None of the thing a you have listed here are deterred by a points deduction.

Had last year been a relegation year, Salford and London would still have been relegated, Bradford would still be in SL. it would still be 'tough titty' and those who went in to admin still would not be punished, The 6 point deduction changed nothing. It achieves none of the things you want.

If I buy a club. Run up huge debts, survive against relegation, then go into admin, if you give a 6point deduction, a million point deduction or a zero point deduction, other clubs have still been relegated and I have still received no punishment.

But you’re not coming up with a suitable alternative.

What else can the governing body do? It’s not like they can impose financial penalties, as the company has gone down the pan.

Yet once again, the game gets a few more damaging media inches & countless companies get shafted.

This season is the only year where a point’s deduction may have a damaging effect on a club. Finishing bottom in the Licence Years was an irrelevance & next season a SL club could finish on minus a trillion points at the end of the first part of the season, yet still stay in SL, come the gimmicky play-offs.

A one up, one down would have done the trick.

Maurice Lindsay took all of Wigan's trophies with him when he left the club. Club didn't exist outside of his ownership you see.

As far as I see it, the points deduction is a payment for keeping a clubs status. The new legal entity behind the club inherits the old clubs status within the RFL structures.

The new legal entity can choose to form a club completely independent of the old one, at which point they would be expected to apply to the RFL for membership and will start from it's lowest tier. There will be no points deduction because the new legal entity would not benefit from the inheritance of the old clubs status within the game.

Inheritance of status for a new legal entity should not be a given, because they are not the same entity as previously and should be treated as such. Thus the choice for a new entity is to accept the previous clubs status and accept a points deduction as payment, or they form a new club in the lowest tier and work from there.

Quite straightforward and quite fair IMO.

It is absurd how so many people can't understand a pretty simple concept.

To inflict a 6 point sanction on a defunct company would indeed be absurd. It would be utterly ridiculous. Why? Because unless a new owner comes along, there won't be any club playing anywhere. That is why sanctions are applied to the owner.

Now you might WANT there to be a fixed penalty system, but there isn't; the RFL under the present rules takes a number of factors into account.

You might think they should not take anything into account, but you need to get it into your head that they do.

They did in Bradford's case. Once Moore & Co. had walked, after giving the RFL a very public bagging, the RFL issued a statement which made it crystal clear that they had taken into account the proposals by BB2014 in regards to paying creditors, and the HMRC debt, that they were not satisfied with those proposals, and this being the case, it was judged fitting to deduct 6 points.

Again, whilst some might not like it, the corollary of that is very clearly that if the RFL hda been happy with BB2014's plan and proposals for the old club's creditors, then their points decision would have been less than 6. This is the relevant part of their formal statement and with respect it can't be read any other way“Throughout our dealings with them, the club’s directors were unable to provide any evidence of new capital investment into Bradford Bulls and consequently, the RFL Executive had no confidence in the business plan that was presented.

“At no stage was there a firm written commitment from the directors to meet the liabilities would have been left with an unpaid liability of almost £170,000.

“In the last six months two other clubs have had to restructure their businesses, introduce new investment from owners and release players to avoid administration. For Bradford to effectively drop off debt as a result of the administration without a points deduction would have significantly impaired the integrity of the competition.'"

THat isnt a good Argument in favour of a points deduction is it. Just doing something, anything, regardless of it being right, wrong, productive, useful is not a good way to run the game.



That’s an argument against relegation and the obvious downfalls of it. Its not really an argument in favour of a points deduction.

The Alternative would be to punish the owners of clubs by banning them from involvement in RL again, putting them on a ‘bad investors’ blacklist. I would be happy to look at owners being personally liable for a £100k fine should they go into admin as part of their agreement to take on the golden share.

So I’ve finally eked it out of you, blacklisted & a fine.

I'd be quite happy for Khan, Hood and Co to be blacklisted and fined.

They should be banned from entering a RL stadium and hung by their goolies from the nearest lamppost - can I have that too?

Quite. I don't know if Bradford should get any points back or not, although obviously I'd like all six back. Having said that, a deposit by the owners with the RFL of £100k or something of that ilk would make more sense to me than applying a points deduction. I can see plenty of issues with the implementation though, so who knows how that would work...

They’ll probably get an Amigo Loan, with Smokey acting as Guarantor!

I meant more as a general approach rather than a special 'keep Bradford on the straight and narrow' measure. But yes, I don't know if there's any way of distinguishing between a bond paid with an individual's personal money rather than with a loan taken out against the club, which would entirely undermine the point.

One of the points being missed here is that a National Governing Body has to have sanctions against its clubs if they go into Administration. It's a prerequisite for being recognised by Grant Organisations like Sport England.

The HMRC also expect nay demand that a NGB has sanctions and penalties to deter its Member a Clubs from seeking to avoid its tax responsibilities by way of Administration. Without that NGB cooperation HMRC would not allow sports clubs to enjoy the freedom of payment schemes which normal businesses cannot access.

One of the points being missed by you is that Bradford's case doesn't fit your bill. The previous owners were put into administration not chose it, and immediately their club was sold from under their feet in a pre-pack to persons who were not a party to the failed business/owners, but brand new people. To say that OKB sought to avoid its tax responsibilities by way of administration would be simply rubbish.

Neither can you say BB2014 or its directors benefited directly or indirectly as a new business since they in the event pulled out of the deal, and so the final winning bidder, BBNL, not only had no connection with previous management but was one step removed.

The member cub was OK Bulls Ltd. Self-evidently, the sanctions and penalties did not "deter" it from going into administration. It didn't go into administration. It was put into administration by a major creditor.

Bradford Bulls more than any club deserved the 6 points deduction. Second Administration in next to no time. The punishment is for spending more than you can afford on players - therefore cheating other clubs and their players and their supporters by getting some wins unfairly.

Not paying HMRC the tax, national insurance and VAT owed for 6 month's running is no way to responsibly run any club.

The owner was in effect also punished as it meant he had no chance of getting his money back. - The new owners have benefitted as the Bradford Bulls Club with a 6 point deduction cost them less than it would have done without the 6 point deduction.

If the new owner runs things responsibly within its means from now on, the Club will have stopped cheating and he might have half a chance of getting his money back as well.

You are getting hung up on the notion of a deterrent.

That is only a part of it.

The other, overriding purpose is as a sanction.

And in what was failing to pay the tax obligations, "not avoiding it's responsibilities" to HMRC?