Information for Bulls Fans.

I emailed BG on 26 June (after the Coral stand meeting to inform players/employees), to let him know that Bulls have a further group of players / employees called the Academy.

Whilst all other employees had been given whatever information he had given out at that time, this group had none. I suggested he consider going to Tong training that night to correct this omission. I got no reply and he didnt go.

As it happened, Ryan Duckett ( a week before being sacked) did give the group a talk that night and told them as much as he could and answered all questions put to him.

Following the Fans meeting Monday, an Academy player's relative followed BG out and after he had spoken to whoever, politely asked for a word, which BG agreed to. He made the same point. BG acknowledged he had been remiss in this respect and asked his accompanying colleague to make a note, and agreed that he would do something about addressing this group, and the relative understood this to be on Tuesday pm at training.

We all know that he didnt turn up to the SL squad players meeting Tuesday. Not surprisingly he didnt turn up for the Academy either. He still hasnt given them any information.

The Academy players all turned up for training at Tong Tuesday night, knowing Paul Medley and Stu Barrow, their main coaches had been sacked, not knowing what to expect.

PM and SB addressed them with understandable emotion and absolute professionalism and wished them the best, but could offer no information to them other than gave them contact names at the RFL (who also had not addressed the issues affecting this group), and BG's phone number.

The U 18 coach and the U 20 and U 18 conditioner was there. I think (not sure) they are paid by somebody else, it will be a pittance anyway, and they took a loose training session just to try to do something for the lads.

Both teams' games against London this week have been called off, not surprisingly. The players were told by the coaches who are left to train on their own and come back next Thursday (12th) to see what the position is then.

Everybody - please remember this group of Bulls players / Employees.

Thats a sad state of affairs for lads trying to start their RL careers. Hopefully Mr Tasker can add it to the long list of items that need attending to, as I suspect it will not register on BG's to do list.

Seems a bit strange that someone who had only recently been retained to do an "in-depth" review of the business did not seem to who was employed by the club?

As I said on another post if we pull through this, once the emotion has died down there is an awful lot of rebuilding to do. Especially in this case as it is pretty clear that bringing on young talent will be vital for the future.

Really sorry for the lads.

Bloody hell.
It's things like this you forget.
This young group of players must be going through hell at the moment and all they want to do is play bloody Rugby.
All the best to the lads!

Once again - how unprofessional is this guy?
Are we sure BG has done this sort of thing before?

I'm not a Bradford supporter but follow my own clubs 18's and 20's and know the sacrifices that this group of players have make for very little financial reward.

I agree that it is an absolute disgrace that BG has not addressed this group of players, however, I think it is an even bigger disgrace that those at the RFL who are no doubt paid very handsomely for managing the Academy game at professional level have not had the foresight or decency to make sure that this group of players are looked after.

Barry John Mather and his colleagues at Red Hall should hang their heads in shame, what a bunch of absolute wasters they really are.

ive just seen on broncos site that all academy games against bulls this weekend have been called off

At the meeting on Monday, a couple approached me and said I was their last hope. They said the academy had been completely ignored in all this, basically abandoned, and were pretty upset about it. I explained that I too was upset, especialy given what we had been trying to do over the last two years, but we too were impotent. Only the administrator has any authority.

This was said a few feet away from Guilfoyle. he never once is his talk mentioned the academy, or the considerable number of human beings that consists of. Or that the academy was surely one of the main assets left of the club, and therefore surely worthy of protecting at all costs?

as I have said before, I had not worked long in corporate insolvency before I quickly realised I cared far too much for my fellow human beings to ever be able to carve out a career in that field.

I admit to being totally and utterly perplexed though by the way the staff at all levels have been handled throughout this whole process, both following the board changes and then, especially, since the appointment of administrators. It just looks to me like they have been treated as liabilities to be parked and then discharged in whatever way as soon as practicable.

I believe that BG has done exactly this type of thing before.

He has done this before, yes. As our Plymouth contributor has told us he needs to be watched, does Mr Gargoyle.

This is 4 years worth of youth development at risk here. And I understand the current plan "moving forwards" will rely heavily on youth....

This is the time of year that next years scholars are approached, and the current scholars get their first pro contract.

You also need a specific coaching qualification for youth development and we seem to have made our youth development posts redundant.

Agreed with this

Isn't it also the case that there is a SL License requirement to have an Academy (which needs these specifically qualified people)?

I too fear for the academy and scholariship players, now and immediate future.

A mass exodus of young players is a strong possibility with the lack of communication from anyone, further weakening the bulls SL aspirations with the federation trained regulations. To tell the academy boys just turn up next thursday we don't have a game or training and "lets just see what happens" shambles!!