Dear New Bradford Club Owner,

I don’t trust you.



Please don’t take that personally; after the last five years the only way I’d trust anyone at the helm of a Bradford Rugby League club would be if they were my own mother, or Trevor Foster himself - and even then I’d have some serious questions surrounding funding and logistics.

We’ve been let down a lot, us Bradford fans, over the last five years. We were let down by the original guys, then by the next guy, then very quickly by some other guys, and - just when we thought it might all be ok - we were let down really badly by the last guy. We are hurt, we are angry, and we are suspicious. All we want to do is support our club; we shouldn’t have to feel those things - at least not at the hands of anyone other than a referee.

Now, I’m not the sort who subscribes to the idea any of this downfall has been caused deliberately, or maliciously. I mostly believe that, at the core, people are basically good intentioned - some just have different abilities, or priorities, or perspectives.

However, we’ve now gone a long way past the point of taking chances.

So.

I implore you, here and now, if your intentions in this enterprise are anything other than establishing a solid, competitive, Rugby League club; playing in red, amber, and black; at Odsal stadium; under the banner of Bradford - or if you have any doubt in your ability, or resources, to achieve this - walk away now.

Seriously; stop reading, make the necessary phone calls, and leave. I’d rather there be no club for the 2017 season than there be no club at the end of the 2017 season.

I’m sorry that had to be said, on so many levels.

Assuming you’re still reading - and you’ve been honest, with us and with yourself - thank you.

Thank you for putting yourself forward to re-establish a reputable Rugby League club in Bradford. There are a good number of people who would have lost a part of their lives had this not happened, so it is genuinely appreciated.

Still, it was genuinely appreciated from the last three sets of guys too, and you see how that worked out; so, if you’ll forgive us, the mistrust. That’s not going anywhere; not today, not this week, this month, this year, or likely for a long time after that. So if you’re expecting the hero’s welcome afforded to your predecessors - regardless of how genuinely grateful we are to have a partisan interest in the fast approaching season - I’m afraid we’re going to disappoint you.

Instead, we (or maybe I - I’m not arrogant enough to assume I speak for anybody not touching this keyboard) have a few things to ask of you; some more reasonable than others, but the time for being reasonable is more than over.

We’ve been mis-promised openness & honesty so often the words have lost all meaning. We can no longer assume that is what we’re getting, just because you say we are.

Pretty soon I’m sure you’ll be giving out a statement, or hosting a fan forum, where you lay out your plans and intentions for the coming season, and the seasons beyond that. I’m not really interested in hearing words anymore. What I would be interested in, with respect, is some of the following.



The Business Plan

You had to submit one to the RFL, now submit it to the fans. There’s no need for smoke & mirrors, you’re not planning a Soviet takeover of Chinese cyberspace, you’re leading a Rugby League club with no like-for-like market competitors. Stand behind yourself, and publish that document.

The Business Plan B

I assume, as part of that plan, you have income and expenditure projections. Do me a favour, grab a big red pen, find any numbers listed under income dated before 2020, and cross them out. Now show me how this club still not just survives, but grows. Show me you have the resources to cover that. Please tell me you do, because the last guys seem to have budgeted for whole lot of occurrences which only had middling chances of happening, and the situation has deteriorated dramatically since then. If you have any figures based on regular crowds numbering four digits, there’s a good chance this isn’t going to last long.

We don’t ever want to hear any sentence resembling ‘the fans need to get behind this if…’; we’ve done our part - over and over and over again - you’ve fought for the right to do this, it is up to you to do it. Show us how that’s going to happen.

The Business Plan C

What are you going to do if you begin to fail? What are your markers to measure this failure? What are your exit plans? What is in place to stop a fourth administration, or a second liquidation? Show us your provisions. Show us how to not come back here again.

Communication

There was an incident late in 2016 when our owner took a holiday as the team played at Post Office Road in what will go down in history as one of the most important games of the club’s entire history. Then, in the aftermath of that catastrophic loss, he saw fit to make plain his annoyance at being forced to interrupt that holiday and make a statement for worried and impatient fans.

The day you do anything like that to us, I will drive to Odsal and change the locks myself.

We are going to be needy and unreasonable, almost infant-like in our craving for constant communication and reassurance, and we will make no apologies for that. What you can offer in this area will be absolutely integral to rebuilding relationship between fans and club, and that faith in the future.

Can you tell me that your plan includes provision to handle that?* I’m talking weekly public Q&A sessions; total and absolute openness. Not a single thing which happens behind closed doors will be trusted, not for a long time yet.

While we’re discussing communication, whoever does take this responsibility**, I’ve some suggestions for phrases to avoid, and how they may be better substituted:

Has Bradford in their blood. / Is good at the job we’ve hired them to do.

Bad day at the office. / We were poor, this is how we plan to improve.

Back where we belong. / Solvent, and making steady growth.

Administrative error with the payroll. / We have no money.

Super League needs Bradford / I’m drowning in my own nonsense.

We’ve been Bulls a long time, our Bullshit detectors are pretty precise these days.

Reputation

Whatever name you end up giving the new club, to the rest of the Rugby League community it will be mud.



Our club, for all we love it, is a disgrace. It has short changed endless small businesses, the taxpayer, and - while I don’t hold with any special treatment claims - has taken up RFL resources which could (probably wouldn’t, but could) have been much better used elsewhere.

The final straw of being allowed to continue in the Championship with an almost meaningless points deduction - as if nothing had happened over the last two months, and the five years before them - is abhorrent.

There is no respect left for a Bradford club, and there is very little pride left in being associated with it.

Of course, we need a plan to put the club on solid ground as a business, and as a competitive team, but we also need a plan to be able to walk amongst the wider community without bowing our heads in shame. No more claims of deserving, or mistreatment, or proud history, or being a big club. We have to earn a new respect, and we have to do this with humility, and with reverence to the other clubs around us.

Please show me we have the philosophy right, because the philosophy has been so very wrong, for so very long.

Future

The one thing Bradford has been endlessly successful in throughout, is producing future stars of the game. The list of names is long, and is known by Rugby League followers around the world. That the club itself couldn’t hold onto these players is one level of shame, that it should stop producing them at all is another altogether.

Please show me that at the very top of your planning documents is printed, in large capitalised Day-Glo letters, the importance of protecting and nurturing the systems and people which have made this happen.





The list probably goes on, and other folk likely have other things to add, but you haven’t even taken office yet - hell, you haven’t even officially been named yet - so there’s no point in over-egging things too soon.

I hope you’ve read this, and I hope - even if you feel dismissive, and rightly so, of the naive and patronising tone my emotion has allowed to seep into many of the above paragraphs - you at least appreciate the sentiment.

We are the fans, this is our club.

You have been given stewardship of our club.

We are grateful, we wish you well, we wish you really really well.

But we can’t trust you.

Please show us we can trust you.

Please keep that trust.

Please.

This time.









(*My CV is ready to go, by the way, just let me know the email address.)

(**Seriously, Odsal is just an hour commute from my house.)

