Roger, Are you hoping Santa Clause is one of our secret RAB members (alongside Duffy, AC, RHP et etc.)

Well Whitehaven have just released there shirt.

Only for preorder so far, and the picture shows none of the sponsors

Season ticket collection day is the 10th December.
I think if that comes and goes without even a sniff of the new shirt then we can start to panic / get the pitchforks out.

I don't think I've put my pitchfork away since 2012.

As a kit supplier that's supplying a current Championship club, I can tell you that we've got the 2018 shirts on sale now.
The RFL don't currently have a sponsor for either the Championship or League 1, and are apparently in talks with one now, but waiting around for that isn't an option for us (all be it we're a smaller company that ISC etc.)
They have provided us with the new logo's for both competitions, but could add a sponsor to them at some point. I was happy to proceed with what I had.
Supplying these clubs costs money and if you lose the pre-Christmas sales, you're behind the 8 ball straight away.

Yes, it would be nice - though I'm not too fussed about whole-year deals. That said, the last "year long" deal we got from Cas didn't last too long, as I recall.

There are no definite one year loans. AFAIK all loans are one month and then are weekly after that unless another one month deal is signed. Players can be recalled after each one month period if the parent club wishes. Larroyer was on a year long loan and look how that turned out. A parent club may say that the deal is "season long" but once they hit Easter or an injury crisis we all know what will happen.

I really don't like having to rely on loan players at all since as we saw last year they often do not train fully with the core squad. If they're only getting the odd game then that's just about ok but if these lads are playing a regular part it's not good. Loan players are not going to be as committed as fully signed up players.

Are you sure? I thought season long loans were possible and even preferred in some cases because they have salary cap implications. Hull KR's loan players last year spring to mind.

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section C1:2:18 covers this. Its not strictly true that its RFL rules that say any loan can be cancelled after 28 days. What it says is that any loan an be cancelled after 28 days if EITHER both clubs and the player mutually agree to this OR a clause allowing this was put in the original loan agreement betwen the clubs. Its the latter case which is more likely and Id suspect is pretty much standard practise to put a recall clause in these days.

The minimum 28 days BEFORE recall is possible is the RFL clause that the clubs have no control over.

Cheers Mat. Thanks for clarifying. So it's up to the clubs. If a parent club decide they want to recall any of their loan players after 28 days they can. We have no comebacks.