Think next year is all about cutting the wage bill by all means necessary, and hope income exceeds wages to try to cut the crippling debt.

Tony’s going nowhere and will have to manage the budget team the best he can.

Long term, the sky money is down, the covid loans need repaying, and the clock is ticking on the stadium lease deal.

Even if a new stadium deal is reached, it will align with the true loss of running the stadium, so will be a big increase at best, and without the mystery 1500 tickets bought by the SMC per match which artificially inflates your attendances. Maybe only 2 stands will be opened per match is a real possibility. There is no way Hull City will continue to generously subside your tenancy.

In turn, I can’t see any upturn in player quality for some significant time, unless Adam moves on and new investment is found, which won’t happen without a new stadium lease in place.

It’s a doom and gloom scenario, but prove me wrong !

Don't all clubs do that?

I'd imagine so, but there are these mystery SMC bought tickets which is unique to us

I'm sure we'll be fine. The attendances have been poor for the last three games but just a bit of on field improvement and hopefully a bit more good news with regards recruitment and investment and the figures will rise again.

Looking a tad more positive than 6 weeks ago.

Smith and Gene jettisoned
Mega experienced serious NRL head coach appointed
Gaz Ellis brought back
Marquee signing in
Quota spots being freed up

Obviously there's other less positive stuff (Hardaker for one) but if we keep bringing in players incrementally better than those here, add a sprinkling of quality like Asiata, and continue to develop the likes of Martin and Charles, the medium term outlook is definitely improved v 11th April.

I'm pretty sure that deal ended when the lease was renegotiated a few years back. There is never a large amount of empty seats in the west stand that could be these mythical ones