It seems the club had not been told of the reasons for refusing the Bulls application.

BRADFORD Bulls are incredibly shocked, disappointed and perplexed by this morning's decision not to grant the club an Elite Academy Licence.
We are struggling to understand any RFL strategy that apparently prevents young Bradford players playing for Bradford.
The decision, if left to stand, is immensely damaging to the sport, the city and the welfare of 90 plus young players and staff.
The club has not received any detailed feedback at this stage, so will be reserving our position until that is received, and we have a better understanding as to why the RFL believe an extremely productive line of young talent can be laid to waste.
In the meantime, Head of Youth Leigh Beattie and his extremely talented group of coaches and players will turn out with immense pride in the red, amber and black against Hull FC tomorrow at 2pm.

I am appalled but not surprised by the decision. I take it from the Bulls statement that we were told of the overall decision but not where we were deemed to have failed.
Cas and Hull KR ( after recruiting John Bastian) are two other notable casualties giving Wakefield and Hull FC a monopoly in their areas. Yet Warrington ( in the same catchment area as Saints and Wigan) survive.
Short sighted and a kick in the teeth for the 90 youngsters and staff ( and their families) currently in our youth set up.
To me it’s also a clear sign that the powers that be want to retain the status quo in terms of funding and membership of the elite.
As Ricky Tomlinson might say
“ Fewer and better my a**e”

Time to get behind BullBuilder.

Done.

Sounds like typical RFL logic doesnt it. We don't think your spending enough on your academy so you've got two years to spend more but we're removing the central funding during that period.

wonder if the withheld funding will be shared out amongst other academies or just go into RFLs coffers.

It's actually just a sneaky way of doing it, just like the perfect 'Yes, Prime Minister' script book.

It's rather like the episode about the ring road, where the council want to build a ring road but it would mean knocking down the memorial garden in the town centre, which would cause a serious rumpus. So instead, they actually publish a plan which includes knocking down the hospital adjacent to the memorial garden. This creates such an outcry that when the solution is 'found' that they only need to knock down the garden , everyone jumps up and cheers.

If we just assume that the RFL really only wanted to save money on the academy set up, it 's a perfect fit.