Financial Crisis At The Bulls

[100% Warrior]

I feel sorry to see the Bulls in this situation after all they are the club who embraced Super League at it's inception and showed other clubs the path to go down with regards to the match day package.

But it's a dog eat dog world and it'd be good to see Tom Burgess in cherry and white. :sly:

[josie andrews]

Merged - already a thread alluding to this news.

[kitt green warriors]

How can they expect people to give money to a club with a board of directors that have got them into this mess if the same board are going to remain in charge.
I was on the official Bradford website before and what they are saying at the bottom made me laugh, in not so many words they are saying
"If you give us £100 it will still be cheaper than a season ticket at other clubs",
all I say to the directors is get selling the big issue at least tramps aren't begging!.
This board of directors must think that folk are either thick or blind this situation has not arisen over night and quite frankly they have a nerve to even ask!.
The directors have created this so they have to go and if they don't then Bradford will never change as this money would get eaten up and then they would be back to this stage again at some point.
To me the board are not fit to be running a club.

[DaveO]

Well my view is this has all come to a head because they sold the ground to the RFL.

I think they did that to stop creditors getting at it if they went bust but once they sold it they had no security for any outstanding loans and I think this is what has got their bank (that tremendously well run institution the Royal Bank of Scotland) worried enough to call time on any debt.

As the tax man is another creditor I also reckon the Bulls maybe a club being faced with bills for non-payment of tax/NI as far as image rights and offshore employee trusts go. Pure speculation on my part but the BBC reports do mention HMRC as creditors.

I think it is quite likely several things money-wise have conspired against the Bulls (such as having to pay Leeds compensation over signing Harris) and it is very hard to say how responsible the current board are for any of it.

Despite having every sympathy with their fans given Wigan's past financial crisis I won't be donating though. Sports clubs are not charities and its charities such as the National Autistic Society or the NSPCC where my donations go.

[cpwigan]

Financial woes are nothing new with Bradford. Bradford Northern (1964) was formed after the club went belly up.

The greatest asset the Bulls have / their only one I guess after selling Odsal are the players. They have some excellent young ones. Wire are sniffing around for the outstanding Bateman, we should be too!!

[wiganwarriordave]

It's sad news. I, like others though, can't see this plea for cash working anything more than very short term. When they started flogging season tickets at dirt cheap prices pre season, as well as offloading the ground to the RFL, it was evident something was afoot. Looking back, both of those move were incredible shortsighted. As someone previous pointed out. They have regular decent crowds, but no one is paying a thing!

They need a wealthy owner, a return to full price season and match day tickets. A youth supply chain not a purchased squad and regular full stadiums. As well as a generous helping of televised games and some damn good away followings to bring in the cash........ It all sounds a little impossible.

[josie andrews]

Widnes chairman Steve O'Connor donates £10k to Bradford

Widnes chairman Steve O'Connor has pledged £10,000 to boost the survival hopes of Super League rivals Bradford.

A total of £155,000 has so far been pledged to the Bulls, who say they need £500,000 by 6 April to pay a tax bill and avoid the threat of administration.

"Steve rang to offer his support and wanted to pledge a sum of £10,000," said Bulls chairman Peter Hood.

"He spoke eloquently at length about the rugby league community and how we are all in this together."

Hood added: "Steve talked of the outstanding contribution that the Bradford Bulls have made to the game and he wants that to continue.

"His heartfelt and extremely generous contribution epitomises the response we have had from [people] throughout the game."

More than £100,000 was pledged to Bradford inside the first 48 hours after their financial plight came to light, with the club targeting a figure of £1m by the end of April to guarantee their survival.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/rugby-league/17548208

[markill]

Re the salary cap - they used to have a gradutaed cap where clubs could spend up to the maximum of the cap limit but not exceed a certain percentage of their own turnover - nowadays I think everyone is allowed to spend up to top limit regardless of turnover, so its their choice to take the losses.

Re sugardaddies running the clubs - this is needed because there isn't great amounts of profit sharing aims put in place by the league. If greater sharing was in place the league itself would be in control of the business side of things more, like the NFL, which is more financially stable than almost all over sports leagues. Of course, if our RFL was more involved with the business aims of each club i doubt that would be a good thing, i mean they threw a certain change of sponsorship revenues down the toilet, bet Bradford love getting a share of being on a Stobart lorry better than a share of betfair money.

Re Bradford - its hard to see how they can escape without this charity they are asking for. I mean, they don't own the ground and most people who go are on cheap season tickets so match day revenues must be really low. Away followings in Super League don't seem to be that great these days either. Add to that, Bradford aren't a winning team anymore. It's worth noting that in the first 6-7 years of SL Bradford were the best supported team, both in terms of home and away attendances, really up until they moved to Valley Parade for a couple of years in 2003ish. Crowds dropped then, picked up in fist year back at Odsal but have been in decline since despite cheap tickets. Maybe the fans were a good time bunch (not like us who turned out in greater number to watch us not make the playoffs) and maybe becuase less people go regularly home and away, and less people have spare money to spend you have to assume merchandise sales will be down on 10 years ago too. Add to that the bank isn't backing them up anymore. Doesn't look at all good.

So lets go get Bateman from them, and maybe take a prop to replace Fielden and cancel his contratc early seeing as he doesn't look like playing again.