There was seemingly an announcement on the club site last week...which then mysteriously disappeared.

If it is a done deal then why keep it a secret? Maybe the Walker thing isn't over yet after all

from the rlBBCrl


"He claimed to have signed a contract with the Bulls before they completed their quota with the signing of Manly scrum-half Matt Orford and sought the help of the Professional Players' Association in a bid to resolve the dispute.

Bradford insist that no contract was lodged with the RFL and team manager Stuart Duffy confirmed today that no settlement had been made with the player. "

Jean-Phillipe Baille will surely start in the centres after last year?

Certainly they have an embarrassment of riches in the three-quarters compared to us.

So the club could indeed have signed a contract, and then declined to lodge it with the RFL?

And so a settlement could have been made with another party or entity? Like a personal services company or Catalans?

Or neither of the above?

Suspect we will never be any the wiser, and there is no mileage in trying to decrypt the semantics - if indeed there is anything to decrypt. Main thing is that compensation is to cover what you have lost, and the injured party has a duty to mitigate his loss. So unless his deal with Cats is substantially worse than the Bradford deal (no-one has denied there WAS a deal?) then the club should not have been much exposed anyway?

Just glad it looks like its all over, and the assorted fekkwittery and trolldom who assured us that we were stuffed and would not be able to sign Orford will surely be queuing up to admit they were talking bollox?

I want to hear if we made this situation or not. It's not enough for me to know we got away with it on this occasion. If we're making the kind of mistake that Walker's people suggested then it could end up costing us more than we have the capacity to pay.
If we did nothing wrong then why be coy about it?
I don't actually think we did anything wrong but that's all by guesswork. I want to know and I think we should be told.

Yeah, cos that'll happen

There is a further possibility of course...that no settlement has indeed been made...yet.

or not.

Must agree I would feel happier knowing the truth of all this. But I increasingly doubt any mistake was ever made...if we DID sign a contract with, Walker I am assuming that it was a conscious decision to then go for Orford instead and in the full knowledge of (any) consequences. Basically as Walker and Orr said, even. And if we did not sign a contract (and I note the wording of the quote attributed to Stuart with interest in that regard) then it was Walker and Orr who screwed up. As indeed it will have been anyway if Bulls did not register any signed contract pretty well immediately and they never pursued it. But that is just supposition on my part.

Please take a look at the Section 2.1 in the AUP. Ta. BP

Can't think what I have done to justify your attitude, but no accounting for folk I guess. If it makes you happy.

Aww, turn that frown upside down Mr Rainyface

But if a contract was signed, it had to be submitted within 48 hours. After that, we either wouldn't have been able to submit it, or else we would have faced some sort of penalty. As Orford came up months later (according to Walker's alleged signing date), his availability must be disregarded entirely from the matter.

That's to satisfy the RLF Operating Rules and, I would guess, they'd expect any contract to be signed by both parties. (And as the RFL looked in to the case we can guess that it wasn't)

As to whether a contract had in actual fact been made between the Bulls and Walker (you don't need to have signed something to have made a contract)... that would be up to a court.

it was suggested to me by a fax fan today, that if walker is convinced he had a valid contract with us then that would mean we're due a transfer fee from catalans.