The only problem being that this constant barrage of 'buy this' 'buy that' and 'buy bulls' is putting the supporter base off, whilst making the club look desperate.



Yes, we know money is extremely tight and that we're currently living on a hand to mouth existence, but please don't alienate the already diminished support base.

Dennis, I know from the email that is circulating from Parker and Hunter Paul re: sponsorship opportunities 2016, that everything is far from healthy in the club's account balance.



The stand off between the disillusioned supporter not buying a season ticket and club isn't just one way. It's fact that the Bradford Bulls' season memberships are one of the most expensive clubs in England to watch Rugby League.



Until Mr Green can find a buyer we're on a downward spiral.

I don't disagree with that. It's certainly putting me off looking at any club media feeds, and I've no doubt it will be to others too. All I'm saying is, they must think the positives outweigh the negatives, or why do it? I'm happy to be personally put off looking at the website or twitter feed, as long as it's working and bringing more cash into the club. Probably a difficult balance to hit right, but since they're still overloading it after a year, I'd think they believe it works.

Again it’s not really the time of year for lots of press releases but bear in mind the press guy recently left and I don’t know if a replacement is in post yet. Hence the sales stuff is getting a lot of prominence. It would annoy me but as I don’t bother with the twitter feed I get to avoid it.

So, because the CEO and marketing manager are courting additional sponsorship, that means the club is in dire straights. It's not that they're doing their jobs or anything like that, then?



The reason for the expensive tickets is that the club wants to get into SL and needs the income to support that goal. Which is also why they're sell sell sell on the merchandise.



If the Bradford fan base got off its collective backside and actually went to the games then the club could afford to offer cheaper tickets. But they won't. They'd turn up if there's a final in the offing, but otherwise they'll stay home.



It won't stop them critiquing the club for its choices of player, coach, strip, choice of toilet paper etc because they feel that, even though they put no money towards the running of the club, the voice should be considered more important than anyone else's.



You see these sorts of people all the time usually in the pub after the game and their question is always the same "how did WE do". If you're that bothered, buy a ticket like the rest of us.



The is no big money benefactor at Bradford. Never had been and likely there never will be. The club is being run as a business by an astute business man who rarely comes second in his dealings. I'm sorry if people don't like the fact that the club is proactively selling itself and its brand, but maybe if we'd had a board that did this 10 years ago, we'd not not be in the state we are

Certainly the only reasons the tickets are so expensive is that the club needs the money.



We've seen where cheap tickets gets us.

That may well be the case but being a Jeremiah about it will only hasten that downward spiral.



We are where we are. We need to get behind what we have. That doesn't mean we need to swallow every bit of hype - just maintain a healthy cynicism and support the team.

Peter Hood - wtf gives you the right to claim you speak for "the fan base"? I for one am a fan and nothing you claim relates to me at all. Who appointed you?



And how ludicrous that a marketing push in the off-season makes the club "look desperate". I am trying to get my head around your point; so, we should NOT market, and just cross our fingers and hope, then we would look what - cool?



Does the barrage of billions of pounds of adverts on every TV channel make all those advertisers look "desperate"? Does it buggery, even when we know that undoubtedly to some degree many of them may well be. If you are in the business of sales, what the fsck do you expect them to do if not try their damndest to, er, sell?



And it is not rocket science to work out that times are hard when we run full-time in the Championship, and when there are HMRC winding up petitions floating about, but you have no access to actual current financial information so you don't actually know any specifics yet you try to pretend that you do.





i remember a previous management deciding to sell cheap season tickets. I can't remember how that ended up though - did we become the wealthiest club in the world?





Wrong! We are throwing money at a second -and probably final in my view - attempt to regain a SL place. if it doesn't come off, again, then yes I would agree we would then be on a downward spiral, I posted as much last year that failing to go back up places clubs without a sugar daddy very quickly in an unsustainable place, the cash runs out, they go part time and the better players go, crowds and sales go down, and the gap between income and expenditure never seems to shrink - more economies lead to an equal or greater loss of more revenue. It ends in tears for a big club like ours. It doesn't end in tears for little clubs, which can operate at the lower levels on a wing and a prayer and never aspire to much, but it can't work for a big club like Bradford.



If we were to run out of cash this year, chasing the dream, that would be that, but it wouldn't be due to any spirals, rather, due to just pushing out the promotion boat unsustainably far. This year is much more like a hideously expensive mortgage, than any downward spiral.



Last, you quaintly refer to "finding a buyer", when you actually mean "Until we find a billionaire who has cash to burn and is prepared to pour millions of it down our particular hole". It would be great to have a sugar daddy, but financially, the books would look several factors worse than whatever they do now - it would just be that someone with very deep pockets was willing to underwrite huge losses.

Pretty much this. We're now being run as a business that has to finance itself and maximise its income streams, rather than a plaything for a sugar daddy or group of directors spending a one off council payment wildly. We're also selling sponsorships for going rate rather than letting them go on the cheap to board members companies. Likewise season tickets are priced at a level that covers the costs. We tried going for volume under the real Peter hood and we all know how that went.



Sad thing is now we only attract championship/ t&a level trolling.

Duffers used to deal with the press side of things [including doing articles for the website which the T&A, when they had no 'official' Bulls' reporter, used to copy and paste so I 'd guess he'll take that on until it's sorted.



As said before though, it's not exactly the time of year when folk are hanging onto every word. It [iis[/i a strong sales period though, so it's not hard to understand why that should be the case...why is it necessary to add up 2 + 2 for people?

Regarding the "relevant income" part - I asked this question a week or 2 ago.



Buy Bulls came about as we are allowed to spend half of our "relevant income" on player salaries. So obviously they're pushing that angle. At the time the chairman listed tickets, merchandising, social events, bar takings as "relevant income", but he didn't mention sponsorship or central funding (TV money).



As those 2 income streams bring in a huge slice of our income, is it correct that they don't count?

As far as I understand it central funding and TV money does count, though on shop and bar takings etc [less vat, of course it is only 50% of [iprofits[/i not turnover, Mr Green's suggestion of a £40 sale in the shop equating to £20 more to spend on the team wouldn't be, well, an exact representation of the reality. Unless we get the goods for nothing and operate in the Cayman Islands....

Workington have just announced the signing of Sammut.

It's a strong sales period? It's not as if it's Christmas though is it...

On a 2 year deal as well. Good signing for them.

He'll be a good signing for Workington. Probably played his best rugby when at the Bulls but unfortunately not as consistent as we would always have liked. He'd probably have done a decent job for us too but we've seemingly decided he isn't for us. I'd probably agree that he isn't the ideal fit to play alongside Gaskell though.



Who is left on the old rumours for us to cling onto then, just Godinet left without a club?

Don't think he'll be an option, he chose not to sign on at Wakefield rather than wasn't offered a contract apparently. If he's not up for super league I can't see him being interested in the championship. I've no idea who else of any quality is available though. Is Briggs still contracted to Sheffield? Didn't get much opportunity the first time around but could do alright for us... I wait to be shot down!

Gone to Fev hasn't he?

No idea, not see anything announced.

Like I said previously, Sammut met with Lowes to discuss options. Unfortunately Green and Ferres are only prepared to pay so much (sensible business acumen) hence Lowes having to let Sammut down.

Now if everyone just toed the party line of 'Buy Bulls' putting vital funds into the club....

There, edited for accuracy

I think we're done with regards to signing halfbacks. For now, at least.

If Jacks is a decent signing then great. Siejka didn't really have much impact at all last season so at least Rhys has the good fortune of not really having much to live up to in terms of replacing last year's 7.

What concerns me slightly is the fact that he's 25 and was still only playing part time before we signed him. You would think that if he was a good player, he would have been given a shot by an aussie club by now. But then again I don't know his back story, so perhaps he did get a chance and it didn't work out, who knows.



But we now have Gaskell, Jacks, Thomas, Addy and (shudder) Purtell who can all play in the halves if need be. Hopefully we don't need to call on all of them next season but the cover is certainly there now.

Only thing I would say is that we still don't have a visa for Jacks so he is very much just on trial with us for now. I think we'd all of been a little more comfortable with having a punt on Jacks if we hadn't lost Mullaney as well, that is a loss if he isn't replaced with a SL quality player.

Been rumoured to be going back to Fev, but I haven't seen anything official. Fev announced their squad numbers a while back and he wasn't listed, but they did leave the number 6 shirt free, so perhaps he's lined up for that.