Keighley Cougars chairman Gary Fawcett has confirmed the club has ended their legal dispute with the RFL – as first reported in League Express this past Monday (December 15).
Fawcett and the Cougars have drawn a line under the issue, and the chairman says that with the 2015 season fast approaching, the club are better served spending their money on the squad, instead of a legal battle that they may well end up losing.
“Litigation against the RFL, indeed anyone, is expensive and success is not certain so wasting money on this is not an option,” Fawcett said.
“There are better things the club can spend its money on such as paying the players on time.
“An EGM resolution is problematic. Although we got five clubs to support us it was for differing resolutions and even those five were not necessarily going to vote for the resolutions, most of them simply wanted to debate the issue.”
Fawcett also said he felt it was unlikely that other clubs in League One – as well as other divisions – would have voted in favour of the Cougars receiving compensation for the dual-registration saga, too.
He added: “On top of this the League One clubs were not going to vote for Keighley Cougars getting compensation, because it would have reduced their chances of promotion, the Super League clubs were completely non-committal (which is very disappointing) other than Wakefield and what of the Championship clubs? The only thing I know is that two clubs would have definitely voted against any resolution concerning this.
“Given that almost half the clubs didn’t turn up to the AGM, which surprised me, I think the chances of an EGM being quorate (validly held) would be remote as, I suspect, only one Super League club would turn up.
“We need to move on and ensure we get promotion back into the Championship next season.”
