KEIGHLEY Cougars co-owner Ryan O’Neill has spoken exclusively to the T&A about some of the burning questions around his departure.
He and fellow co-owner Kaue Garcia will step down at the end of the season, marking an end to nearly eight years of the husbands being at the club.
They insist that Cougars will be left in good hands and that their new venture, Keighley Town, will be looked after too, though the football club will have to play elsewhere for a period.
The news of O’Neill and Garcia’s upcoming departure came off the back of a dire 50-16 defeat at Goole Vikings on Saturday.
Keighley conceded nine tries to their struggling hosts, making it a fifth Betfred Championship defeat in a row and seeing them slip to 14th in the 20-team table.
While O’Neill is not concerned about the future of Cougars once he and Garcia leave, he is concerned about the future of the sport, with many Championship clubs in particular suffering financial hardship, with the route to Super League basically closed off.
“In fact, there have been changes and investment into the non-playing side of the club which means it is in a very good position for the future.
“In regards the sport, yes I am concerned about where it is at and where it is going.
“The Championship seems to be a dead duck and there’s no opportunities for clubs to go beyond the status quo.
“The artificial manufacturing of teams, such as the York/Newcastle link up, and the crazy amount of super league loanees to Championship clubs, means that you never know who you are playing.
“Just last weekend we played Goole who had 5 Hull KR Super League players- were we playing Goole or a Hull KR mark 2?
“It means for blow out scores against authentic teams who build their own squads, which reflects badly for them, and just makes the whole thing look like a farce.
“Dare I say IMG….?”
We wondered if the investment O’Neill and Garcia have put into Keighley Town, formerly Eccleshill United, would be affected and perhaps even put the football club’s future in jeopardy.
But O’Neill said: “Keighley Town is progressing well.
“We have a fantastic chair in Charlie Wysocki who, along with (manager) Des Hazel and (coach) Ces Podd, are getting everything lined up.
“We’ve been incredibly fortunate to have them, and it has taken less involvement from us than what we have with the rugby.
“Any new owner of Cougars will be agreeing to security of tenure for Keighley Town FC, and that will be crucial to any discussion we have with interested parties.”
Keighley are aiming to lay an artificial surface at Cougar Park to ensure the pitch is not ruined by having rugby league and football on it.
It will affect Town rather than Cougars, with O’Neill saying: “We have back up plans to play some football games at Bradford (Park Avenue) during pitch construction.
“The construction will be around two to months, so we have it all timelined and organised around that.”
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