They were allowed to wear dirty shirts throughout the season. Disgraceful.

I thought it was now lowered to £300K not £350K, unless you have a turnover of £1Million?



This is why the suspicion and mistrust arises.

I said Barrow were favoured by the RFL ,i said nothing of you having more than 1 quota player ,i merely meant that they would prefer you to be in SL as opposed to Leigh.

Leigh miners, Twist Ln. Now there's a level playing field.

No!!

]

How were Barrow favoured???

Gateshead get dispensation for this reason:

Clubs in the championship are semi-professional. They have the same legal obligations as a full time club, but without the revenue. It's extremely hard to find the money to get players to relocate on a part-time wage, so heartland clubs have the VERY distinct advantage of a bunch of top-line amateurs playing on their doorstep (literally, in the case of LSV/Easts).

Development area clubs don't have that. The dispensation on o/s players is to allow a levelling of the playing field... i.e. Gateshead can't just sign a Ridyard from the local amateur team, so it's fair to give them a broader criteria to widen their available talent base.

To answer Demon's question as to what Gateshead are doing for development, there is a substantial development team based at the Gateshead International Stadium, where the RFL's Regional Team work hand in hand with the Gateshead Thunder community development staff. In particular Andy Kelly has just been started in post Regional Talent Coach, implementing an extensive programme throughout the locality.

It is to be hoped that the NE RL Conference, within a decade or so, can produce senior teams of a comparable standard to Miners, Easts, Hunslet Parkside, Egremont, and all the other senior BARLA clubs that feed into the pro clubs in the heartlands. Until that long-term progamme comes to fruition, Gateshead 'deserve' their dispensation precisely to ensure the competition is fair.