Knights' team prize to cap awards time of year

The Knights will be presented with the Kingstone Press Championship One league winners’ trophy at tomorrow’s match against London Skolars, the title being secured regardless of the result.

It follows on from the club’s own excellent annual awards presentation last weekend, as detailed in this column last Saturday. Print deadlines meant we weren’t able to run photos from the evening that day, so we’re running them instead this week, courtesy of club photographer Charles Peart.

There will be two more awards presented at tomorrow’s match too – The Press Player of the Month gongs for July and August.

As reported, Colton Roche won the former, and the latter has gone to James Saltonstall.

The work-a-holic winger got the nod in the poll ahead of James Haynes and Jack Aldous, with head coach Gary Thornton delighted his efforts had been rewarded.

The Italy international, who turns 21 later this month, has been an ever-present since joining York on loan from Warrington in April, scoring seven tries in 15 appearances. That tally includes five in the last five outings, including his vital late touchdown in the comeback win at Hunslet, something which contributed to his Player of the Month accolade.

But it is the amount of dirty work he gets through that regularly stands him out.

Said Thornton: “The forwards must love playing with him because of the amount of work he does for the team, especially coming out of his own area.

“He sometimes does two or three carries in a set of six. As a prop, you’d be loving that.

“I always say, ‘Don’t waste a carry and scoot just to get your stats up – it’s got to be about yards made’. James achieves that.”

As for try-scoring, Saltonstall bagged two in ten games before his recent rally.

“One of the criticisms was maybe he doesn’t get enough but five in five has made his ratio better and I’m pleased that’s coming for him and that his hard work is paying off.”

THE Player of the Month award means James Saltonstall has shot up onto the podium in The Press Player of the Year stakes, giving himself a chance of winning the overall award.

The three bonus Player of the Year points it gleans took the winger to 14, joint-third alongside Ben Reynolds on the leaderboard ahead of tomorrow’s last game of the regular season.

James Haynes may have been pipped in the monthly poll but he too goes joint-third courtesy of his man-of-the-match accolade in the decisive victory at Hunslet last time out.

Reynolds, Saltonstall and Haynes are four points behind joint leaders Jack Lee and Jack Aldous with, depending on how the play-offs go, three or four games to go.

Haynes’ hopes of snatching the top gong, however, have been thwarted by the broken rib he suffered against Hunslet, which means he sits out tomorrow’s match and has only a small chance of being okay for the first play-off tie in a fortnight’s time.

Ryan Backhouse was many people’s man of the match at Hunslet – and indeed took the Championship One Player of the Week accolade – and therefore can count himself unlucky he didn’t get full marks from us, pipped only by Haynes heroics of playing through the pain barrier and indeed scoring the winning goal.

Backhouse, though, gets two Player of the Year points to get onto the leaderboard not before time, while prop Brad Brennan is awarded the one remaining point from that match.

The Press Player of the Year standings: Lee 18pts, Aldous 18pts, Reynolds 14, Haynes 14, Saltonstall 14, P Smith 11, E Smith 8, Roche 7, B Dent 6, Paterson 5, Brennan 5, Presley 4, Morrison 4, Day 4, Pickets 3, Bell 3, Backhouse 2, B Hardcastle 2, Minikin 1, Mallinder 1.

TALKING of awards, and considerably significant ones too, we were given early notice this week of the next annual York RL Hall of Fame sporting dinner.

With Huntington Stadium and Bar 13 being closed next spring’s event will take place on Saturday, March 21, at Chalkers Restaurant, New Earswick Bowls Club. Starting at 8pm, it will comprise a four-course dinner, and a guest speaking turn by ex-international referee Ronnie Campbell plus guests to be confirmed.

Tickets are just £25, so get them early.

Stadium saga not ending yet

SO, it seems the community stadium saga might not yet be over, and not just because new planning permission may be needed.

As reported this week, City of York Council says York City Knights will be able to thrive - and not be financially disadvantaged - when moving into the shared ground in 2016.

But Knights chairman John Guildford, after looking at the club’s contract offer for life at the new stadium, claims they will be much worse off, arguing they will lose vital income by no longer having their own bar/function room.

Public debate is stifled by confidentiality agreements behind the scenes, but what cannot be doubted is that clubs of the Knights’ size need as many income streams as they can get, especially if they ever want to compete in the new-look Championship against some full-time clubs or even go for promotion again in a stronger League One.

We’re not talking millions of pounds here, of course, but could losing this income generator, if that be the case, really be damaging or even fatal for those hopes, as Guildford warns? Is it a bit of posturing by the Knights supremo, trying to get the best he can for his club?

Either way, as fans saw with the closure of the old Clarence Street ground and the not-unconnected demise of York Wasps, moving home can be costly. For several other rugby league clubs in more recent years, shiny new arenas have heralded troubled times.

Doncaster, Leigh, and footballers Coventry City have had strife on the back of it, where third-party stadium management companies are involved. Swinton have become nomadic since losing their own home, once powerful Oldham have ended up at a Whitebank ground that is barely a stadium.

York City appear happy with their side of the deal, but, among all the politicising, rhetoric and argument, ensuring both of York’s professional clubs thrive remains of paramount importance.

ONE constant nagging doubt about the viability of the community stadium remains City of York Council’s decision to create a leisure portfolio for the stadium management company. In other words, to lump Yearsley Grove pool and Energise into the same portfolio as the stadium.

Most people agree the stadium itself is self-sustainable. However, Yearsley and Energise are losing a lot of money. So, will cash made by and for the stadium be used to cover those losses, to the potential detriment of the Knights and City?

It might be good on a local political level to save those centres, but who pays for it?