Lovely guy..
Not a head coach of the Bradford bulls.
Shows that Mr Wood is as useless as expected.
Aims for mediocrity at best and will eventually put us the way of the Bluesox.
I've not seen the club in such a poor state in all the time I've watched them.
The only way we get a reprieve from the inevitable is if someone steps forward to buy Wood & Co out.
And I think the queue to do that would be as long as the high calibre overseas candidates that applied for the job.
(And why lie about the applications?)

This is all a little dispiriting when thinking back to the bunker mentality of the “Administration III” thread.

Dunning has refreshed The Bulls since JK “left”. Results have picked up. There have been losses to Fev & Leigh (free hits as Gledhill puts them) that any Bulls fan would have expected at the start of the season taking a look at the squads being assembled by those two outfits. Discount those and MD’s record is:

Played 6 (3H + 3A)
Won 5
Lost 1
For 185
Agin 84
Diff +101
Points 10

That, projected onto the season so far, would see you sitting in a play-off spot.

For all Nigel Woods’ (many in Bongser’s opinion) shortcomings, he surely still has more contacts within the RFL than do most and therefore knows what’s in the wind when Dunning’s contracted tenure is up.

Saw Jordan Lilley’s post match interview with Gladys; the former seemed to indicate that the team as a whole just wished to know which way the board was going to jump.

The players now know and can back their coach 100%.

It is pleasing that current and past Bulls players that he has coached are backing him on social media

What makes you laugh is all the guff about interviews.

Good luck Mark. In the post Leigh match interview he said it was going to take someone to come in with a lot of money to get the club back to SL. It's the most honest thing anyone has said at Odsal in 10 years.
My guess is Noble has volunteered for free, or he wouldn't be here either. It's hard to see any light.

There is nothing to suggest that there weren't interviews and nothing to suggest who was interviewed.

Maybe the interviews went to the tune of:

"Were you to be appointed Bradford Bulls coach (as we hope), your player budget would be X and your salary would be Y"

"What! Y the X did you get me over here? I'm going to get some Zs on the flight back!"

They claimed to have interviewed high quality coaches from around the globe. You’d expect to avoid wasting everyone’s time that there would be in initial enquiry about salary expectations before an interview. Any semi competent business does this - either an expected salary requested with application or an initial conversation prior to an interview.

Technically, and I use that word carefully, if you interviewed more than one Aussie coach, you could then say accurately you’ve interviewed “high quality coaches from around the globe”. Those Aussie coaches could already have been in the uk however.

Regardless of location, they’ve apparently interviewed multiple high quality coaches but gone for a candidate without a proven track record.

Accepting that I might be on my own but I see this is a largely a positive appointment that also demonstrates a pathway for other coaches.. Since taking the interim role there have IMHO been noticeable signs of improvement particularly regarding a more entertaining style of play. Yes Sunday was a battering but blimey look at Leigh's team sheet, was that result really a coaching issue?

Secondly personally I did not know much about Matt Peet until this season. Not a "big" name/big statement appointment as such has already won the CC

Brian Noble as a consultant, yes hands up unless Mr. Dunning requested such an appointment that is somewhat baffling.

Finally, has it all taken too long to announce? Yes, no doubt.

Any one from minute one knew what was coming. If the club think this is going to re-ignite interest from the fans who have drifted away is nonsense. This is a stranger appointment than the Cummings one. I wonder if at the forum the club will come out and give its reasoning for the appointment.

I get the impression,based on the reactions across social media and from on here that the fans forum could get a bit lively!

I doubt because the club will carefully manage whats asked.

The problem is, you can see it at Odsal and even on this board, the vast majority have stopped caring.

The crowds are continuing to fall. It would be interesting to know what the clubs budget is based on next year - is it based on 1k crowds? If not, we’re heading for trouble again.

The club has made its decision, but they must know that this appointment won’t inspire people to renew (and certainly won’t help bring back lost supporters).

Results now are the main thing that will bring back lost supporters. Shall we give it 10 games….?

Matthew Shaw saying on Twitter that we're on a "bottom half" of the championship budget next year.

If that is the case professional rugby in Bradford is dead and I think it proves we are being kept on life support simply to keep Odsal in use.

Isn't he the Halifax loving clown that gets aroused at any thought something negative could happen at Bradford and if there is no hint of anything will make up any b0ll0x at all to get his fix or am I thinking of another Twitter-tw4t?

Agree and this is why I won't be watching the Bulls in 2023
Club are still pushing the challenging for playoffs line when it's clearly not true.
Last year we had a group of 10 who went to games
It's now down to 2-3. With the 2-3 remaining unlikely to renew.

He is a well known Fax supporting RL journalist. Gets more right than wrong.

Looking at some of the comments on the clubs Facebook account, I really hope Dunning doesn't read it. Whilst we all have reservations about the motivation behind his appointment, he himself hasn't done anything wrong. It makes me cringe that the poor bloke may see some of the extreme responses.

The spending "in the bottom half of the league" is just a bit of headline grabbing and gets the desired effect as its Bradford. Note, he hasn't tweeted Widnes, Londons budget for next year...

He can't know ANY teams exact budget for next year as no club would divulge that info. Plus I'd league positions, St sales will all have an impact on budgets. He's just looked at it that we're likely spending less than Fev, Toulouse, Fax, Newcastle and thrown in the line "Bottom half budget" as it's creates a reaction.

York and Keighley will have bigger budgets next year than Bulls so that's already 6 teams, John Kear also said he has a bigger budget at Widnes so that puts us in lower half of league no?

On the current crowds and their downward trajectory I'd be amazed if we aren't on a "bottom half" budget next year. Time to face facts. If that's the case we need a radical culture change in the club so we get more out of less - a bit like Batley. Carry on with the same half assed approach and we'll be seeing the administrators again within 12-18months and there won't be anyone lining up to pick up the pieces.

Just to add to that I'd be willing to get back on board if I saw evidence of a genuine change on and off the field with some actual leadership and visibility from the main man. There used to be 5 regulars amongst our group. That dropped to 2 after 2016 and then to none now. The latent support won't remain latent forever.

We've turned into Huddersfield Barracudas. A club playing in an old relic of a ground, in front of 3 figure crowds, trading on past glories. Waiting for a Ken Davy to turn up.