TrueBull

The first & easiest thing to do would be looking at single use plastic water bottles - in all team sports, rather than just RL

Training ground at Tong, on a long lease from the council. Club shop & offices about to be announced in Wibsey. (Contract been signed) Foundation and community rugby (and sports chaplaincy) still based at Odsal . The council have defined the area of the lease for the Rfl and it doesn’t include the offices or office car park. The reserves and academy will play at Dudley Hill and train at Tong. A 3rd physio is advertised to cover the expansion of the academy

Big Nige is no longer at the RFL to explain why he didn't want to sell the Odsal head lease to Thorne, which then forced Thorne to walk away, stating that he has never tried to deal with such a bunch of incompetents in his life & he thought the RFU were bad.... The RFL, worse at business and running their sport than the RFU. Not a great tag line really.

I'm not sure Bulls have employed him directly. Not recently anyway. Match commentating is through Pulse radio - this year anyway. Pulse is one of the radio group just been taken over by Haymarket publishing who are deciding whether to continue commentary of rugby league, which affects several clubs with local radio stations I think. The live games he commentated on last year, I think he was employed by the company that set up the live streaming, I forget the name.

I think he's commentated on the OurLeague app for a Bulls game - would that count as RFL work? I can't recollect anything recently specifically for the RFL that's not related to commentating. Other than some interviews from RFL employees for his podcast which wouldn't count.

Hopefully that’s a rhetorical question rather than a daft one. Because obviously the three options are yes, someone is absorbing the cost or the club is in administration. And they’re not in administration. Be careful not to believe everything the Rfl says on this matter. The conflict of interest interferes with their objectivity

That of course is one scenario. The other scenario is that Bulls asked the Rfl to pay Halifax through central funding, as is common. But they asked the Rfl too late for them to change the payments that month, so the Rfl rolled it over to the next month. Halifax, noticed this and queried it. The Rfl gave Halifax the perception that the Bulls were struggling and the Rfl were all over it. Halifax then packaged that perception up as gospel (because why would they expect the Rfl to be economical with the truth lol) and handed it on. In summary, Bulls followed the letter of the guidelines, but not the spirit. The Rfl, well I don’t know if they’re trying to punish Chalmers because he’s had the temerity to call their bluff and leave them with a white elephant, or force the Bulls into administration again, or what. He’s not on their Xmas card list anyway.... Bulls have few debts, ST money is still coming in (despite the efforts of that unprofessional statement from Rfl) and crucially no debt to HMRC who usually trigger winding up orders at the drop of a hat. There aren’t really any applicable levers for the Rfl to pull to apply pressure any more, except special measures. And that is being questioned by several championship chairmen as Chalmers has kept them in the loop re what the Rfl want & what has been provided. Any other club it would have been withdrawn last week. Anyway, time for some rugby to hopefully break out tomorrow

The first part, hindsight would say that spin on events was wrong. The second part is rumour. Now who has a vested interest in damaging the Bulls by spreading rumour again?

And what squad definition the gossip columnist is using. Bradford has approx. 105 players registered this season - covering 1st team, reserves, 19's (3 academy years), scholars (2 scholarship years) and the women's team. If he's saying we've the second highest wage bill (total), then that's possible but unlikely. If he's saying we've the 2nd highest wages for a 1st team squad of 25 then that will be rubbish. Likely 4th I would think.

Although in the real world, the Rfl were desperate to convert their unsecured loan which they had significant exposure with into either an asset(lease) or another secured option as a short term (###### covering) measure. The longer term destructive (for both parties) conflict of interest was deemed to be of lesser importance. The spin about “protection” was gobbled up by the fan base. With hindsight, it was the culmination of a series of stupid decisions

Lol - Bulls specifically, or Rugby League in general.....

This bit has a bit of background. Towards the end of 2011 season, Bradford (like many clubs) had a cashflow problem and went to the RFL for a loan (again, like many clubs) to cover things until ST money & xmas sales came in. The difference this time was the size of the loan - high 6 figures, so both the RFL and Bulls kept it a secret loan. I have no idea how this unsecured loan was arranged. I'm frightened to think it may have gone along the lines of: Hood - we need a £900k loan to put my plan into action to turn around the club. RFL - is it a cunning plan? Hood - of course RFL - that's fine then, here you go, it'll have to be secret as the other 41 clubs might be a bit upset. Hood - no problem, unsecured, of course. Forward 6 months.... Panicked RFL - our backsides are on the line here, words beginning to leak about the loan. We're exposed to the tune of £900k. Maybe if we offer to buy the lease to Odsal,we basically convert our unsecured loan to a secure one. We can spin the Bulls as the bad guys, we save Odsal from development, we look good, It'll give us options in the future. Reasonable RFL - There'll be a massive conflict of interest in the future and ethically, it could be seen as taking advantage of a financially distressed member club? Panicked RFL - were you not listening? Our backsides are on the line here, we need to do what we can to dig ourselves out of this hole (sic), the future can takecare of itself and ethics be damned. And early 2012, the RFL take the Odsal head lease for £1.5m and everything starts to go wrong.

That’s the annoying thing. There’s value in the Odsal site - both sides of the road. Needs a chunk of cash to unlock it. The council are the only ones who could access that money, and as a taxpayer I wouldn’t be annoyed if the council stumped up £3m now and got a multiuse community sports stadium and £4m back in 5yrs time whilst the developer pocketed £8m

Last couple of seasons the reserve & academy games have been played at Dudley Hill in the pre summer time part of the season

Yep, he went short, curled round the marker and twisted over the line.