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Leigh switched over from up front season tickets to a monthly membership this year and it was probably the best decision the club made through the whole rebrand. It's funny because when you actually work out what you'd be paying the cheapest adult level of membership at Leigh is essentially £300 for a season ticket which is the highest it's ever been by some margin, but there was nothing but praise from the fan base and the club is at record levels of season ticket/membership. Previously there would always be comments about the affordability of season tickets that were priced in the £200-£250 range but when you see it as £25 a month it suddenly looks quite enticing.

So, where do you draw the line between good natured banter, essential and understandable fan rivalry and wishing fellow fans and clubs nothing but harm? It seems to me some fans would only be happy if RL was left with their own and 6-7 others so there'd be someone to play! Except it's already been invented, it's called Subbuteo! so has this "wishing nothing but harm" It's called social media.

Croft deal has break clauses at the end of every season which is is well documented. It is also well documented that once the sale of the stadium goes through and Salford council are sole owners the club will generate much more income from matchdays providing a larger income stream. This share option is not a new thing and has been doing the rounds for a number of years, the MD of the club is not a mega rich businessman he is just a fan who is having a go! Wanting the community and fans to all buy into the same journey. hopefully this is the start of a long and sustained future for the club which will allow us to grow.

I hadn't seen this before, but if someone's going to unexpectedly sing a tribute to you at the end of a long day, Stevie Wonder, Ray Charles and Smokey Robinson are a decent trio.

With Foundation of Hearts we have 8000 members paying a minimum of £10 per month and usually raise just under £150k per month. It should be noted that the shares are owned by FoH not individuals and its 1 member per vote regardless of whether you pay £10 per month or £1000 per month. The club still has a separate board of directors of which FoH has 2 members and the club mantra is "fan owned not fan run".

Hey ho the auld RL family Oxford. The People' Club. Full or partial citizen ownership is significantly more democratically and morally better. It turns a mere sporting club into a community asset. Added to the facilities becoming wholly council owned, SRD can truly claim to be RL's People's Club. There is a spectrum of what people ownership can develop into. Everything from 50+1 German model to membership run FC United or Wimbledon. Then there is John Lewis', Nationwide, the Co-Op and Arla. Each have well publicised strengths and weaknesses. At this time, this proposal seems correct for Solly. Bereft of a "sugar daddy" recruiting the fans makes economic sense. It additionally throws a light of the Sport's owners finances, the fiscal doping, the levels of debt masquerading as "loans" and the "curious" sources of the monies. Join the evolution now. You know it's right. https://salfordreddevils.net/owntheclub/

There is a difference between wishing Salford harm and discussing whether they are in danger and the extent, and i can only see the latter on here.

Mmmm, so why hand out an 8 year deal to your star player?

Interesting move for Salford going fully down the fan ownership route, which I'm assuming means the touted takeover by Gerrard is off the cards now. I am curious to see how this works, I'm assuming the share purchases are one off payments which does seem like this is more of a short term fix, however I know this has been successful at some lower league football clubs so maybe there is something I'm missing. One concerning detail i saw picked up on loverugbyleague was Paul Kings article here in the tribune about the share issues, with the below quote taken from it(link for full context). https://tribunemag.co.uk/2023/04/saving-salford-red-devils/ But despite all of these successes, the club still has no money. In recent years, we have lurched from cash-flow crisis to cash-flow crisis, planning from one payday to the next, even at times unsure of our continued tenure at our present home, the AJ Bell Stadium. As I write this article, my house is sunk as security on a loan that is keeping the club afloat. The truth is, behind the scenes, a team of fans and staff alike have been holding the club together, keeping things above water at inordinate personal cost—and the truth is we’ve nearly run out of road. It doesn't paint a very good picture and this/the council loan seem to be really at odds with the long term deals being signed by the higher profile players at the club.

£500 it was iirc. The fact they are saying this is for day to day running costs not some major infrastructure is worrying.

his version of "marys boy child" is a thing of true wonder

A vote at the FoH AGM, election of office bearers, directors etc... Any decision on ownership, selling shares, selling ground etc... requires a 95% super-majority.

As LeytherRob said there's only the limit (5, inc maximum 4 DR) on how many you can have in the 21-man squad. I think Bradford now have 5 loan players on their book - Fenton Rogers, Jake Bibby, Jason Qareqare, Rob Butler and Connor Wynne. That said I think a couple of those are eligible to head back to their parent clubs now after being at Bradford for 2 weeks. Even the loanees there will have to look over their shoulder, not sure how they plan to continue to fit in the Leeds DR contingent when they are available but Bradford have already dispensed with George Roby who was meant to be on season-long loan with them and has ended up with Swinton again. Looked like he wasn't going to get a look-in once they switched Lilley to 9 and I guess Roby's disciplinary record wasn't helping. It's all perfectly within the rules of course as Blues Ox says and every other Championship club has used DR/short-term loans at some stage, but Bradford have made such a big thing about their supposed change of culture and also their academy this year that I'm not surprised that some of their fans seem a bit restless about it.

There was nothing in it, and we all know Newman is made out of blancmange.

Good luck to Salford Im buying a share. I want a strong Salford, and a stronger rugby league. Fan model good step - especially coupled with council buying the stadium. I liked the comments about Leigh - all clubs need to do more…

Totally agree. Capital is usually raised to fund investment, not to pay running costs.

Hang on, they are trying to raise £250k from fan investment to be able to pay players and staff? Sounds like they are in big trouble. I have not so fond memories of clubs asking fans for bail outs. Its the start of a downward spiral. I really hope they find another way out of it.

This is my only issue with it - it surely needs to be a recurring/subscription model or else they will need to do the same again very soon.

I think they're hoping this £250k will help them be, but it'll take a lot more than that. £250k disappears very quickly in RL and with this not being a subscription model i think it would take some incredibly smart investment and a great deal of luck to turn what's likely to be a one time cash injection into sustainable long term funding.

Foundation of Hearts – New Website Heart of Midlothian the biggest fan owned club in the UK... £15m raised so far!!!!

I've been doing a bit more digging on this through the community share document they've put together and it looks like unless the initial £250k target is reached by 5th June any investments will be returned. The first £250k is also set to go on wages for playing staff/commercial staff.

Just another example of mismanagement at Broncos. They moved to a new ground, went part time and didn't invest in the squad. And now they will wonder why people aren't turning out to watch a team that just isn't competitive. If they'd properly invested in the squad and got to Superleague again then Wimbledon would have made sense but they've just thrown a load of money down the pan on expensive facilities that just aren't suitable for them.

Tyler Dupree to Hull FC. That’s one way to end the career trajectory he was on.

Unless they refuse to move and the club defaults on their contracts, and then they move for free. It's a risky game to play. Fan ownership is definitely an option for sports clubs, but in Salford's case I can't quite see how it brings the club to sustainability. It will bring in a one-off cash infusion that will keep the bills paid for another couple of years, but unless that period also sees a substantial increase in matchday revenues it won't fix the fundamental problems. It feels like both the council and the directors are saying they're no longer willing to subsidize the club indefinitely, so now it's over to the fans to make it work. Indeed, the if club did eventually get relegated, perhaps being fan owned at that point would mean a less drastic decline than seen at other clubs.

Because the club knows its deep in the doggy doo and their only option to bring in large cash amounts when the cash completely runs out is to sell off star players, hence why they've tied down several of them to long term deals. The likes of Croft, Dupree & Ackers will all be able to get decent transfer fees to keep the club afloat at least for another year.

sounds like my mates ex-wife

The model does seem to work at a couple of other places, AFC Wimbledon being the most obvious example. I'd imagine it would limit things a bit, but at least they're trying something to try and a) make the club sustainable b) make sure it is rooted in the community and the community feels it belongs to them. I'd rather that than some ego maniac 'buisness man' who could pull the plug any minute, sell your ground to property developers, load your club with unsustainable debt, use it to launder money, or the 101 other similar things that have happened to football and rugby league clubs in the past. Good luck to them, I hope it works.

Interesting video here from Graham Annesley here explaining why some tackles are penalised for hip drop and some not. https://www.nrl.com/news/2023/04/24/34the-outcome-is-important34---annesley/ Essentially, the three ingredients they are looking for is 1) player held upright, 2) tacking player twists the ball carrier and 3) the tacklers weight lands on the tackled players legs. On the first 3 he showed, which resulted in bans, I thought the first two were clear cut. The last one though, Payne Haas, I thought was unlucky. I don't think the player was held as he carried on forward and landed front first. I also don't think there was a clear twisting motion from Haas but he did land on his legs which is probably why he was punished. I thought he was unlucky though. But Graham Annesley made clear that it was the body weight on the legs that is the most serious part of the tackle and so I suspect they will be very strict on all such tackles to get it out of the game. I hope we do the same.

Less than 8,000 is a subset of less than 10,000, what he said is fine.

I can't remember every word of the conversation but he said there was no way 10,000 in today and later in the conversation said no more than 8,000, sorry i will remember to record conversations in future.

Pleaded guilty but got it downgraded

I'd be quite keen to go in on this, I've always had a soft spot for Salford and lived there for a while. However, I'm concerned by the suggestion that this is to cover running costs in a last roll of the dice rather than a considered attempt to become a wholly fan owned democratic club. I'll wait and see in the next few weeks what emerges.

Yea, by not paying bills

According to the pdfs, the money is returned. What that does to Salfords financials, who knows but Paul Kings comments about 'running out of road' don't sound particularly comforting. It was probably a bit of a red flag when Salford let Sarginson and Lannon go and said they didn't have funds for replacements.

If they are doing this to pay players and staff, you're right, they're in trouble. But reading their statement, it says part of it is to 'maintain a competitive playing squad'. Not sure they are the same things are they? That could be read a few ways I think. They surely know that a one off cash injection of £250,000 (or thereabouts) to pay wages owed now is not going to go very far? You'd hope so anyway. It's not something that can be done again without people rejecting it. Good luck to them, hope it works out and the Salford fans feel a bit of ownership of their club.

Daryl Clark and Sam Walters to Saints both reasonably loud romours currently.

Ive got my tin hat on ready for the incoming barrage !

As I said at the time we should have stayed at Trailfinders. Wimbledon was way too big for where we are at the moment and where we are likely to be for the next 5 to 10 years. Does Man of Kent have any comment to make I wonder?

I'll go with that all day, thanks for the discussion........

I do use GAAGO and have no problem with it to be honest. You get loads of games and the quality is good, for the big games you're just watching the RTE or TG4 coverage that they put onto GAAGO. For some of the smaller league games that wouldn't be on RTE, there might be just two cameras or something but for any big game game of hurling, you can't go wrong. This weekend I think there is two games from the Munster Hurling Championship and two from the Leinster. As I'm not in London anymore, finding a pub that shows the hurling (or even knows what it is!) isn't always easy so GAAGO the best money I spend TV wise to be honest. Yeah BBC only show Ulster Championship Football (their coverage is decent to be fair and tou can get it on the iPlayer) although I think I may have read somewhere they will be showing a bit more from this year.

No wonder you were disappointed!

I've not changed anything. 1 Saints Wigan final in last 8 years. That is the 'resultant grand final'. I added the Challenge Cup as a valid addition as another major trophy. I can add in the League leaders shield as well if you like? And also I have accepted I want more variety. Though your example of 8th beating 1st is a worse example of a 2 horse race than any of mine. As for the rest of the post I don't see any suggestions to change this duopoly. I understand it is not your responsibility but surely you can't pan the current system and the proposed alteration and not expect to be asked how you would fix it.

Absolutely,they are playing attractive,winning rugby,have played in 2 major finals & still can’t attract a crowd.

Latest Round of Superleague Attendances Saints/Warrington 14866 Wigan/Wakefield 12240 Hull/Huddersfield. 10859 Cas/Hull KR. 7110 Leigh/Leeds. 6686 Salford/Catalans. 3974

Just checked actually...somewhere called Rosslyn Park

I own my own company, I would never put a load of money into staff on the hope that we might win a contract. However if a contract had a strict set of guidelines that I would have to comply with (not just staffing) to get that contract I might be more inclined to invest more into the company as a whole to get it. Your analogy simply doesn’t work.

Championship crowds will drop with no automatic promotion.That means less revenue for the clubs so where will the money come from to put improvements in place.Less money for players so playing standards drop and then with nothing to play for you are down to a hard core of true supporters who would still watch the team in the Conference division.

What do you do in your employment? Were you given the opportunity to better yourself with your efforts and the performance levels you obtained, or was your job a dead end street in which no matter how hard you tried and how successful you were against your contemporaries promotion was always denied you? I bet you wouldn't stay employed in such an environment, and I would guess not one other of the closed SL shop advocates would do either, but you all consider it OK to subject others to suffer from it.

From a practical point of view (and match programmes are practical items), digital programmes are useless. Impossible to read, at the game, on a tiny phone screen - especially in brilliant spring and summer sunshine. Clubs issuing digital programmes might as well not bother.