Templegreen

This was on a Skolars fan group facebook page... Very worrying for their future as the comment is from the original owner who still sponsors the team. I assume he is still in contact with the club and will have sone idea what is going on behind the scenes.

Just got home to Leeds from Colwyn bay (Great to see Crusaders finally back ) and am left to ponder if maybe, just maybe that might be the last time I get to see London Skolars in league 1 Their team today had about 5 players worth mentioning: Small, Thomas & Junior in the backs, plus big shift from prop Gale & loose forward Ross who both played the full 80. The rest are nowhere near league 1 - repeated missed tackles, poor shape, lack of basic skills, bad decision choices etc… pretty much the same story as in the rest of the away games i’ve been to this year. (Can anyone comment if they putting any better performances in at home?) It’s blatantly obvious there is not enough of a talent pool in London for 2 part time teams. If Broncos stay mid table & part time, coupled with league 1 funding at such a derisory level it doesn’t even cover travel expenses,I wonder if the current London Skolars board will choose/be able (delete as appropriate) to continue to subsidise them or will they decide to cut their losses (or be forced by the RFL) & go back to amateur competition.

Cb2 - I agree with the general theme of your comments on this thread you obviously know about the club & it’s current circumstances, but, I didn’t say it was the coaches fault the squad was not good enough - i said it was the coaches fault there has been zero improvement at all over the season. Being a London exile, I only get to watch the away games, but the fans I have spoken to at the odd game they traveled up to have said they knew & understood this season would be very difficult. What frustrated them is not losing (they are used to losing), but the lack of any improvement in performance from game 1 to game 16. Surely after a whole season the coach should have had sone positive effect in performance. the squad can put in a performance at North Wales on the weekend & show they can be competitive.

I’ve seen most away games this season & there are certainly a handful of good players in the squad, but the rest are clearly not up to league 1 standard. Not convinced about coaches at all - team selection has been very erratic & at times clearly not playing the obviously much better players. While coaches can only work with the players they have got, there has been no development or improvement at all from 1st game os season to last - a decent coach would at least be able to install the basics & systems that 1/2 the team clearly can not do.

The current owners have financially kept the club alive after the cut in central funding from ~£70,000 2 years ago to ~ £15,000 for the last 2 years. Without the current owners the club would not have existed the last 2 years. In January at the pre season friendly prospective new owners publicly announced they were going to buy the club & make it the #1 London team - they then delayed at every stage of due diligence process & repeatedly made excuses for not making any payments to Skolars, finally last week saying they were not going to purchase the club. The current owners I am sure would more than welcome new owners/parties to move the club forward - the reality is for over 10 years Skolars have tried to secure additional expertise & investment only to be burnt by Argyle & then ARC.

Skolars down to bare bones (3 experienced & powerful players missing - Smalls ban, Juma ban, Gale England university tournament), but even so they looked poor today. Awful performance & currently on train back to Leeds wondering why i bothered!

Broncos taking Basset is fine & shows the progression route offers a pathway in London from amateur to Skolars to Broncos & possibly higher the way he is performing for them atm The realm issue is the current size of £400 fee for a loan - would any of Broncos fringe players make much improvement to Skolars? (Broncos fringe are mainly academy players stepping up & the current Broncos reserve team is almost exclusively current academy kids which reflects in the Broncos reserve team getting hammered every game they have played.) In contrast a couple of years ago, a friends son who was at Wigan and played a few games for Skolars on loan told me they got £100 for a loan fee.