It (seems that it) isn't just administration though. It is a failed administration, the creditors get nowt, so from their POV he might as well have liquidated. If this level of failure isn't sufficient to prevent a new licence being granted or the old one being transferred, then... well there isn't a level of failure beyond that. So there are no meaningful sanctions.

Of course you can continue acting as if licensing is a meaningful process, but even as a proponent of it, you don't seem to believe it is any better than harmless. Nobody seems to think the fannying about with 'detailed assessment against key criteria' and 'ensuring standards' has any value anymore. So what's the point - it isn't placating fans of Championship clubs and it is a waste of time and energy for those in SL. Failure to admit that officially would be farcical, because it would be a statement so clearly at odds with obvious reality.

I can honestly only imagine the announcement of the outcome of a mini-licensing round being made by Comical Ali.

There are lots of vested interests in this game of "ours" and I would suggest they don't all rest with the "flatcappers". It's almost inevitable where money is involved.

Before the Sky money came along the game was on its knees. It's this money and the oxygen of TV coverage, not sudden good business acumen, that has seen the gap between SL and "the rest" grow to almost unreachable proportions.

It's worrying that without a sugar daddy, SL seems unsustainable, and lower leagues cannot hope to make the leap through the franchise ceiling.

Removing a licence in some as a form of retribution would be nigh on the worst thing we could possibly doing. If your argument only comes down to wanting some form of symbolic blood letting, then it is a good thing the RFL have taken a more pragmatic approach.
Why isn’t it meaningful? Because we haven’t followed a rule in kicking Bradford out, even though that rule never existed? Why is removal of a franchise the only acceptable outcome for this scenario?

Removing Bradford and replacing them with a less suitable club wouldn’t mean we had a 'detailed assessment against key criteria' or that we were 'ensuring standards'. In fact it would mean the exact opposite. It would, in reality be exactly what the flatcappers didn’t want, what they argued against, it would be the decision on who gained a franchise, not based on an application, not based on the evidence presented, not based on which club is most suitable for SL, but which club it was politically expedient to pick. Yet because this would a ‘big’ club being damaged they have let their lust for schadenfreude cloud what they pretended were dearly held principles.

Absolutely Smokey! Well said. Here's some irreleavnt stuff to back up your wisdomhttps://www.thetelegraphandargus.co.uk/sport/sportbulls/9906491.Creditors_in_desperate_fight_to_get___1_5m_owed_by_Bradford_Bulls/rl

You're on a wind up, yeah? edit, that question was for Smokey.

In case notunneccessary[/i fudge that is in prospect. They can achieve the same end so much more easily and logically. Yeah, basically it's the contradiction/paradox I hate.

Let's face it, 12 months ago you would have put Bradford on that list

As far as I can see there is only one decent BUSINESS model in SL and that's Leeds. (I'm open to being shot down here as I've only cursory knowledge of the others)

The chunk of Sky money and TV coverage is the honey pot. There are to few businessmen running their clubs as genuinely good businesses, let's not pretend otherwise

Oh I don't know.
As an honest British taxpayer I'm overjoyed that the Bradford Bulls have been able to stick 2 fingers up over £1/2M of MY money whilst being able to carry on as if nothing has happened.

I'll also be just as happy if Sport England reduce our funding when we as a sport are seen to just shrug our shoulders over it.

What you seem to be saying in your last paragraph, is that, if one of the bigger names breaks the rules (although they appear to be guidelines as opposed to rules), then we shouldn't even dream of demoting them, because thier likely replacement maynot have the same "draw".
Conversely, had this circumstance bestowed itself on one of the "lesser" clubs, would you be in favour of the same level of "protection".

The honest answer is, it depends.

Some clubs bring more to SL than others.

If the smaller/lower SL clubs want the same protection as the likes of Bradford, then its easy, get the crowds, get the youth, get the success and visibility Bradford have. If you are a smaller/lower SL club, if you are getting low crowds, have plenty of overseas players, have poor facilities, struggle on and off the pitch, then you are bringing less to the table and your position is less secure. And yes, that includes London etc.

So, let me get this right – and please interject if I’m incorrect.

Bradford have been bought for circa £150k – who gets that money?

The administrators tab is around £170k, does this come out of the £150k & if so where does the shortfall come from?

One more thing, presumably the RFL won’t have got any rent money this year, will they be in the same position as the rest of the Creditors getting a few pence in the pound or will the debt carry over to the new owners?

I wonder how the ripples will effect other clubs cashflow if the RFL are seen to be laughing in the faces of those owed money eg a club may order 5000 pies for a game, baker says not a problem but I will only deliver them once the money has cleared due to the BB scenario, will banks withdraw all overdrafts without PG's? Grants have been mentioned, will it affect them?

Of course our friendly RFL rep will have a spin on this that involves no answers.

The problem is, Bradford are, or are supposed to be a flagship club. Do the smaller do what Bradford have done? Overspend. Sell their product cheaper than a netto basket?

Bradford have brought success to their own table but a pile of crap and debt to the RFL's. But sshhhhhhh, they're Bradford Big Balls - 10,000 average per home game. Untouchable.

Because they failed utterly on the very criterion on which licensing is primarily based.



I didn't, the principles of licensing did. You're right though, perhaps it would be better if Bradford were given a place in SL for next season. And we can do that - we just have abandon those principles and find some new ones. Little bit embarrassing, but that's life. Trying to retain Bradford in SL (assuming, as always, a newco) and the principles of licensing, is doomed to failure. Do it quick and clean or let it wither away - either way it'd be over. Eventually it'll need replacing - why wait?




Tinkering it to death. The vote to change the rules so that entering administration was only a points deduction and a black mark was a major retreat. This would be surrender, however they try to dress it up. Folk aren't daft. Well not [ithat[/i daft anyway.



Think about it like this. Licensing moved the emphasis from how the team performed each year to how the club performed over 3-year cycles.
Imagine under a system of P&R, straightforward 1 up, 1 down, a team gets relegated. But they say, 'actually we're not that bad, we just had a rubbish coach, but we've sacked and replaced him now and we'd to like to stay up'. The governing body thinks this team might indeed get better under their new coach, so they come up with an innovation - a play-off with the winner of the second division. This would likely provoke some scepticism, and if they claimed that the system hadn't in fact changed and they would still be standing by the principles of 1 up, 1 down the scepticism would become incredulity. The governing body have got stuck trying to avoid an unwanted outcome of its own rules, and still wanting people to believe that they are enforcing them in an equitable manner. They can't - they have to live with the outcome (a principled approach) or be honest about changing the rules (a pragmatic approach), it is one or t'other.