It was perhaps the opening few words of the Rugby Football League’s statement regarding the liquidation of Bradford Bulls which struck the most telling chord of all. “While this is terribly disappointing and sad,” they said, “it is not an entirely surprising development given the scale of debt incurred by the previous management of the club and the debilitating level of financial commitment already entered into for 2017.”
However, this was not the result of a few months of off-field troubles for the former Super League champions, more the culmination of years of mismanagement for a club who blazed a trail for so many following rugby league’s switch to summer in 1996. At the height of what was dubbed Bullmania, it was not uncommon to see 20,000 people inside Odsal. When the Bulls played what proved to be their final game in October, there were only 3,518 present. It was a telling indictment of how far the club had fallen.
Those who have played a part in dragging a club who were world champions only 11 years ago to its knees should be ashamed. Three administrations in four years, relegation from Super League in 2014 and a failure to subsequently gain promotion have all combined to lead the club to their lowest point – but what now?
The RFL has already confirmed that a new club should be formed within the coming days and will take the old entity’s place in the Championship this season, albeit with a 12-point deduction and severely reduced central funding. On a dark day for rugby league and the city of Bradford, that is at least a rare glimmer of light in all of this.
Encouragingly, the RFL has already fielded several expressions of interest about starting a new club – and with that, there is hope. Any new company will start debt-free – rather than facing the £1.2m-plus the previous company owed to creditors – and it also has an opportunity to cut its cloth accordingly. In many ways, it is a blank canvas and the RFL will ensure only those with the club’s best interests at heart are afforded this opportunity which has now presented itself.
Placing the new club straight back in the Championship as opposed to the bottom tier, League 1, is a decision which will naturally be seen as controversial by some. But replanning fixture lists – which for League 1 clubs include the newly introduced transatlantic trips to Toronto – was unfeasible, say RFL sources. Thousands of Bradford fans had bought season tickets on the assumption they would get Championship rugby – how would they be refunded? These are all problems which led the RFL to its decision, rightly or wrongly.
But as encouraging as a new start for rugby league in Bradford could be, it is a process which will be intertwined with difficulties in its infancy. How, for starters, do the prospective new owners begin to build a squad capable of competing and overhauling a 12-point deduction this season?
All the players are now free agents and many will sign elsewhere. Some, it is believed, already have and clubs already spending the salary cap will be given special dispensation to bring in former Bradford players. This is not a plan which can be carefully executed over a period of several months: Bradford are due to start the new season at Hull Kingston Rovers in four weeks.
Will their coach, Rohan Smith (who should emerge through this process which a huge amount of credit for the way he has handled it), decide he wants to stay? That should be any new owners’ priority: keeping the highly regarded Australian would be a significant building block from which to start.
However, that only addresses the problems on the field – which have to be solved with around £100,000 less central funding than the club were expecting for 2017. The RFL will offer the new club a chance to stay at their Odsal home on the same terms as the previous club, but there are myriad issues for new owners to solve to have a fully functioning professional club up and running in just a few weeks, as well as the business-related practicalities of starting a new company from scratch.
For the good of the sport, this will hopefully not be the end of rugby league in Bradford, more the closing of a catastrophic chapter. History has taught us that clubs can reform and rebuild; Bradford did it themselves in 1964 after all. This, perhaps, is an opportunity for change and for a forward-thinking owner to start afresh but it will not be an easy road for whoever decides they want the sizeable task of trying to restore one of rugby league’s biggest names.
