I've always had a soft spot for Donny, so I often pop on here from the Bulls board just to catch up on what you're doing. Can I just say that as a total nerd I love this thread.

Thanks for visiting us Pumpetypump. I'm a total nerd too which is probably why I've spent all morning sorting out my last post. It's good fun speculating. It's turned out to be a fascinating season between some very evenly matched sides, with York and your boys being some way ahead of the rest. Good luck for the rest of the season. We need you to beat Whitehaven, Workington and Oldham and put a hole in their points difference please!

Bulls 46 Haven 0. West Wales 6 Hunslet 86 today's results, poor old West Wales only had one named sub.


No messing about at Coventry please Dons.

Update Monday 6th August
Bradford 36...........+666 (1).......N Wales (H).......Workington (H).........Keighley (H)...........W Wales (A).........Oldham (A)..........Hemel (H)..............48 (1)
York 36.................+574 (2).......W Wales (A).....Hunslet (H)..............Workington (A).......Oldham (H)............Hemel (A)...........Whitehaven (H).......48 (2)
Workington 28 ......+298 (5).......Coventry (H).......Bradford (A).............York (H).................Newcastle (A)........London (H)..........Dons (A)................34 (4)
Oldham 26.............+475 (3)......Whitehaven (H)....Newcastle (A).........Coventry (H)...........York (A).................Bradford (H)........London (A).............34 (6)
Dons 26.................+323 (4)......London (H).........Whitehaven (A)........Newcastle (H)........Keighley (A)...........N Wales (A).......Workington (H).......36 (3)
Hunslet 26..............+179 (6).......Hemel (H)..........York (A)..................London (H).............Whitehaven (A).......Newcastle (H).....Coventry (A)..........34 (7)
Whitehaven 26......+149 (7).......Oldham (A)..........Dons (H)..................Hemel (A)..............Hunslet (H)...........Coventry (A)........York ((A)................34 (5)

I've changed the colour coding for today's update. The fixtures in Blue are the expected losers. For example, Workington are expected to lose at Bradford in Round 22, lose at home to York in Round 23, and lose away at the Dons in Round 26.

Nothing much changed after Round 20 with all results going as expected. Round 21 sees one vital gameMUST lose these games or else they will get within the 36 point range. I've got the Dons down to lose at Whitehaven. If we win it would be a huge bonus and see 38 points as a possibility for us. Get all your mates signed up for the bus and lets see if we can win this game!

If we do win at Whitehaven, we could be assured of a promotion play-off place regardless of what happens in the last match at home to Workington. That would take the pressure off somewhat. It's not the end of the world if we lose at Whitehaven, it just gives less scope for any slip ups in the rest of the run in. We'd still be on target for third spot. The points difference between us and Worky needs to be kept tabs on too. We need to keep ahead of them in that race.

Bradford and York must keep winning or else it'll change the picture completely but as they've got each other to worry about for the automatic promotion spot, they should both be fully motivated to win all of their remaining games by good margins as points difference could be critical to them too.

Yes ... York beating Bradford was a huge bonus and will keep both sides honest right until the last game.
The trouble is coming into that game York might need too many points to pip Bradford and rest a few players to the advantage of Whitehaven whom York play.

Oldham v Bradford and Workington v York are problematic too.

That's a fair point about York, but Bradford play Hemel in the last round so the points difference between York and Bradford might look quite close on paper before that game. I'm trying to find a good reason for York not to take their foot off the gas!

York ought to close the points difference next weekend as they play West Wales whilst Bradford play Crusaders.

But Bradford play them too in a few weeks ... both away.
So not much change over all.

Should keep it interesting over the next few weeks.

How does everyone feel about the current structure? It certainly keeps everything interesting right up until the end of the season but Bradford and York have clearly been the best sides in the league this season. Would it be unfair if they both didn't go up?

Yes ... but extremely funny!

Yes. Clearly, I'd prefer we went up but if it's those two it's arguably the right result.

They both deserve to get promoted on the strength of the seasons results, however sport as we know can be a fickle thing. Either of those two would be odds on to win their respective play off games. I would still love it if we can be in the final game with either of them.