Quote: LeagueDweeb "It wasn't a fine as there is nothing in the operational rules regarding financial punishment. It was the RFL recouping the huge amount of funds it had to pay the administrator to prevent liquidation'"
Probably worth another flying visit to make an observation or two here.
1 - Please state precisely what the "huge amount of funds [the RFL] had to pay the administrator to prevent liquidation" was? Since you would clearly seem to know.
The Administration Order was granted on 26/6/12. OKB acquired the assets from the Joint Administrators on 31/8/12. Statements made at the time made it clear that the RFL was continuing to pay - to the Joint Administrators - the monthly Sky monies due to a SL club. The Joint Administrators sacked the non-playing staff, and ensured they incurred no costs beyond those that were absolutely essential. A lot of people volunteered their services for free. They continued to receive gate receipts, plus the gate receipts payment from Leeds.
So, are you asking us to believe that, over a NINE WEEK PERIOD the RFL had to pay the Joint Administrators a further c. £1.3m? To "prevent liquidation"? When, in any case, the Joint Administrators were legally charged with trying to secure a going concern sale if possible, and there were clearly parties interested in acquiring the going concern from quite early on?
And nowhere in any of the reports of the Joint Administrators do we see any reference to any such receipts? Certainly on this scale. Even if what the RFL paid over that period was NEW money, it beggars belief that it could be anything approaching £1.3m - does it not?
Unless you have more information on this allegation than you have already shared, what you say would seem to be totally absurd.
2. Even if WAS some factual basis to what you say, and if perchance the RFL WAS recouping a seven-figure sum it had had to pay to "persuade" the Joint Administrators - then the RFL would have RETAINED the money confiscated from future owners. Wouldn't it?
NOT ALLOWED ALL THE OTHER CLUBS TO APPROPRIATE IT AND SHARE IT AMONGST THEMSELVES.
And take a seven-figure hit in it's annual accounts.
Is there any part of that argument that is not irrefutable?
Is there any way that subsequent events did not totally debunk your assertion?
3 - Strange that someone chooses to come on here, just now, at this particular time, seeking to try and justify the actions taken by the RFL (acts of both commission and omission)? Acts which which, with the clear benefit of hindsight, would seem to have been instrumental in bringing about the present disastrous (and quite likely irretrievable) situation? And giving the clear impression of seeking to rewrite history to attempt to retrospectively justify some of the absurd and seemingly irresponsible actions that were taken?
4 - I also note, in passing, that a guy who will assuredly know where the bodies are buried, and whose recollection of the actual events would surely make VERY interesting reading (and clear up what the hell actually DID happen and what is still happening), has just been appointed - internally - to a new, ongoing senior role within the RFL/SL structure. So I guess that's a ship that will never dock, at least for the foreseeable future?
If a club owner puts his club into administration, then buys the assets off the administrator and carries on through a phoenix company, then the points deduction should not be six points. It should be much more. Because he has secured a big financial advantage at the expense of creditors. Indeed, I would argue any such proposal should not even be allowed to proceed.
But where totally unconnected new owners seek to make a go of it, buying the net assets off an Administrator, it is patently ABSURD to severely penalise THEM - both in competition points AND massively financially - for something they were in no way responsible for. Indeed, I can think of little that would be more likely to deter precisely the kind of prospective new owners the RFL should be seeking to attract!
Absurd. Totally absurd.
And, before anyone says "ah, well the new owners will have paid sod all for the net assets, precisely because they knew they would be so penalised", let's kill THAT nonsense off quite easily: If a RL club goes bust, it will invariably have sod all net tangible assets. SO there will not be anything to pay that much for anyway. And the value in any intagible assets like goodwill must be very limited indeed. "Ah, but they get a business free of liabilities", I hear them cry? Bollox they do. They assume very considerable employment liabilities under TUPE. As well, usually, as certain essential suppliers and providers being able to force some degree of recompense or otherwise financially hamstring the new company. In the case of both cases at Bradford, I would suggest that these liabilities will have been far higher than the value of any assets acquired.
So the new owners are effectively paying a sum of money for NET LIABILITIES. AND with severe future penalties to overcome. Can someone tell me who the hell in their right mind, acting commercially, would want to do that?
Would you?
FWIW, I am expecting that, when history comes to be written, the actions of the RFL over a protracted period (including approving OK as an appropriate new owner) will be seen to have turned an ongoing crisis (a cris, let's be clear, caused entirely by incompetant and irresponsible club managements and ownerships not the RFL) into a total unmitigated disaster.
