I feel more for the poor sods who the Bulls owed money to and who on good faith expected to be paid duly,some poor family's with small business' will have been hit very hard
The folk who collectively donated the £500.000 to the fighting fund were being nothing more than oblivious to these sort of procedures

I have heard Fielden bleating about his donations to the cause and how it was money down the drain,oh really stuart you don't say, what did you think would happen to your money then?

the 50% rule is all well and good as long as any other expenditure by the club apart from players salaries does not exceed 50% of turnover as well.

Bradford spent less than 50% of their turnover on the salary cap.

Really? What did they spend the money on?

Which is what I paraphrased earlier - there was no need to repeat it again, but thanks anyway.



I didn't choose to ignore the bit about the Bulls Directors fault because it's what I said originally. For the second time it doesn't matter what the stated aim of the cap was, what I original said which you've seemed to disagree with again for some reason is that the cap has never had anything to do with a club going bust. Bad management is the only reason the Bulls are in the position they find themselves in. No matter what the stated aim of the cap on an RFL document says it has absolutely nothing to do with the Bulls spending much more than their income.

I'm still waiting for you and Dave to tell me how a document with some aims and objectives somehow made the Bulls Directors spend money they didn't have - was it a gun or knife the piece of paper held to their throats?



I actually agree with doing away with the flat cap and believe it should reward sensible ambition and investment, but even then a % of turnover is still a figure (like the flat cap figure) that doesn't stop clubs spending more on other areas on things they can't afford.

I've a soft spot for the Bulls, and I think even those who haven't don't want to see this happen to the club. It makes the game look amatuerish and has massive implications to the league in the future. Firstly, as the club has gone into administration, are they going to get a license next time they're given out? Will they be demoted at the end of the season (doubt it. The RFL would have to have a contingency plan in place for that to happen, and we all know they've none of them). Surely this proves that Bradford's application for a license was falsified in the first place. I hope they remain as a club, and continue to play at Odsall, but they shouldn't be allowed to claim a place in SL next year.

Also, intead of the fans having Belgian flags flying from their cars when they're going down the M62, from now on they should be made to have the Greece flag.

The RFL will keep Bradford in SL, what else will they do with odslum, turn it into the biggest Indian restaurant in England!!

The salary cap didn't make the directors overspend. It failed to prevent them overspending. It failed to meet its objectives. As did the licensing process, which is supposed to vet clubs management and finances. The whole system is a joke, overseen by clowns.

It doesn't but at the end they'll have played 27 games like everyone else.

Doesn't matter either way now

Thanks BK. I also offer my sincere apologies for continuing to oppose the cap.



The fact is that the Wigan club benefits significantly (in the short term at least) from the SC now that the club is competently run. We have an owner who doesn't want to burn millions of pounds of his own money on the club so we could never compete with Wire's apparently super rich owner if there was no SC. We have the best youth set up in the league by a country mile, which is a massive advantage, as shown in the recent injury crisis. Wigan are in an excellent position, albeit in a competion which is in serious danger in the long term.

The fact that the SC is good news for the short term interests of the club I support does not of course prevent me from opposing it as the failed and counterproductive measure that it is. The SC is a key part of a system that is now in utter disrepute, presided over by people who are to management what Ashley Young is to penalty taking. These muppets and the people running many clubs who are even more incompetent than the RFL are going to run the game into the ground. The SL will be reduced eventually to a small, semi-professional competition similar to the domestic French RL competition. That's where we will be in 10-20 years if this continues, the financial failures of clubs and dwindling real term incomes of players make it inevitable, unless major changes occur to the management and structures of the professional game.

But the cap still had zero to do with the current Bulls situation whether it failed its objectives or not - something some people still fail to understand, especially as they spend less than 50% of their turnover on the cap. You actually hit the nail on the real talking point which is the failure of the licensing system, unfortunately the cap obsessives can't see the wood for the trees.

How about "OdSlum Dog Millionaire Tandoori"

I made myself laugh then, sorry.

There are a lot of people quoting lot's of financial figures. Could someone tell me where they are getting their info from please? Wouldn't mind a look to satisfy myself.

I think everyone agrees that the CC does not prevent a club from overspending. That much is pretty obvious- you could pay the cleaner £10m a year and your players £0.5m.

However, and this is the key point, it DOES put an "extra" safeguard into the system (or at least did under the old 50% non live cap system).

Well, Bradford's monthly outgoings have been stated as £300k by Guilfoyle, which equates to £3.6 million pa, which is more than double the cap limit.

Surely the outgoings arent just the players wages? Im sure there will be rent and other things eg the Coaching staff's wages and travel to away fixtures and training facility rental/upkeep (assuming they dont just use Odsal).

Even so the outgoings do seem quite substantial for a RL club.

That's the point, players wages can only be £1.65 million, so even if the 50% rule was in place they'd still be under 50%.

The current situation at Bradford Bulls is sad for all concerned. Players, staff, fans and the whole sport of Rugby League will feel the ramifications for years to come. I really do hope Bradford turn it around but the current administrator, Brendan Guilfoyle, has said he is open to offers for players but has yet to receive any offers.

I was wondering, given our current situation with half backs, whether Jarrod Sammut is worth a bid. Comparisons with Chase and Moran about his individual flair and play style will, of course, be keenly debated. Could Sammut do a job for us in the short term, while Tommy is out, and in the longer term next year in a partnership with Matty Smith? (if it ever gets finalised and announced).

I am in two minds myself; he can be devastating at times but has vulnerabilities that need to be worked on. On top of that he has had more than his fair share of injuries and might be seen as some sort of Jonah, considering he has now been at two clubs which have gone into administration in the last year.

So, what do you think? Worth a punt or don't touch with a barge pole?

kinky sod!

Falls into the silly hair category and simply not good enough for Wigan

have you been on the pop

Another problem Bradford have is that I don't think the sale of their best players will bring in as much cash as they may hope.

Bateman is the one who seems to be attracting all the attention, but he's only 18 and some of the figures being mentioned in his case are frankly ridiculous.

Two that I would be interested in are the centre, Lulia - because he's a big unit (but of course he's an overseas player, and that seems to be against our policy at present) and Kopczak (but we've already got lots of big forwards - so the same reservation must apply to Scruton and Langley).

We also have to be wary of 'star players' in teams who aren't even in the top eight. Usually it's a sign that they're not really star players.

I would look more at Jefferies more than Sammut. And even then I don't think he is that good either.

I'd have Ainscough back