I see the phony wars have begun already.

As far as Damian Irvine is involved, I have nothing against him, but he is one of the names that was oft bandied about during our troubles - he didn't come through then and so there's no reason to do so now.

In fact, any fellow males from that time can do one.

Irvine has been assisting up at the club on the commercial side for some time now apparently.

Surely a club owner owning the lease of the ground of another club is a conflict of interest?

Don't think anyone could argue otherwise. The only option is to sell it back to the Bulls, at the price they brought it for.We shouldn't get it at a cut price, and the other club chairman certainly shouldn't get it, as you say it's a conflict of interest. Hudgell in particular isn't exactly fond of us.

I don't buy the part that they see it as an investment, the lease isn't worth much if you don't have the Bulls playing there. The council own the part the money is in, which is the land. What would happen if Hudgell & Carter own it and the Bulls won promotion replacing Hull KR or Wakey (which isn't exactly an impossibility) Do they whack the price up forcing us out of our home to weaken us?

If the RFL want rid of it, tough, they shouldn't have brought it in the first place (it was a disgrace they did) They're not losing money on it as we pay for all the maintenance etc.

Well, you cant be an "influential person" at two clubs. (RFL operational rules C3.1.2 and associated declaration) and I'd argue having control of the lease you would be able to "exercise direct or indirect control over the affair of the club" So another club owner/chairman/CEO shouldn't be allowed to have the lease in my view.

It would be typical rugby league though, we're already in a situation where there is a conflict of interest with the governing body owning the lease, what's pretty much the only scenario that's a worse conflict of interest? another club (that will in the medium to long term, hopefully, be a direct rival) owning it....so yeah, I fully expect this to happen.

At least you'll get some interesting threads and comments to mod

Interesting that the money they want to withhold would cover the bill nicely

Found it quite amusing that the club kept insisting he didn't work there, then Look North (or Calendar, I forget which) cut to Odsal while they were showing one of the England games and stated "Damien Irvine of the Bradford Bulls is here with us". He didn't correct them.

Some interesting replies to this intriguing thread.

If the head lease for Odsal is up for grabs (and again that has to be a suspect 'IF') let's hope this time that if a transaction is brewing then the RFL, and also the Council Executive (acting independently of the RFL), will look in rigorous detail in to the true background of all those who may apply for our head lease from both the UK AND abroad, and in particular examine all of their many recent business failures that may leave creditors (inc Bulls fans) many tens, and hundreds of thousands, of pounds out of pocket.

The Bulls supporters do not wish to see (or deserve) a person to own the head lease for our iconic stadium at Odsal (whether directly or indirectly) who has, for example, had at least two business failures (and been involved in another recent failure) in the past 12-18 months. Such a person (and their cohorts) would not be good for the Bulls, would not be good for Bradford, would not be good for Rugby League and should most certainly not be allowed to pass any fair and objective fit and person test carried out by Bradford Council, who are of course the final arbiter of any such lease re-assignment decision.

With regard to the RFL's governance 'duties' let us not forget the RFL's dreadful and well documented recent (and arguably ongoing) record in respect of the Bulls ownership, a fact which must surely raise questions as to whether or not the RFL hierarchy (both past and present) are themselves fit for purpose. In the real world any top company executives with such a bad track record would surely have been dismissed by now as being totally incompetent.

HC, Irvine's probably contracting. Will work for himself so correct in saying he's not working for the bulls and probably couldn't be 4rsed correcting someone during a short TV interview?

Keeps the reported headcount down but gets a role filled...

Technically, ANY club that is a member of the RFL should have full access to utilise Odsal Stadium seeing the governing body hold the lease contract. We don't want the RFL showing any bias do we.

Sums it up nicely.

As a Wakey fan, I see this merely as MC and the other SL Charimen seeking to ensure that something they (the RFL) paid the old regime GBP 1.33m for is not sold back to the new Bulls regime at a cut price GBP 750k (which is what in their accounts the RFL are now saying it is worth)as it is worth more than that

That seems fair enough to me.