Yes this year's squad was good enough to stay up.

I hope next years' is as well, I'm sure your club will be contesting the middle eight final next season hopefully not against us.

No disrespect intended at all, but I'd be extremely surprised if Wakey aren't also in the Middle 8.

I think he means he hopes that Wakey will be too good to be playing in the "million pound game" that will be between the lowest SL club and the highest Championship club.

Looking at the way squads are shaping up I think Wakey have the thinnest squad on paper in SL. They're the team that the Championship top 4 will be targetting I reckon. Still, a lot of water to go under the bridge before then.

Therein lies the rub. I haven't a clue what you are talking about. What a (to coin a Halifax Blue Sox programme) retarded system. However I've now refreshed my knowledge based on the snappy RFL explanataion that:

"In The Qualifiers, the top three clubs after seven matches will play in Super League the following season with the final place determined by the Million Pound Game, a play-off between the clubs finishing 4th and 5th. The loser of the match will join the three remaining clubs from The Qualifiers and six Championship Shield clubs in the Championship the following season."

So, if we finish third ig ask, I know we avoid the play off..and Wakey get an easier game...

Salford, Hull, Wakefield, Hull KR or maybe Widnes may be playing in the 8 next year with us, London, Leigh and Fev or Fax, Donny or Sheffield IMO.

Looking at the way squads are shaping up in SL I’d say Salford should be safe given their squad and backing. Hull should be safe but I think they’ll be in the middle 8. Hull KR have lost a lot of players and not announced replacements yet so a lot depends on that. Widnes got in the top 8 so you’d think they’d be safe. Wakefield got some good results and have a decent first 17 if Smith signs. If they get a few injuries it looks less sure.

I think our best chances versus SL opposition based on current squads are versus Wakey and maybe the Hull clubs. Despite that both Hull clubs were clearly better than us this year so we’d need to show quite a bit of improvement. Beating Wakey is a more foreseeable prospect.

I either never knew, or have forgotten, where this 4th against 5th game is played - I guess at the ground of the 4th placed club, or is this too logical given that I'm still gobsmacked that Big Nige didn't wait to announce the points format until around next may?

If the two clubs competing for the 4th versus 5th place are known within 14 days of the final fixtures being played within the middle 8, then the team finishing second will ballot the 1st team (at the time) to ascertain whether they will choose the 7th and 8th placed club to hold a raffle on the side to be placed at 'home'. The side losing that vote, thereby deemed 'away' gets to chose whether they play home or away, unless the team finishing 3rd in the middle 8 could in theory finish top or 2nd, in which case they must decide if the 6th placed club can go forward to an elimination decider whereby 4th and 5th placed clubs play alternately home and away for successive weeks at a neutral venue.

Imagine if a team from the champ (not necessarily us) did well enough in the round robin to find themselves in 4th place in the middle eight after the weekly rounds were over, but then lost this farcical 'million pound game' and were denied promotion as a result.
It just seems like a complete gimmick to me, almost as if the RFL wanted this new system but were afraid to lose the equivalent of a championship grand final, so they just came up with this rubbish to try and have the best of both scenarios.

I hate the concept, and what annoys me further is that if we are ever to get back into SL, we will probably have to make it through this 'million pound match' to get there.

Sky and the RFL will get their drama, but spare a though for the losing side. How on earth are you meant to budget for the future when your best laid plans can be dashed by the outcome of 80 minutes of rugby. Ridiculous.

It's a good thing to have hope.

That's actually not as bad my worst thoughts - lets just hope nothing finishes up going to court..

I haven't quite got my head around it, but am I right in thinking that it [icould[/i be four up, four down?

I've long felt it was a system worked out with the basic intention of retaining the status quo. As I've said before, the advantage given to the better sides in RL is much greater than in soccer, for instance; RL is very unforgiving game. Much as it very rarely happens in RL, it's still much easier for a lower division team to win a one off cup game than in a league format. I retain hope only because we are remaining in full time training and still have, at east half a super league team. But this minor advantage disappears if we don't go up this time round as we become accustomed to championship football. Let's hope for the best.

In theory. In theory if I trained really [ireally[/i hard I could jump over the moon, I guess. It would be a bit like you and your 3 best mates all winning the lottery with separate tickets, on consecutive weekends.

TBH, I feel this whole concept is just purely to provide the illusion of promotion and relegation and I base that on the obvious stacking of the deck against the Championship clubs.

They are being asked to compete against teams with both a higher salary cap and a larger overseas quota. It's like putting Floyd Mayweather in a boxing match against Wladimir Klitschko.

I feel that in 2015 the Bulls have an advantage in terms of crowds and income. We've got a decent swell of fans and the BOD are doing a top job in building back the trust of those fans. But at the same time, promotion MUST happen this coming season as I feel it will be much harder for the club to achieve promotion in 2016 as I feel that we are likely to lose players like Gaskell and Ferguson if we don't make it back into SL at the first ask as well as hamstring those fans who've been burnt too many times in the past.

Bad guess, you couldn't. Just to escape the pull of Earth's gravity you would need to be able to run at 11.2 km/s (approx. 40,320 km/h, or 25,000 mph). Now, given that the top speed reached by Usain Bolt is 30 mph I reckon the additional 24,970 mph might be an improvement too far.

And that speed just gets you into orbit. Not to the moon.

Overseas quota is same for SL and championship. Whether championship clubs can afford to use all the available quota places, particularly if their part time is a separate issue.

Surely, once you are in orbit, the moon is there for the taking?

200 miles down, 249,800 to go. You need a big fekkof rocket motor, else it's ever decreasing circles till ya crash and burn

Ok Sheldon

I was allowing for Stevo's momentum rule..

We dont want anybody getting hurt when you drop down the boards in a few hours

Poor quality trolling

Look Starbug, us lads [n lasses in the championship should stick together and watch out for our enemies in super dooper league. You're wasting time on here when you should be on the Wiggin or Sentellens board telling them to watch proper rugby league and not that nouveaux riche shambles at Old Trafford. Chop chop!