketing director and a board cleanout mid-2010, and a series of strong initiatives including the highly-successful pledge campaign looked to have started the club back on the road to financial recovery. Change of head coach and big turnover in playing staff suggested the club was back on the road to recovery on the field. Optimism returned to Odsal.

That was then, and this is now.

In a word, money. Or lack of. That is what went wrong. And going back many more years than most people realise - just look at the accounts year on year!

Sadly, too many supporters don't see or appreciate this, and are therefore bemused at our fall from grace and seeming inability to spend what it takes to get back up again. Equally, those of us who watch the team increasingly wonder why we are not performing better, money notwithstanding since it surely cannot ALL be down to that?

I think it's slowly dawning on a lot of people that there's going to be no quick fix. We show up week after week hoping for a turning point; in reality we're praying for a miracle. If anything this season is turning out worse that last. Yesterday was a very dark day.

Sadly I see a further demise. The Pledge scheme was a great idea but what are we going to do to retain the fan base next year? We were promised 'a new era' but it's just not being delivered. I don't think Potter is going to leave us in any better position than he found us to be honest.

What we put out on the park is the only way to make us money - but even when we were winning titles fans deserted the club. With the progress being made elsewhere in Super League it is not beyond the bounds of possibility to see us losing our licence by the end of the decade.

Has a club ever fallen from grace so quickly?

Its sad to see the demise of the once mighty bulls, especially the effect it has on the fans. I remember only too well the hammerings dished out to the wire by the bulls in the superleague era and loosing 2 challenge cup semis. The bulls players were so big and seemed to have a giant in every position. The seemed almost unbeatable. I still find it hard to believe that it is now wire that is handing out the hammerings and the Bulls taking such a pounding. It is a privelage for me to see Warrington doing so well but we will have to win a few more things yet to match what the Bulls have done.
I Hope for the Bulls fans sake that things pick up, believe me i know what its like following a poor team. For the sake of the competition we need a strong bulls team - except when they play wire!!

I wish the season would end right now before we are embarrassed even more than we already are. How do we rescue a season from here with a squad decimated by injuries and average players taking to the field each week. In many ways we are lucky that there is no relegation as I think we would be looking at this as a fight for survival right now.

this is a riduculously stupid thread

riiiiiiight.

thanks Adeybull, my exact analysis at the start of the season when the fantasy footballers were bemoaning the lack of Aussie superstars signings. And you dont need to read the accounts to work it out: If we had the money we would not have any space under the cap, it would be spent.

I find it absolutely amazing that any Bulls fan could think that we had a hope against Warrington, my view is that we get the points we need to get into the playoffs by beating mid to bottom teams by just one point if necessary nine times to get us the 18 more points we need to get there. and on that note one good thing that happened for the Bulls yesterday is that KR lost to Wakefield, ok by 2 points, but that is exactly what we have to do.

So forget the game yesterday, it was irrelevant to achieving the target for the season. we need 6 points from the next three SL games ie Hull Kr Salford and Quins. That is a big step on the way to the playoffs, and will give the lads a bit of confidence too. If they can do it.

And at the start of the season I said I would be happy to get into the playoffs PROVIDED the younger players had not been over-played, which is also the message from Hood in that article. So despite saying I would not want Leon back in previous threads, right now a fit Leon would be a big help as would Mason, both to take pressure off the kids and put a bit of edge into our play, particularly defence, and help restart the season. and Kearney could stay at FB all the time when he returns, and Briggs would have a mentor that has done it all. So a bit more positional stability would be a good thing, utility players are all very well, but you can have too many of them, we need a full time SO and a full time FB

If we all know where we're deficient and I wouldn't disagree with a lot that has been said, why isn't our coach fixing it? Why are we so unfit? What set plays are we working on in training? Why can't we string more than one pass together and let the ball do some work for a change? Why do the players look so uninterested? Why are everybody elses 'kids' ready and ours aren't? Why are we getting so many injuries, is it our conditioning or pre-match drills? Why didn't we give the players we've signed a chance to play in a settled position instead of chopping and changing all the time? Why have we signed a stand-off we don't play? Why did we sign a highly rated Scrum Half we don't play, cos the Aussie version ain't got it I'm afraid? if this a three year turn around, why has the coach only got a two year deal?

Some answers are needed, and fast. If the club is rotten to the core as eluded to on here where is the problem and who needs to go so we can

Thanks for the reply Adey, so seems it is a combination of factors that have contributed to the Bulls current status. You have the fan base there, I suppose it is a matter of maintaining and growing this again but onfield matters would have to improve to do that.

My main observation about your set up and this has been stated many times is the ground and its drain on finances. If valuable funds are being spent on the ground this will be at the expense of spending on additional or better players up to the cap limit. I know plans aren't going well for redevelopment but why not share with Bradford City? I read earlier they are having financial difficulties so maybe a ground share would benefit both parties. When I attended VP during your season there it didn't seem a bad ground, apart from the away end and being further away from the motorway. I know Bulls fans may not like the idea of a groundshare but it could be the way forward. Not all SL clubs own their own ground now, even the SL Champs.

This is over-simplistic. I understand knee-jerk "sack everybody" reactions after a debacle like Warrington, or Salford, but what you have to factor in to the equation is the same coach and the same squad putting in monster efforts like against Cas, Leeds and others. Why aren't we faultless every week? I don't know, but if you blame Potter for Warrington/Salford then do you equally give Potter the credit for the good performances we have put in?


Don't buy that.


A good question.


As our good performances show, though, we actually can. The question would be, why do we have weeks where it looks as if we've had our hands chopped off? (Although my perennial moans about the ridiculous number of unforced errors we have been making these past few seasons must sadly continue).


I would say "some of" - but THAT is to me the big question. And has been for some time. Not so far this year, but more than once last season and before we have actually had first team players admit in the press that there were colleagues who had not been putting it all in. No names were named, but most of them surely remain at the club.

It is quite shocking to see where the Bulls are languishing at present, It's almost like seeing a club in freefall, It is often easy to critisise and castigate when things arn't going your way

IMO you Bulls fans need to keep faith and more importantly keep up your support of your club going in it's time of need, you're clearly needed more now than you ever were during your recent glory years

I have one serious concern regarding the Bulls and i mentioned this at it's inception with my Bulls supporting friends, and that is in regards to the Pledge scheme

How could your club ever find a way back if all of it's pledge members refrain from renewing next time around, Or even if half it's members refrain from renewing for that matter?

That is a deeply worrying thought

Its not really.

The pricing, as this year, would reflect the number of (renewal) pledges. Fewer pledges = higher prices. You'd end up with similar income overall.

The worry is with the consequential loss of the loads of additional ancillary and sponsorship etc income the higher crowds have brought in.

The REAL worry though IMO is that if we don't turn it round soon we will not get a franchise come 2015.

That would be a dissaster Adey as i think that the RFL's agenda on franchises will possibly deem it almost impossible for clubs outside of the elite division at that time to get back in.

Agreed. If we lose the franchise its a one way ticket to oblivion.

Can't be allowed to happen.

Thanks for saving me time, as my post was going to be just about the same as that

So no mention of the decision to award Steve MacNamara a 4 1/2 year contract or any number of dumbfounding decisions on player recruitment and retention that the board, minus Chris Caisley, sanctioned in the last 5 years? The failure to sack Steve Macnamara 2 years after he was clearly not up to the job? The near constant spinning of information through unofficial channels so that figures like £3 million become accepted fact? The story about the club going bust but spending £100,000 on Solomona + Brett Ferres despite the club's policy of focussing youth? The loss of the world's best young forward because he couldn't get out of Odsal quick enough? The signings of Feather, Orford, Sykes, Glenn ? The utter capitulation in the face of Orford's agent? I could go on and on and on.

Why no mention of any of these decisions? How on earth is it Brian Noble's responsibility to balance the books of Bradford Bulls Ltd? It's an absurd charge to hold him responsible after all that has been totally ballsed up since he left? Was he the accountant? He was a good, hard working player who captained GB and never let us down and he is the club's most successful ever coach with the budget he was given which I would very much doubt was any different to Leeds, Wigan, Saints at the time. Your undermining of his achievements at the club is out of order and plain wrong.

I can't leave that as it stands, since I have to take issue with what you say. So I'll spend probably ten times as long on a reply as I spent on the original, quick post, which was in response to what seemed a genuine question about why the club had fallen so far so quickly. Readers who are understandably more concerned with how the hell we get out of the hole than how we got INTO it can skip this post.

OK. In no particular order. Do you know the full facts about what happened with Orford? if you know less than I do, then your statement about THAT is out of order and plain wrong.

Do you know how much it would have cost to sack MacNamara with two years left to go on his contract? And whether the club could have afforded it? If not, then you are as much out of order as you accuse me of being. I have argued repeatedly over the years not that Macca was a good coach and should be retained for that reason (I always said others were far better able to judge his coaching ability than me) but that the financial state of the club meant carrying effectively two head coach costs for two years could only come out of the playing staff budget. So it was the financial position that administration inherited that was the real issue. that was why I made no specific mention of the coach who succeeded Noble - and also since none of us will know the extent to which his failure (big time) at this club was down to his own inability or down to the wider financial problems - or, as I suspect, a mixture of both?

The board trusted MacNamara in his judgement regarding which players to sign. I know - from ftf discussion - that there was recognition towards the end that his judgement seemed to have been too often in error, especially over the likes of Sherriffe. But would we have been in the position we were in, and with the coach we had, if the financial situation was not so dire? Again, I blame the financial situation the club faced, and had to deal with, as being the underlying cause of much of the recent difficulties. I COULD have listed a whole stream of examples of WHY that financial situation so adversely affected the club, rather than what I saw as just some fundamental ones, and had I done so then I would certainly have stated the same point as you - albeit offering the board at least some excuse.

the £3+m figure? Er...that was quoted officially by Hood and widely reported in the media and never challenged or contested by Leeds Rugby Ltd. Which, given Leeds had recently retracted a statement by Hetherington that was otherwise libelous (the "coherse" affair) would surely have been open invitation to Leeds to demand retraction for defamation had it not been true? Given how badly if reflected on Leeds in the eyes of most non-partisan observers? I have anyway learnt enough about this affair over the years to have little cause to doubt the numbers.

We did not sign Brett Ferres. He was one of our youngsters who we managed to lose. Like a load of others, including Atkins and Reardon that happened under Noble, and too many since that SEEMED to be down to lack of money OR dumb signing decisions or both. IMO one of the most serious problems of the post-Noble era was our seeming inability to hold on to our upcoming backs in the face of offers from big-monies sugar-daddied clubs, and for whatever other reasons. I made this point in another thread the other day. When writing the comments that seem to have so upset you (and they were written as I said quickly and with no intent to be a blow-by-blow synopsis of the club's downfall) I mentally (again) attributed this big problem to lack of money. There may have been other reasons - I don't know and I doubt you do fully either - which, had I wanted to spend longer on my reply to the poster, I would have flagged up as an ancillary cause of us being where we are today.

Signing Solomona? Yes, with hindsight a huge disappointment. The guy appeared - like so many others - not to really want to be here. But that is with the benefit of hindsight. I recall at the time teh signing was almost universally applauded, and the RL Hacks almost to a man picked him out as a marquee signing for us that ought to make the world of difference. Would you not have us sign ANY senior players with clear ability as he had showed? Hindsight is all very well - we can all do that.

Regarding losing Burgess, if he could not wait to get out of Odsal quick enough why did he not go sign for Wire or Hudds or someone else seemingly with megabucks to spend? When instead he signed for Souths on what he suggested at the time was hardly a massively-better package than he could have commanded in the UK? No, he went because he had the opportunity of a lifetime, and took it! And was dead dead right to do so IMO - who could blame him for not? And, in the face of that, what would YOU have done? Forced him to see out the last year of his contract (and receive no transfer fee?)? Somehow found so much money to pay him that he could not afford to follow the lifetime's opportunity? Come ON now!

We can all point to what we may regard as poor signings, without crediting those that turned out better than expected. That is as out of order and plain wrong as what you accuse me of. Orford was a disaster with hindsight (albeit minor compared to Harris), but who could have known that at the time? Most of us were pretty excited at the signing. It is downright disingenuous to beat the club over it with the benefit only of hindsight.

Equally, how could anyone have known that Hall would not work out? It SEEMS much was down to the personal tragedy that befell just before he moved here. Recognise it did not work out by all means, but again it is disingenuous to beat the board up over a signing that again most people were content with at the time.

Feather I never expected to work out - too soft. Although he did better after he left us. Not a signing I would have made, but signing mistakes get made. There were worse ones than that made. By all clubs.

Sykes - the guy holds his hands up to play wherever they tell him to. Not the best player we have, but one that adds to our options. IMO he is the latest scapegoat, and not entirely justified. You clearly think otherwise.

Why no mention of the above? Either because I do not agree, or because I saw a more deep-rooted underlying cause, or because I wrote my reply quickly and late at night. And in a lot less time than this reply is taking. That is why.

In the same way, I never mentioned the oft-reported comments that Noble "lost the plot" second half of his last full season, hence our performances deteriorating, and that it was MacNamara who had to step in and motivate the players so we got to OT. If he DID (and I have been told that but have no direct proof) then I always attributed it to him being told that he would have a lot less funds to utilise in future than he had been used to. And so at least explaining if not justifying what happened. I did not mention it because it - like some of YOUR points - if true it seemed to me to be detail and symptoms not underlying cause.

Where did I say I hold him repsonsible for all that has gone wrong since? Or seek to undermine his achievements? All I said was that we had a head coach who bought success by spending (and I stated it was backed by the Chairman) beyond our means. You cannot argue that, with a team full of internationals, we must have bought a lot of that success? Same way as the sugar-daddied clubs have been doing in recent years? He spent the budget he was given; the fault with giving him a budget seemingly beyond the club's means lies eleswhere. It is my opinion that Noble is a very effective coach when he has a first-rate squad of players at his disposal, and I yield to no-one in saluting his fantastic achievements whilst our Head Coach and in that environment. I fear he would NOT be effective when the pursestrings - and the for the support functions not just the playing staff - are tight, and the club is no longer a big attraction for top players. For that, you'd be better off with a John Kear-type IMO. And that, plus the previous point, is why I would not want him back now as Head Coach - I just do not think it would work. Although yes, in fairness, as yet we do not seem to have found any solution that DOES.

But you are attributing to me things I never said, and THAT is out of order and just plain wrong.

I won't get into debates about the budget Noble had to work with, and how it compared to other clubs. I recall commentators in 2003 (in particular) posing the question how Bradford managed to afford a team full of internationals like we did, but that is a debate best not carried out on an internet forum.

The reasons for our decline in recent years will always be a matter of personal opinion. You clearly have different opinions to me, and in the past have come across as very close indeed to the Caisley camp - same way as the poster "Duckett" on the T&A, for example. it is of course your right and prerogative to express those opinions, although I would prefer you not to ascribe to me things I never said. And if you choose to use hindsight to justify your stance, as you have done above, I cannot complain - since my views on why it all went wrong were formed largely with the benefit of hindsight too (although the worrying financial signs were very apparent from the first accounts after our return to Odsal).

I would HOPE we all have the same aspiration for the future - a renaissance for the club on the sort of scale that was achieved under Caisley at the start of SL (which massive achivement has been, like those of so many other visionaries and leaders, overshadowed by the subsequent failure). The fact that things look pretty gloomy right now unfortunately only encourages people to spend too much time debating why it went wrong in the first place. I so hope it will not be long before we can recapture the optimism and buzz that were there a few months ago - and I am sure you do too?