Derwent

Has to be a better deal than last time or it’s not worth it. The Co-op sponsored it but as part of the deal clubs had to give 1,000 free tickets away each game. Which would be fine if it was to 1,000 new or lapsed fans but all that happened was that existing fans who would normally have paid ended up with the freebies. A lot of clubs lost money on the games getting hardly any gate income. Some clubs tried things to make it work, e.g. I recall Oldham letting everyone in for £1 at one of the TV games and got 4,000 there which sounds great but financially it’s the equivalent of 300 full paying spectators, and of course very few of those people came back and paid full price.

Betfred League 1 Player of the Year Jamie Dallimore (Barrow Raiders), Jamie Doran (Workington Town), Rob Massam (North Wales Crusaders), Tee Ritson (Barrow Raiders) Betfred League 1 Coach of the Year Anthony Murray (North Wales Crusaders), Richard Squires (Coventry Bears), Chris Thorman (Workington Town) Betfred League 1 Young Player of the Year Charlie Graham (Keighley Cougars), Brad Holroyd (Workington Town), Phoenix Laulu-Togaga’e (Keighley Cougars)

Hurry Up Harry - Sham 69 So good to have equalized

Surely for a game in France it is the responsibility of the FFR to arrange TV coverage and shouldn't be reliant on UK based broadcasters ?

Despite the fact we have beaten Keighley home and away this season ? The last few weeks Town have been playing without any props due to injuries. This has had a big impact on performances as we were not the biggest of teams to start with. If the 3 front rowers are back that Chris is optimistic about then I expect our performance to improve massively on recent weeks. For example, in the second half against Hunslet we had a threequarter playing prop, the other prop was a second row and the hooker was Gabe Fell who is a full back. No wonder we have been getting outmuscled. But if the regular front rowers are back then its a different ball game.

If we have the personnel back that Chris Thorman is hopeful of (5 or 6 who have been out injured) then we should be much more competitive than we have been lately. Won’t be easy but I’ll go for Town to win narrowly by 6-10 points.

Signed for Fax hasn’t he ?

It’s a bit of an uneven contest in the sense that you’ve got one team who have played just 14 matches and one who have played 28 this season.

As a Town fan it pains me to say this but Whitehaven are surely team of the year if they make the playoffs when most would have had them favourites for relegation at the start of the season.

You’ll not be buying tickets for the gigs then ?

Rick Astley sings This Charming Man as a precursor to his Smiths tribute shows with Blossoms as his backing band….

Isn't that the case if they stay semi-pro on the proposed funding ? Players will be expected to do the same travelling for little more than beer money. If the funding is £20k and income from other means is similar then how do they pay a squad of 24/25 players plus coaching staff etc as well as meet all other costs of staging games such as insurance, stadium costs etc ? The players will be on absolute peanuts and a lot of them will just pack in.

No and I’m not saying it’s what Coventry should do. I was merely pointing out that the travelling issue isn’t really an argument against it. There are other perfectly valid reasons against it but that isn’t one of them.

Not really. A team that isn’t good enough is still a team that isn’t good enough. There may be varying degrees but the overall outcome would be the same.

I’m not saying they should do it but the above isn’t really a valid reason for not doing it. The Cumbrian clubs in the NCL do that sort of travelling routinely and seem to manage ok.