We can argue the toss all day about the details of the individual cock-ups and instances of bad judgement, but there's no denying there's a fair old list of examples of mismanagement. For whatever reason though, the prevailing opinion on here always seemed to be that whenever something good happened at the club, it was down to good old Jim, while if he did something that the fans didn't like, it must have been because Kath made him do it. I could never understand why he was given so much benefit of the doubt by most fans, especially since nobody could really say what his job description actually entailed!

So now we've got a situation where there are two instances of him being a proven liar, and he's banned from the game in disgrace, yet some fans still want to claim that, on the whole he did a good job, it's absolutely ludicrous!

Those who defend(ed) him were just those who were taken in by his spin

See Gleeson has been speaking to Max Cliffords people, looks like he's going to try and pin this all on the others, or FC.

Good job nobody is denying it then. The worst one - by far - was the appointment and retention of Agar. How much of that was down to Rule is open to question of course.


Rule was given credit for those aspects of the day-to-day running of the club that it could be reasonably assumed fell under his direct control - in particular marketing activities as that was his original function and background. He was cut slack on those aspects that were unlikely to have been under his sole control, such as hirings and firings etc. He was given so much benefit of the doubt precisely because there was uncertainty about how far his authority went - that's pretty much what benefit of the doubt is all about.


People are simply saying that regardless of how badly he performed in certain areas - and nobody has defended him when he has been proven to have fouled up - that doesn't change the fact that he did [isome[/i things right during his tenure. I'm not sure I'd go as far as to say that the balance is positive mind.

I'm not sure how he thinks he's going to manage that given the personal responsibility for checking the banned substances list that's enshrined in all anti-doping rules. My guess would be he's just after a payday from the press stories rather than attempting any legal action.

Other than a short life of hard-graft in the lower leagues from the 2013 season, it's difficult to see where else he's gonna get a payday

He could work on Sean Longs dads market stall

Now the dust has settled (slightly), do we think there will be sanctions against the club?

In our favour I see:
None of the convicted are at the club, and neither are others who may be involved (Hetherington, Agar, Long)
Follow-up tests in the last 6 months have all been negative
Further action would see potentially a legal case between someone who's just put a few mill into one the comp's best supported clubs and the Hetheringtons who seem beloved by the RFL - not sure they'd want a public bunfight over it.
When Keiron Cunningham got done for HCG, he escaped punishment because a Saints conditioner had administered it to him without his knowledge. IMO this is more evidence of a club's complicity in a drugs culture than what has transpired at FC, and AFAIK Saints weren't punished as a club? Maybe someone can correct me on this?

Against us:
Club CEO orchestrated cover-up
We employed an incompetent conditioner who didn't exercise the right level of control
There's been shedloads of bad PR for the game.

Thoughts?

As I said before: no further action. It's a dark & deep cupboard that the RFL will not want to delve too deepy into, there could be more skeletons than they can handle in there.

Someone should also have a quiet word in Gleeson's shell-like and convince him that he'd be far better off sucking the mop and going away quietly. He might possibly get a book deal out of it, although I'd struggle to think of who just might buy it.

From Wakefield Forum
Just want to point a couple of things out to peeps here and there seems to be some stuff lost in all the gunsmoke.
Firstly the old regime at hull were not allowed to divulge any information about the pending and ongoing investigation by UKADA as per their rules wich the RFL sign up to, this is why the new owners knew nothing about this until they had taken over the club, not a cover up to gain a better price for the club.
Secondly, this "Cold/dietry" supplememnt is also a stimulant and if you look in to what its effects can be if taken in certain doses, it is a performance enhancing drug, giving the taker of it greater focus and sharpness on the field, this is why the substance is allowed in the off season as there is no on field advantage then

FWIW IMO Gleeson is guilty of being stupid, Cooper is guilty of agreeing to deceive and Rule is the ringmaster, I don't think his ban goes quite far enough where the others seem pretty fair on reflection, however as the RFL have stated in their statement, Hull FC have brought the game in to disrepute and I would not be surprised if they get a fine at the very least Afterall didn't Cas get stung by £40k for doing the same

There is no way the club should face any sanctions, none of the protagonists are involved with the club, it would be interesting to know what Agar knew about what was going on, but only "interesting" from the point of view of if he knew anything at all, I doubt he did as UKADA would have charged him at the same time.

Cooper should never work in professional sport again (for two reasons, firstly for doing it and secondly trying to take shortcuts to weight loss, hardly the actions of a "sports scientist"), Gleeson was just dumb (but we knew that anyway), Rule is the biggest surprise, he's binned a promising career.