Bradford face threat of administration

Odsal Stadium
27 March 2012

Bradford will be forced to enter administration if they fail to raise the £1million they say they need to rescue the cash-strapped Stobart Super League club.

The Bulls revealed they have run out of money and have warned they need to reach at least half their target in the next 10 days in order to keep the club afloat.

Bulls chief executive Ryan Duckett said the club's financial problems reached crisis point as a result of a decision by the Royal Bank of Scotland to cut their overdraft facility ahead of payments due to HM Revenue and Customs.

The club's players received their March wages last week but Duckett was unable to offer any guarantees over future payments when he addressed them on Tuesday morning, although he remains confident the club will survive.

Duckett told Press Association Sport: "We felt we had to be proactive to address some of the issues rather than letting them escalate and that's why we've gone out with this radical message.

"We're appealing to people's passions. If they don't get behind it, there might not be a Bradford Bulls. It's a serious situation and it's taken a lot of people by surprise, including staff and players.

"But in the four or five hours since the news broke, the response has been fantastic, the phones have been red hot. The passion showed so far and some of numbers pledged to donate make me feel very confident we're going to get through it."

The Bulls have launched a plea for all fans to pledge £100 to help save the club.

The appeal on the club's website states: "If every 2012 member pledges to donate £100 or more, if you possibly could, then we can make it - and the club can move forward - debt free - unlike many other sports clubs, enabling us to deliver our long-term business plan which has home grown players at its heart."

The club have called for all pledges to be made by 5pm on April 6 as they bid to raise the £500,000 they say they need to carry on.

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Create Account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy policy .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in