No, I think you are not looking at this in the wrong way

At the moment SL is getting very bad press as this whole issue drags on. Its embarrassing, its damaging to our image, it puts off potential sponsors (who want to be associated with a successful sport), it will make it more difficult to negotiate lucrative deals with Sky (' well we are interested in putting the money in guys, but how many clubs are you likely to have in 2014 '?).

Then there is the effect on the clubs players, family, academy sides who simply have no security and have to listen to a series of offers, rejections and endless speculation.

Then we have the problem of the remaining Bradford SL matches. If they are liquidated, what do you do about the points already won and lost ? and Leeds play them 3 times by the way. Plus all the additional bad publicity / embarrassment of the solution.

The consortium offering to buy the club wanted guarantees that the RFL were not able to give, plus it looks to me as though they were intending paying for the club and lease from their business cash-flow (rather than put money up front), plus this was a business taking on a rugby club as a commercial venture ( we want directors who want to run a rugby club, but to manage it in a financially sound way).

Finally, BG the administrator has the power to liquidate the club if the RFL rejects the consortium offers. If that happens, the Bulls disappear for good.

So by stepping in and OFFERING ( not accepted yet; I think Tues /Wed is the deadline) to buy the club, a lot of these problems are sidestepped. It will give time (until end Nov I am hearing) for SLE to find another buyer on their terms. It will provide some security for the players, it will allow the SL season to be completed, it will remove BG from the equation and allow the RFL to control the show. Even if no buyer is found, it will allow an orderly dismantling of the club rather than an immediate liquidation and for the players to look for alternative clubs.

Its all IMO, but I think this solution is by far the best, even though you can certainly argue that Bradford are getting far more support and preferential treatment than other clubs that got into financial difficulty in the past. Its also a solution that all the SL club chairman have agreed to - Moran included.

I think this is a good move by SLE.

Our sport is a relatively small sport and it would do it no good to see a team like Bulls disappear. It would send all the wrong messages to the wider sporting community, the media and sponsors.
Hopefully it's a short term measure and ownership can ''bought'' by an independant group when things become a little clearer.

However the thing that still irks me is (and on the same page as the detail of the Bulls bid on the SL website) that bulls aree given a grade B in 2011 and given a 3 year licence on the back of it.
I'm in favour of the licence system BUT how the ~~~# can they be grade B? The regulators have made a serious error of judgment on the state of the Bulls and it makes a mockery of the licence system.

Well as i said in my earlier post its a conflict of interest however you look at it,Anyone remember when they said Nottingham Forest to good to go down etc etc,well tbh im sick of hearing about Bulls being a big club etc we cant let them go,well sorry i believe at minium they should be put into the championship,some may say im being harsh but thats the way it is.

I'm finding all this blaming of the RFL and SLE a little ridiculous now. Surely the people to blame are the previous board for deceiving just about everybody, and Caisley for the Iestyn Harris affair which cost them a huge amount of money.

They can't have taken this lightly and it really must have been a last resort. They obviously feel Bradford are too important to lose and have taken drastic action. Bit like the govt. bailing out banks.

Long term, this cannot work. They'll look to sell pretty quickly I'd imagine because it will create all sorts of conflict scenarios, most of all if licensing survives (although that seems unlikely). The "precedent" and "they didn't do this for other clubs" arguments are valid must miss the point. Bradford are not Wakefield, Crusaders or (gulp) widnes. They've treated Bradford as a special case, however morally unpleasant that seems. It's not "fair" but since when did fair matter in top level sport?

Yeah, this was the problem, not the licensing system. As far as I can tell, the board had fooled everyone into thinking that Bradford were in a better position financially than they were, probably so that they got their license and could gamble on something like a cup appearance.

The important difference between Bradford's current situation and that of the others like Wakefield is that Bradford face liquidation in a matter of days. The others had assets that they could (reluctantly) sell to pay their debts if they couldn't find a buyer, which in the end they did. Bradford has nothing - only the players, who become free agents if no buyer turns up.

They also all found buyers with plenty of time for the deal to be arranged. If their administrations had gone on as long and as desperately then the RFL might have stepped in at the last minute for them too, but obviously they can't say "we will step in if nobody buys" because then potential bidders will hold off and wait for a better price from the RFL. The worry is that they have now set this precedent, so if (when) this next happens people will expect it of them.

So what happens if, and it's a big if, no buyer is found?

When Hull and Gateshead were merged, the SL clubs put in around 1 million pounds and each SL club 'owned' around 10 % of Hull. So I think the precedent has already been set, but I would agree it is far from ideal and once the league season is over I think the Bulls are likely to be sold on very quickly.

I think the chances that a buyer for a SL club will come along are very small;

Nobody has come along so far
It would prob. require £2m up front investment
It would need a business plan with income streams (Bulls are losing money)
It would need to be done very quickly
Lastly and most importantly, it would have to be agreed by SLE.

You have to remember that there are other SL clubs out there that are scraping along, and who will ask the question ' are we also going to be bailed out if we get into difficulty'. These same clubs though voted unanimously to buy the Bulls. Ask yourself why ?

I think you will find that the Bulls will be sold as a Championship side. This would make the amount of money required by a prospective buyer much more achievable and the income streams less demanding (as the player costs will be much lower). It will mean the RFL get somebody who is interested in rugby running the club. It will mean the club can be rebuilt on a sound financial footing. Perhaps the Bulls supporters may even be able to have a large say in the running of the club, they certainly deserve some pay back after what they have been through.

If you work through the implications of this I think you will see what is likely to happen, and why the SL chairman have been happy to support it.

Very good thread with some intelligent points made, especially by Winslade's Offload and a few others.
My initial reaction to this news was one of disbelief and outrage, though having listened to the points in favour of why this action was taken, I can at least see the reasoning behind it to some degree.
However, what concerns me deeply is when decisions of such magnitude are taken purely on the basis of commercial viability, and where this route may lead us.
For example, let's say, hypothetically, that Bradford make the play-offs. The perceived wisdom of the man on the terraces (whether true or not) would be that it then becomes in the interests of the ruling body, or bodies, for Bradford to do as well as possible and to make as much money as possible. If your team plays Bradford, and is on the wrong end of a heap of refereeing decisions, maybe even loses as a result of a controversial decision, how are you, as a supporter, going to view that? Would you be inclined to go back and spend your hard-earned money again next season?
And taking the point about commercial viability to a wider extent, what if the Challenge Cup semi-finals had been, say, Wire v London and Wigan v Catalan. Would it be considered commercially non-viable to have a London v Catalan final, and would decisions be made accordingly to ensure that this didn't happen?
I'm not saying that would be the case, of course, I'm just saying that one massive can of worms is being opened here.
Maybe the gap between the fair world and the real world is actually a chasm.

The RFL have little to do with the refereeing though, other than setting the rules that referees should be following for every decision. If they were stupid, they might try telling the referees to swing a match one way or the other, but with 6 match officials the chances of this not reaching the press are very slim. Assuming controversial referee decisions even have any factor in the outcome of the match - you can give one team 2 or 3 tries they didn't deserve but it means nothing if the other team score 4 more anyway.

From the sounds of it the RFL have accepted that they will take a loss on this deal, to prevent this year's league from coming apart, so I don't think any major commercial decisions will come into it. Bradford will probably move into the Championship at the end of this or next season (maybe even at the end of the license period, but that seems unlikely) so they have a better chance of being bought, and another team can be brought in to make up the numbers (I think the league will stay at 14 at least until the end of the licensing).

Although it causes problems, I fully expect us to move to a SL of 13 next year. As I said in my previous post, you have to ask why the club chairman were unanimously behind the Bradford offer.

I imagine it was to avoid the absolute chaos of having Bradford disappear from this year's league before it finishes. I believe the league will stay at 14 because as well as being easier to deal with for the moment, dropping to 13 may well breach the Sky television contract and will almost certainly result in less money when it is next renegotiated due to fewer games and viewers.

One of the problems if Bradford go down is that a side of full time professionals will suddenly have to become part time players who will probably need to find a job to bolster their championship wages & seeing as jobs are few & far between this could cause these players all sorts of problems.On the other hand,whoever replaces Bradford will have a situation in reverse where players with steady jobs would have to finish work to become full time pros & if a replacement team is put in that position without being ready it could result in problems for that club in terms of viability & subsequently relegation & players having to find jobs again. My opinion is that in the current economic climate is one of 2 alternatives ,firstly, Bradford are saved &,secondly Bradford go down but with no replacement. I think the RFL would need to look long & hard to find a team in the Championship with the right pedigree to succeed ,in terms of financial viability & suitable playing & coaching structure ,not just as a stop gap but as a long term viable replacement.It would be no good bringing a temporary team in just to make the numbers up till Bradford is back on its feet. If a replacement team has to be found ,i think that team should be given first refusal on any released Bradford players in order to improve its existing squad.

They haven't been top level for many years, although they may make the 8 this season (in spite of a points deduction)......oh the irony

Bradford confimed as £1.5m in debt. SLE see there involvement as a short-term measure. Players free to talk to other clubs. SLE and 13 other teams are effectively Bradfords new administrators.

Sounds more like SL are fed up with the inaction of the current administrator ruining the game, rather than thinking they will "save" Bradford.

thats what i think as well.

On a similar point aren't/weren't melbourne and someone else owned by News International in the NRL for a while?

Then the RFL will have a giant asset (Odsall) that no er wants to play in. Bradford will go under and their losses written off. Their only option would be to agree to let Bradford continue to play there as a conference team at a reduced rent. That at least gives the RFL a little return for a couple of years.

There's some clues here when you look at them allowing the players etc to look elsewhere to play next year.

The only question is this. Is the conference league in it's present set up capable of supporting another club whilst Bradford lick their wounds, keep what they can to win the league & qualify to bounce back up nect time the franchises are reviewed.

You are correct in that Melbourne were (could still be) for sure, i think the Broncos too.

We don't know the terms of the Sky contract, but our legal guys will have crawled all over it before it was signed. I would be very surprised if they did not have a 'get out clause' for a club going into administration and hence reducing the size of the league. That would surely be a basic precaution.

I would think it more likely that the agreement allows Sky to pick and schedule any game from the league that they wish. One team dropping out will hardly make any difference; each team in a league of 13 will play 24 matches, so that is still a hell of a lot of games to chose from in total.

By far the most important aspect of the agreement will be the TV viewing audience as this dictates the price that Sky can demand from advertisers. As we already know, viewing audiences have risen 30-40 % this year, so I doubt Bradford dropping out of SL will affect this much.

It's true that viewing figures have gone up, but 2 weeks less of the season (24 weeks instead of 26) means 4 fewer games, plus the Magic Weekend's 7 games gone too. Losing 11 games out of 66 is a massive drop in viewers across the season - better to keep to 14 and get a 40% increase in the rights revenue than drop to 13 and only get a 26% increase*


* 100% + 40% extra Sky money = 140%, add 140/13 = 11% as Bradford's former share split 13 ways = 151%, then multiply by 5/6 for the drop in games

I agree with you entirely, and I'm not suggesting that the RFL would seek to influence referees, or that referees would ever be less than impartial.
However, we all know how many biased and blinkered fans there are, at all clubs, and my point is that if they feel like they are being cheated (even though they would be mistaken) it might make them feel less inclined to attend future games.
It's a matter of perception, that's all.

With only 13 clubs, one team would not play each week in any case, so stretching the seasons games over 26 weeks (if Sky demand it) poses no real problems.

Magic weekend is more difficult. At worst it could be scrapped, but the games sill played over the season. Or perhaps you could be more inventive and have the World Club challenge on the same weekend ?

But as long as Sky gets the same number of live games to screen, I would have thought that there would not be a major issue in all of this. Yes, it becomes more difficult but not unsolvable. However, if another SL club were to enter administration, it would be disastrous following on the heels of Bradford. And if we have 13 clubs next year, that means more money for each club. So I am guessing we will move to 13.

Just out of interest, we currently divide the pot into 16, as the RFL and Championship clubs also get a share.

www.thetelegraphandargus.co.uk/n ... ord_Bulls/ The plot thickens.

www.thetelegraphandargus.co.uk/n ... ord_Bulls/ The plot thickens.