Re: Bulls Takeover : Wed Oct 16, 2019 9:27 am  

I think in these times of cutting our cloth we should make some changes...
1. if you are a fan of another club and commenting on our ownership, or troubles -a £1 donation to post should be made. general comments and team/player comments free.

2. if there is a mention of living within your means or cutting cloth then the fee is £1 per mention. (if this becomes repetitive from same poster I.e. 3 or more posts advising us the bradford fans how we should act, support or RUN the club an additional fine of £5).

We will be richest club in the land.... or be saved from the repetition and very kind offers of help.

[Bulliac]

Re: Bulls Takeover : Wed Oct 16, 2019 9:50 am  

paulwalker71 wrote:

On the face of it, there's not a lot to disagree with in the T&A piece.

In particular

It looks inevitable that we will going fully part-time, which means that the full time players will be leaving. I take that from his indications about 'living within our means', not from inside knowledge.

So long as we don't get a point deduction (and ti doesn't sound like we are going into Admin) and so long as we keep John Kear, then I see no reason why we shouldn't be in a position to pull together a squad that survives next season in the Championship. I don't think Whitehaven or Oldham will be pulling up any trees next season, so avoiding the drop should be feasible.

Noted that the report said nothing about Odsal, beyond the hint that the 'new shop' might actually be the old shop. So who knows...

Not sure how we can go fully part time if it is a continuation of the same company. We can't just cancel contracts and if players can't get equivalent deals elsewhere they would surely be within their rights to insist their deal was honoured?

Re: Bulls Takeover : Wed Oct 16, 2019 10:07 am  

Bulliac wrote:

Not sure how we can go fully part time if it is a continuation of the same company. We can't just cancel contracts and if players can't get equivalent deals elsewhere they would surely be within their rights to insist their deal was honoured?

If their wage stayed the same, but their hours were cut, I'm sure they'd be ok with that. There just won't be any new FT players coming in

Re: Bulls Takeover : Wed Oct 16, 2019 10:44 am  

domthebull wrote:

I think in these times of cutting our cloth we should make some changes...
1. if you are a fan of another club and commenting on our ownership, or troubles -a £1 donation to post should be made. general comments and team/player comments free.

2. if there is a mention of living within your means or cutting cloth then the fee is £1 per mention. (if this becomes repetitive from same poster I.e. 3 or more posts advising us the bradford fans how we should act, support or RUN the club an additional fine of £5).

We will be richest club in the land.... or be saved from the repetition and very kind offers of help.

I've not a problem donating, done it before and would do it again no problems but could you also add for those that post stupid comments of what we going to do if a rich owner doesn't come a long that they are given a good sharp poke in the eye

Re: Bulls Takeover : Wed Oct 16, 2019 10:49 am  

That bugged me a bit over the last 2 months. It became obvious that leaving Odsal was the single biggest cloth cutting we could do, but few fans of other clubs could acknowledge it

Re: Bulls Takeover : Wed Oct 16, 2019 11:16 am  

Bully_Boxer wrote:

I don't see what how the rumoured debts can be cleared in 1-2 years.. how do we go from racking up huge debts to turning a profit and paying them all off in 2 years.. all sounds a bit fanciful to me.

It also seems either glaringly obviously or remarkably convenient that the total debt quoted is equal to the annual expenditure on staying at Odsal.
The 3 largest creditors keep being mentioned - whilst it would be interesting to know who they are and how much they are owed, the nature of the other debts may be more revealing.

Re: Bulls Takeover : Wed Oct 16, 2019 11:38 am  

Apologies now for the long post, but might be of interest to some.

In terms of “cutting our cloth accordingly” there are far too many elephants in the room to us on the outside to understand where any cost cutting can be made.

• We are led to believe that opening and maintaining Odsal for RL cost the club circa £500k per year. Clearly moving away from the money pit makes good sense, and believe it or not, if that is true, Andrew Chalmers may actually have saved the club from administration (although it does not seem like the case at this time).
• Moving to Dewsbury will cost us £2k per game – when you consider the options of staying at Odsal, makes clear sense. What it does not tell us however, is the lost value of advertising, match day hospitality revenue, likely attendance drop etc, so the £2k cost will in “real” terms, be considerably higher.
• Where will our junior and reserve teams play? Again, what costs will be additional to this now we have “moved out”.
• Should we run an academy and reserve side next year? In order to receive funding towards the academy from the RFL, I believe we also have to run a reserve team. Does the receipt of funding, and what is now the annual sale of upcoming talent to SL or more wealthy sides, cover the cost of running such an outfit. At first guess I’d say almost certainly not. It would however be a very unpopular decision to see the scraping of our junior set up that has helped produce recent talents in the current GB Lions squad of Jake Trueman, John Bateman, Elliott Whitehead, Tom Burgess (and the rest unavailable or not selected). Unless the academy is self-sufficient, how can it be a justifiable expense at this time? It’s horrible to say, as I worked in previous years on the BullBuilder board, and they have done many fantastic things for the club, but without seeing the numbers first hand, I don’t see how the existence of the academy can continue in its current guise.
• Do we need to move to a 100% part-time playing staff? Clearly this would be a cheaper option than operating any sort of hybrid squad we currently use. Any full-time contracted players would need to agree to any change in terms, or accept some form of pay-off for the remainder of their contracts – again, an added expense to the list.
• Cash is king. Companies can make shed loads of losses and operate absolutely without problem provided they have the cash available to pay wages and suppliers. Clearly we are not cash rich as we once were in our hayday.
• Managing our existing creditors is key at this present moment in time. All it needs is a few of them to play ball and go through legal proceedings and any takeover will hit the floor pretty quickly. It is interesting to read that Chris Brereton has already started to speak with our main creditors to try and gain agreement on payment.
• How on earth are we supposed to manage payments to staff, players and suppliers needed in the coming weeks? Rumours of advance payments from the RFL of next years funding have surfaced, but we probably don’t have the cash to pay them going forwards in the long term if we are already looking at setting up deals with existing creditors, unless there is a mass influx of cash from season ticket sales, which will be very difficult to believe being high given the massive uncertainty hanging over the club.
• The clubs existing credit rating is horrendous (Well, that of Bradford Bulls 2017 Limited). From one credit agency, you are advised to offer zero credit, our rating is 0D (Poor), and High Risk. 3 CCJ’s remain unsatisfied (2 from June, 1 from late September), all for not what you would call significant amounts of money (6k, 1k & 2k). There may be legitimate reasons for not paying these I would add.
• The next accounts are due to be filed at Companies House (y/e 31/01/19) by the end of this month. A little more information may be there, but as the club publish unaudited abridged accounts, there’s not too much to play with and interrogate. What the last accounts (Y/E 31/01/18) did show however, was that Creditors: amounts falling due after one year were a value of £675k. Without further detail it is impossible to understand what makes up this balance – it will most likely be loans to individuals / organisations – possibly the RFL, who knows…….. Also, when those amounts are actually payable (or have been paid) is unclear…
• The last accounts showed Creditors : amounts falling due within one year to be £115k. If this has now risen to £500k it may be a shift from Creditors greater than 1 year to current, as per the point above
• Issues with Pensions payments have been declared as an “administrative error”, I’m hoping that is the case, and it’s not a case of robbing Peter, to pay Paul……(see above 2 points)

So in summary, from the outside in we are clearly in a mess financially, and I suspect there’ll be a few more skeletons coming out of the cupboard if previous administrations are anything to go by….

Re: Bulls Takeover : Wed Oct 16, 2019 11:49 am  

Bully_Boxer wrote:

I assume Wakey had the benefit of quite a bit more central funding income though?

Spot on Bully. There is to a large extent no meaningful comparison between the two businesses in regard to the incoming income streams.

Re: Bulls Takeover : Wed Oct 16, 2019 11:53 am  

Bully_Boxer wrote:

I don't see what how the rumoured debts can be cleared in 1-2 years.. how do we go from racking up huge debts to turning a profit and paying them all off in 2 years.. all sounds a bit fanciful to me.

Not sure if you listened to the Full Eighty Minutes last week but I said a large chunk of the debt will be addressed by selling our young players (Rowan Milnes, Matty Storton) and those more established (Joe Keyes).

I still stand by the term I used which was asset-stripping but what else can CB, KH and MS do? Chalmers has left a car crash behind and it's either sell these assets to repay the creditors or administration number five.

Re: Bulls Takeover : Wed Oct 16, 2019 11:55 am  

Bradford Badger wrote:

Apologies now for the long post, but might be of interest to some.

In terms of “cutting our cloth accordingly” there are far too many elephants in the room to us on the outside to understand where any cost cutting can be made.

• We are led to believe that opening and maintaining Odsal for RL cost the club circa £500k per year. Clearly moving away from the money pit makes good sense, and believe it or not, if that is true, Andrew Chalmers may actually have saved the club from administration (although it does not seem like the case at this time).
• Moving to Dewsbury will cost us £2k per game – when you consider the options of staying at Odsal, makes clear sense. What it does not tell us however, is the lost value of advertising, match day hospitality revenue, likely attendance drop etc, so the £2k cost will in “real” terms, be considerably higher.
• Where will our junior and reserve teams play? Again, what costs will be additional to this now we have “moved out”.
• Should we run an academy and reserve side next year? In order to receive funding towards the academy from the RFL, I believe we also have to run a reserve team. Does the receipt of funding, and what is now the annual sale of upcoming talent to SL or more wealthy sides, cover the cost of running such an outfit. At first guess I’d say almost certainly not. It would however be a very unpopular decision to see the scraping of our junior set up that has helped produce recent talents in the current GB Lions squad of Jake Trueman, John Bateman, Elliott Whitehead, Tom Burgess (and the rest unavailable or not selected). Unless the academy is self-sufficient, how can it be a justifiable expense at this time? It’s horrible to say, as I worked in previous years on the BullBuilder board, and they have done many fantastic things for the club, but without seeing the numbers first hand, I don’t see how the existence of the academy can continue in its current guise.
• Do we need to move to a 100% part-time playing staff? Clearly this would be a cheaper option than operating any sort of hybrid squad we currently use. Any full-time contracted players would need to agree to any change in terms, or accept some form of pay-off for the remainder of their contracts – again, an added expense to the list.
• Cash is king. Companies can make shed loads of losses and operate absolutely without problem provided they have the cash available to pay wages and suppliers. Clearly we are not cash rich as we once were in our hayday.
• Managing our existing creditors is key at this present moment in time. All it needs is a few of them to play ball and go through legal proceedings and any takeover will hit the floor pretty quickly. It is interesting to read that Chris Brereton has already started to speak with our main creditors to try and gain agreement on payment.
• How on earth are we supposed to manage payments to staff, players and suppliers needed in the coming weeks? Rumours of advance payments from the RFL of next years funding have surfaced, but we probably don’t have the cash to pay them going forwards in the long term if we are already looking at setting up deals with existing creditors, unless there is a mass influx of cash from season ticket sales, which will be very difficult to believe being high given the massive uncertainty hanging over the club.
• The clubs existing credit rating is horrendous (Well, that of Bradford Bulls 2017 Limited). From one credit agency, you are advised to offer zero credit, our rating is 0D (Poor), and High Risk. 3 CCJ’s remain unsatisfied (2 from June, 1 from late September), all for not what you would call significant amounts of money (6k, 1k & 2k). There may be legitimate reasons for not paying these I would add.
• The next accounts are due to be filed at Companies House (y/e 31/01/19) by the end of this month. A little more information may be there, but as the club publish unaudited abridged accounts, there’s not too much to play with and interrogate. What the last accounts (Y/E 31/01/18) did show however, was that Creditors: amounts falling due after one year were a value of £675k. Without further detail it is impossible to understand what makes up this balance – it will most likely be loans to individuals / organisations – possibly the RFL, who knows…….. Also, when those amounts are actually payable (or have been paid) is unclear…
• The last accounts showed Creditors : amounts falling due within one year to be £115k. If this has now risen to £500k it may be a shift from Creditors greater than 1 year to current, as per the point above
• Issues with Pensions payments have been declared as an “administrative error”, I’m hoping that is the case, and it’s not a case of robbing Peter, to pay Paul……(see above 2 points)

So in summary, from the outside in we are clearly in a mess financially, and I suspect there’ll be a few more skeletons coming out of the cupboard if previous administrations are anything to go by….

Just a word of warning. Don't be fooled like I was by the club's accounts. Andrew Chalmers self audited them and nothing that has been submitted can be trusted as fact.