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.

Are you saying that the rfl have been disingenuous with their valuation of the odsal lease?
You might want to be careful how you phrase your opinions.

It's clear to me that if Rimmer had been in charge rather than Wood the RFL would never have done that deal on Odsal. Now he's in charge he seems to want to get it off the RFL's hands.

Many of the SL chairman can't stand Chalmers it seems so they don't want the lease sold to him. Not that I think he could afford it TBH, even at a knock down price.

RFL rules prevent other club owners having a piece of it anyway.

I don't expect this to be sorted quickly nor do I expect the value of the lease to ever get back to £1.3m.

The man's obsessed with us. Have Wankfield got a ground to play at next season yet?

Can we still walk away in 2019? If that's the case we should just walk.