Jump to content

Match thread: Championship Rd 24. Bradford v Featherstone Rovers. Sunday 3rd September 2023.

marklaspalmas

By marklaspalmas
in Featherstone Rovers

 Share

Recommended Posts

Tubby

Tubby

Posted
Posted
1 hour ago, POR said:

 

Bradford Bulls CEO Jason Hirst says that the club currently have their best chance of a return to Super League in 8 years 

Fair enough, I'm in with my best chance of dating Kylie Minogue in 8 years too.  Probability is relative.

  • Like 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Replies 124
  • Created
  • Last Reply

Top Posters In This Topic

Popular Days

Top Posters In This Topic

Popular Days

Popular Posts

The Phantom Horseman
The Phantom Horseman

Bradford CEO to media intern; We're announcing an extension for Eribe Doro, can you fix us a highlights reel? Intern: Sure, but there's no footage of him doing anything notable in a Bulls shirt. C

Robin Evans
Robin Evans

Not dismissing any claims made by anyone else, but the credibility of that shi thouse is down the pan. He is to journalism what Athur Harris was to town planning A vile man. A crapola journo

The Phantom Horseman
The Phantom Horseman

Might be on my own here but I thought that was a creditable effort. We were misisng Ford, Kopczak, Taylor, Briscoe, Hau, Bussey, Hardcastle, and Yei, at least 6 of whom would make our first-choic

Posted Images

The Phantom Horseman

The Phantom Horseman

Posted
Posted

It's probably true that they have their best chance in years, anything could happen in one-off play-off games, but it does highlight how daft the promotion system is now, ie teams that have lost 8-10 games or more still have a shot at promotion.

The play-off system used to exist for the benefit of the Sky cameras, but with ViaPlay covering it now and with what are clearly much-reduced subscriber numbers, that clearly doesn't apply any more. You've only to look at the match threads for the live ViaPlay games on the General Forum to see that basically nobody is watching them. I predict that when the final comes a lot of people will be asking around for how they can get a stream, because I think even a lot of hardened Championship followers baulked at the lack of value in the ViaPlay coverage this season.

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites
J Phil Loxton

J Phil Loxton

Posted
Posted
3 hours ago, POR said:

 

Bradford Bulls CEO Jason Hirst says that the club currently have their best chance of a return to Super League in 8 years 

The problem there is, that five other clubs could put out the same statement when the play offs come along. But the chances are that the best club over the season might miss out. That's Rugby League for ya.

  • Like 3
Link to comment
Share on other sites
Bullmania

Bullmania

Posted
Posted
2 hours ago, sentoffagain2 said:

  If we  play like we did at Sheffield we will win.How many Bradford players would make us a better team about 3 at the most. i have said before the players are good enough Its just putting a joined up performance together which we have only done about 4 times this season.

Interested to know which 3 you think that would be?

Link to comment
Share on other sites
The Phantom Horseman

The Phantom Horseman

Posted
Posted
46 minutes ago, Bullmania said:

Interested to know which 3 you think that would be?

Good point, like you I can't think of 3 either...

Seriously though...there's obviously a lot of ability in the Bradford squad, but a lot of players with questionable temperament or consistency issues too. You've only to look at the Bulls results to see that, but it's even more obvious when you watch them play.

But there's clearly a lot of talent there with so many ex-SL players etc, and if most of them were on a good day and playing against a team that were below their best it's perfectly feasible that they could win against a team higher in the table, as they did against Toulouse.

That's the weakness in the current play-off system in my view - there are teams that have lost 10 games in the weakest Championship for years that could sneak into SL if they just put a couple of performances together at the right time - but that's what we're stuck with until next year when IMG comes along.

  • Like 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites
roversspud

roversspud

Posted
Posted
8 minutes ago, J Phil Loxton said:

Lesley Vainikolo. Robbie Hunter-Paul and Paul Newlove.

I would have gone Jimmy Thompson, Paul Newlove and Deryck Fox.

  • Like 1
  • Haha 1

"Out of the way,son. Where's my medal?" Alex Murphy's immortal words as David Hobbs scores his 2nd try in the '83 Cup Final!

Link to comment
Share on other sites
TrueBull

TrueBull

Posted
Posted
20 hours ago, The Phantom Horseman said:

Good point, like you I can't think of 3 either...

Seriously though...there's obviously a lot of ability in the Bradford squad, but a lot of players with questionable temperament or consistency issues too. You've only to look at the Bulls results to see that, but it's even more obvious when you watch them play.

But there's clearly a lot of talent there with so many ex-SL players etc, and if most of them were on a good day and playing against a team that were below their best it's perfectly feasible that they could win against a team higher in the table, as they did against Toulouse.

That's the weakness in the current play-off system in my view - there are teams that have lost 10 games in the weakest Championship for years that could sneak into SL if they just put a couple of performances together at the right time - but that's what we're stuck with until next year when IMG comes along.

This bit is the interesting bit. I would adjust it slightly as 2 things have happened since this statement was fully accurate -

“ Seriously though...there's obviously a lot of ability in the Bradford squad, but one key player with questionable temperament or consistency issues. You've only to look at the Bulls results to see that, in the period before he was dropped and compare to the results since he was dropped. Arguably the loss of Segeyaro is equally significant as it means more reliance on Flanagan who has noticeably been caught by age/time this season. “
 

That’s more where Bradford are currently. I know people like to say Batley were distracted, but Bradford were really good that day and Batley just don’t get 40 points put on them at home that often. 
 

Im not sure what effect a Bradford win would have on you guys as I’m sure Ford will spin it as a complacency thing, the kick up the backside that was needed , will have no meaning on the playoff etc, but I think Bradford could do with this win, not just to keep a top4 spot, but also confidence that they’re on the right track. 
It’ll be a good game, competitive hopefully, small margins. 

Link to comment
Share on other sites
The Phantom Horseman

The Phantom Horseman

Posted
Posted
On 30/08/2023 at 18:07, TrueBull said:

 We’ll wrap a ribbon around a measuring wheel for Fordy on Sunday. It’s amazing Odsal still lives in his head after  his experiences there with York !

Just out of interest, has Ford actually said anything publicly about Odsal since he joined Fev? Or is is true that the only people who have actually brought it up were Gledhill and Greenwood in their interview this week?

  • Haha 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites
The Phantom Horseman

The Phantom Horseman

Posted
Posted
1 hour ago, The Phantom Horseman said:

Briscoe and Hau missing from the 21-man squad for this game, not unsurprisingly.
Looks like Bradford are dipping their toe back into DR with Liam Tindall of Leeds in their squad.

In the line-up just published on Fev's social media, Briscoe is included and not Lacans. Remains to be seen if that's correct.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
fevnut

fevnut

Posted
Posted
4 hours ago, The Phantom Horseman said:

Briscoe and Hau missing from the 21-man squad for this game, not unsurprisingly.
Looks like Bradford are dipping their toe back into DR with Liam Tindall of Leeds in their squad.

Confusing. According to Fev's official twitter page Briscoe is in the squad but Thomas Lacans isn't.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
The Phantom Horseman

The Phantom Horseman

Posted
Posted
19 hours ago, The Phantom Horseman said:

Just out of interest, has Ford actually said anything publicly about Odsal since he joined Fev? Or is is true that the only people who have actually brought it up were Gledhill and Greenwood in their interview this week?

As he hasn't answered this, I'll give the answer myself. This has sprung up not because of something Ford has said this week AFAIK, not because of something he has even said since he joined Fev, but because someone started stirring things up by putting a couple of pieces up on the "Bradford Bulls Live" Facebook page (which has over 4.5k followers and appears to be a vehicle for Gledhill from what I can tell)  including one post which simply said this:

James Ford: “The pitch at Odsal isn’t suitable, the facilities are below standard and the corners are dangerous.”

RFL/IMG: “Odsal Stadium currently meets minimum standards.”

Of course all the Bulls fans took to the bait immediately, because they understandably thought he'd said it in the build-up to this week's game whereas in fact it was in May 2022 when he was still York's coach, and it looks like Bradford have made more of an effort to cover those dangerous corner areas this year. Still, that's got the fans wound up, so job done.

 

  • Like 2
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
 Share
Go to topic listing

  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.


×
×
  • Create New...

Important Information

We have placed cookies on your device to help make this website better. You can adjust your cookie settings, otherwise we'll assume you're okay to continue.