The Lonely Bull

The story for me begins Sunday 15th February 2015. The first game of the Championship, Leigh Centurions vs Bradford Bulls, the current Championship Winning team against the once mighty Bradford Bulls recently relegated in the Super League reshuffle from 14 teams to 12. A beautiful crisp and sunny February day with 7,449 fans willing to see their team win at all costs. For Leigh it was a gauge to see how their promotion ambitions would fare against a recent Super League team, for Bradford Bulls, this was a chance to put the noisy upstarts in there place. The atmosphere was absolutely electric.

The story unfolded as per the article from Yorkshire Post. Leigh were down at half time 6-20 with the Bulls rampant in the first period. The game was marred by violent niggly play by both teams and cards were flourished at regular intervals. In the end Leigh stormed past by Bradford with relative ease, but all who witnessed this game had seen a fantastic spectacle of two teams going at it tooth and nail. A modern day rivalry was started on that day, and it would be Leigh who would have the upper hand throughout. Bradford would get revenge that season and it was they not Leigh who eventually competed for the Million Pound game. In achieving that one game of 80 minutes Bradford had gambled big style, running a team at a loss in the attempt to return to Super League at the first time of asking. In many ways this was the beginning of the end.

The London Broncos chose the other route and have slowly build a team strong enough to finish 2nd in 2016, The Centurions dusted themselves down and built a stronger team that no longer resembled the Championship winning team of 2014. Instead it contained 13 internationals and a team of gnarly veterans and bad boys. Bradford in contrast would go backwards, with inconsistent form and financial problems.

The Golden Age of the Bradford Bulls came into effect with the advent of Super League and they would eventually win 3 Grand Finals. Looking back with hindsight at what cost was this achieved. 2012 - 2017 has seen an assortment of maladies Administrations, Relegation, and Liquidation. Despite the rivalry of the last 2 years it is sad that the Bradford Bulls no longer exist but the club has been mismanaged for a very long time and for some reason I think the biggest issue is the ground itself. Odsal is an expensive millstone around their neck, and a new stadium or a ground share would be a better option.

The recent decision by the RFL to keep a place open in the Championship for Bradford is wrong, it is based on the RFL having a stake in Odsal. Demoting them to Championship 1, would reduce income for a newly formed team and would make Odsal under the current terms non-viable.

The RFL should be fair to all it's members and they should have a standard set of punishments. Other clubs Oldham, Gateshead etc have been exiled to the lowest league, so it is wrong for them to be given special privileges.