It appears the RFL can decide what happens to the Sky money why dont they put it into an account to pay the Tax man??

Absolutely right. Why didn't they? Instead of sharing it out amongst the other clubs?

What a brilliant point! Why on earth wasn't the punishment, half your sky money to pay off creditors. Instead they all had a cracking christmas party.

I'd rather the money was re-invested in the game, which is what the clubs were obviously thinking.

Touching to see Olicana is now twinned with Utopia

Are you suggesting that all those SL chairmen, of clubs that have not gone into administration, would pocket the money themselves rather than re-invest? The next time the Bulls launch an appeal for half a million quid I'll bear that in mind & save myself a few hundred.

To re-invest is one of those strangely, inconsistently declined verbs:
I invest
You waste
He squanders
They spend on themselves, etc..

I'm sure they mostly invested in spending a bit more on their first team wage bill and, some may have invested in not having to put in more money themselves and, at least one, may have invested in making sure his house remained his own property...

If "re-invested in the game" meant support for the grassroots clubs, encouraging the youth game and building links with schools to get more people interested in and playing the game - then to me that is real investment in the future of the game, but as Bulliac points out the feeding frenzy on the money withheld from the Bulls would have gone to a few players and their agents, and to reducing bank borrowings at clubs

Tigers is wrong, but so is everybody else. Except me, of course.

I have explained it all before, but the penny seems exceedingly hard to drop.

1. There WAS no available "slush fund" - at least, not under the agreement. (The existence of which was finally admitted by RFL this week, when they pointed out that in another clause, OK had PG'd the entire distribution).

2. Under the agreement, the clubs would still have received a Brucie bonus - just not as big. It appears the Bulls were short changed simply because nobody could do the simple arithmetic, so instead of dividing the distribution in such proportions that the Bulls got half of what everyone else gets, which results in a larger sum for the Bulls, and is what was agreed, they instead took a pretend figure of what one full share was if everyone got the same share, then deducted 50% off Bradford's - and then realised this doesn't work out - you end up with an unexpected surplus namely one half share.

I know, despite to older members who went to skule and learend their summs seeming extraordinarily simple, such simple arithmetic - and working out why you obviously haven't arrived at the right answer - is too hard for many, brought up in the "everyone passes" generations. But without being rude, it is very easy.

And it indeed seems such a dolt was left in charge of the pencil and paper at RFL/SLE, so instead of recalculating and rectifying the error, or simply asking his dad, he/she left it at that and then the RFL/Clubs met to decide what to do with the bogus "surplus". And decided to keep it.

I have always been against the HMRC and creditors being shafted especially by administration dodges, but our was no dodge. Still, whilst recognising the importance of the grass roots etc or "investing in the game" as tigers naively puts it, I'm afraid that it reeks of hypocrisy.

The new owners are being berated from all sides for not agreeing to pay off HMRC and old creditors. People are slagging BBNL widely for having bought the club "cheaply" by buying clear of debts.

And people are using that to justify why half the distribution should not be received by the Bulls. The logic seems to be - you are stealing a march on other clubs, cos your club spent money it didn't have on players, and shaftedf HMRC and creditors. Therefore if you want to join the game, one way or another, you must pay".

And I recognise the validity of that argument, even if the details are more complex than msot realise, BUT

I assumed once the Bulls where purchased most of this was put to bed.

Is there still an actual on going process regards the points deduction???

I have no problem with the Bulls getting some point back, assuming some creditors are repaid as for me the whole purpose of the points deduction is as a punishment for overspending. (I know it's probably not the case) But I would prefer a system where the club gets a points deduction for going into administration and a points reimbursement for paying off maximum creditors when coming out of administration.

That way a buyer can improve their league status by paying off more debt. It also retrospectively evens things up in terms of the 'club' paying it's way.

Appeal hearing later this week (Thurs) by all accounts.

Thanks for the update

Yeah says in telegraph before millieum magic they want it sorted , some points back this week would be another huge boost after last two weeks games

Be a interesting appeal if get all 6 back I see teams moaning about it. Personally I feel lucky my team are in the top 6. If I was a Bradford supporter I be hoping for the 6, then a great chance of staying up. If get 0 points back then will be much tougher.Goodluck Bradford.