Danny Ward leaves London

[ATLANTISMAN]

4 hours ago, Harry Stottle said:

Inevitable BB, he has been far more than generous for a long time now, he has kept investing when those apart from a very few diehards "darn sarf" couldn't give a flying one if a RL club didn't exist in their locality, perhaps had there been some interest in the club by the locals they could be thriving now, if Mr Hughes does throw the towel in what then?

Harry

My personal opinion is DH has been incredible with the amount of money he has invested in the Broncos.

Its time to take the bull by the horn

 

P 

[voteronniegibbs]

1 hour ago, THE RED ROOSTER said:

  We are back in the 2013 scenario, with a World Cup supposedly taking place how will the London based media react if the only professional club south of Wakefield folds at the same time that the World Cup is about to start?

 In a city of 9 million I expect a club watched by hundreds will get barely a mention. 

[paul hicks]

 it seems to be strongly suggested around leeds that he will be at Leeds next season  as an assistant coach under agar for 1 season then agar will step up to full time director of rugby operation's leaving ward and long to work in a joint coaching capacity similar to ward and Langley at London.

looks like a repeat of the successful McDermott from London to Leeds  signing also engineered by Hetherington  some years ago. ward enjoys working with younger players and with the crop at leeds with many more to come that are staring in the 16s and 17s this season I'm sure he will be happy

[Les Tonks Sidestep]

3 hours ago, THE RED ROOSTER said:

Are you suggesting the ownership and management of the club are not daft enough to do just that.. What evidence do you have that a contract has not been signed

Contrary to the Club's statement, Danny Ward's ex-teammate Barrie McDermott just stated at the Warrington - Leeds game that Danny Ward was sacked though Baz is not the most reliable source.

Appointing Tom Tsang as the interim head coach is not just underwhelming but perhaps a sign of winding down.  We are back in the 2013 scenario, with a World Cup supposedly taking place how will the London based media react if the only professional club south of Wakefield folds at the same time that the World Cup is about to start?

Ignoring Championship and L1 clubs Huddersfield, Leigh, St Helens, Salford, Warrington and Wigan all have grounds that are further south than Belle Vue.... 

[nadera78]

This should be a sad day for me, because I really like Danny Ward and the Broncos have been a big part of my life for almost 28 years now. Unfortunately, it's been met with a bit of a shrug. It's been coming for a long time. Good luck to Danny and his family, they've all contributed to the club and the game in London. 

What is there new to say about the club itself? Not a lot, to be honest. Hughes has put an astronomical sum of money into the Broncos, but at the same time is almost entirely to blame for the club's fanbase collapsing from a 4,000 average when he took over to less than 10% of that now. If and when he does walk away - which looks more likely than ever - then that's probably it for the club. No-one else is coming in to take it over.

And even then Hughes is once again to blame. The Supporters Trust was set up to help out with small things in the present, and to raise a few quid for the academy, but with one eye on the future and potential days like this one. Contingency planning, I guess you could call it. Unfortunately, the club has done everything it can to strangle the Trust - from ignoring it entirely through to actively sabotaging it with its new "Official" supporters club. If it had been allowed (god-forbid even encouraged) to grow then perhaps it might now be in a position to take over, or at least do so alongside some other investors, but I doubt the Trust is in any kind of shape to take on that commitment.

[EssexRL]

10 hours ago, Bedfordshire Bronco said:

Yep. Are you doing any mid season ticket deals at moment? You don't seem to have a 2021 replica shirt for sale on website? 

We always did a half price deal for LB ST fans.

 You should come along for the Friday Night Lights game in a couple of weeks.

Re shirt I think they’ve had some distribution issues. 

[Archie Gordon]

8 hours ago, ATLANTISMAN said:

My personal opinion is DH has been incredible with the amount of money he has invested in the Broncos.

But he's done it for himself, not you and me. He's never been interested in building the club, just *his* team. I guess we are lucky that he's allowed us to watch his team. But I am no longer grateful.

He's refused a lot of offers of help - the LBSA being the one that seems most bizarre. At the same time, he has managed to make the club completely unattractive to any investor, hiring a succession of failures to a skeleton back office operation who have shown either little interest or, worse, have been actively useless. 

His legacy will be to hand over a vastly diminished London Broncos brand - and not much else. The idea that he's "invested" money in the club is just wrong. He's actually disinvested quite massively in the Broncos - they are worth vastly less now than when he took over.

 

[The Phantom Horseman]

31 minutes ago, ShropshireBull said:

Looks like the end for Broncos.  Yes David Hughes put money in  (some saying 30 mil over 20 years) but to do that and not have a stable home or a single asset to the clubs name is horrific mismanagement. He could have built 5 clubs state of the art stadiums for that.  

 

As a point of reference:
Brentford's recently-built 17k capacity stadium cost over £70m.
York City/Knights' 8.5k capacity new stadium cost £44.2m.

 

 

[Les Tonks Sidestep]

3 minutes ago, The Phantom Horseman said:

As a point of reference:
Brentford's recently-built 17k capacity stadium cost over £70m.
York City/Knights' 8.5k capacity new stadium cost £44.2m.

 

 

I think he means 5 Odsals, but 'state of the art' might be stretching it a bit

[westlondonfan]

It is still possible that someone from the Southern Hemisphere might come in a buy the club but  I would of thought but signing up for 10 more years at trailfinders seems to make more sense to me than moving to somewhere like Wimbledon unless a huge amount can be invested which is extremely unlikely.

[Chronicler of Chiswick]

14 hours ago, gingerjon said:

Asset wise?

The name, IP on the branding and whatever training kit they own.

That's what Roy Close got when he bought the original Fulham club from the receiver, plus the goalposts. He paid £25k and thought he was also getting the player registrations which wasn't the case. 

[The Frying Scotsman]

1 hour ago, westlondonfan said:

It is still possible that someone from the Southern Hemisphere might come in a buy the club but  I would of thought but signing up for 10 more years at trailfinders seems to make more sense to me than moving to somewhere like Wimbledon unless a huge amount can be invested which is extremely unlikely.

Yep, still a possibility. There, or the Northern Hemisphere.  I reckon a potential buyer will be from one of the two.

[newbe]

Shame Barry Mac could not go back and step in to help to the end of the season. 

[The Frying Scotsman]

13 minutes ago, newbe said:

Shame Barry Mac could not go back and step in to help to the end of the season. 

the Sky commentator??  What would he do??

[EastLondonMike]

Where's Eric Perez?..

[The Frying Scotsman]

13 hours ago, Bedfordshire Bronco said:

Yep lots of great young players may be moving north next year. At least they might be able to buy a house even if its cold 

Back in the real world, the vast majority will not relocate to the other end of the country, but will simply switch to union, and the pathway will be lost.

[gingerjon]

39 minutes ago, EastLondonMike said:

Where's Eric Perez?..

What we need is someone to go on the Chasing Kangaroos podcast to explain that, yes, they do have the money in place for a new London league with teams in each of the 33 boroughs all feeding into a London Broncos super team that is going to play out of Wembley.

And here's a link where you can buy all the shirts.

[Bedfordshire Bronco]

4 hours ago, EssexRL said:

We always did a half price deal for LB ST fans.

 You should come along for the Friday Night Lights game in a couple of weeks.

Re shirt I think they’ve had some distribution issues. 

I've been to most of the Friday night lights evenings. Always good

[Bedfordshire Bronco]

2 hours ago, Chronicler of Chiswick said:

That's what Roy Close got when he bought the original Fulham club from the receiver, plus the goalposts. He paid £25k and thought he was also getting the player registrations which wasn't the case. 

I think the 'franchise' of having a Championship place is worth something to someone in terms of developing a new team

[The Phantom Horseman]

1 hour ago, ShropshireBull said:

As a point of reference, David hughes took over before 2000 so let´s factor that into the cost of land then and now. Plus York City knights stadium did not cost 44.2 but the entire complex. After 30 million the fact there is not even part ownership over somewhere in London should be considered a failure. 

So he's put in about £1.5 million a year, presumably mostly on putting out a squad to try and survive/get into SL. The Broncos' recruitment in recent years suggests that he doesn't have limitless resources to spend on RL, and I don't think it's as simple as suggesting that almost all the money he has splurged on his hobby over the last 20 years should have gone into building a stadium straight away, even if he had the necessary huge amount to outlay in one chunk from the beginning.

[EastLondonMike]

58 minutes ago, gingerjon said:

What we need is someone to go on the Chasing Kangaroos podcast to explain that, yes, they do have the money in place for a new London league with teams in each of the 33 boroughs all feeding into a London Broncos super team that is going to play out of Wembley.

And here's a link where you can buy all the shirts.

All joking aside it wasn't that long ago that we did have a high number of community teams in London, and plenty with Junior dev. going on too.

We only scratched the surface back then, and look at the amount of players that came through and have gone on to enjoy pro careers. Just imagine what might have been with continued and increased investment.

[westlondonfan]

2 hours ago, The Frying Scotsman said:

Yep, still a possibility. There, or the Northern Hemisphere.  I reckon a potential buyer will be from one of the two.

I can’t see another Richard Branson or David Hughes coming along now. I think I could see a big business from Australia and New Zealand wit\h an office in London getting  involved though possibly at something the future?

[gingerjon]

5 minutes ago, EastLondonMike said:

All joking aside it wasn't that long ago that we did have a high number of community teams in London, and plenty with Junior dev. going on too.

We only scratched the surface back then, and look at the amount of players that came through and have gone on to enjoy pro careers. Just imagine what might have been with continued and increased investment.

Don't. It makes me wince just how much the Broncos as a club and rugby league as a sport has retreated in the past decade and a half.

[Archie Gordon]

Community RL - senior and junior - across London & SE and the East isn't in decline, certainly if you are looking over the past 5 years. The numbers and quality coming through right now are pretty impressive. Getting volunteers onboard is a bigger problem than playing numbers.

[The Phantom Horseman]

9 minutes ago, ShropshireBull said:

Infrastructure first. Always. I don´t know why anyone would do anything else. And not all the money but by working with a council or another partner they could be a part owner a perm facility and in an immeasurably better position than now. 

Even Richard Branson and Virgin couldn't/wouldn't afford to take that step in London when they were the majority shareholders.