I think that given the fact the a number of players who are coming to the end of their careers now, only ever knowing RL as a full time professional sport should mean (or at least I hope) more and more home grown, quality coaches should be starting to come through over the next couple of years.

Given a lot of fans have been saying SL has progressively gotten worse the last few years (& some stupidly saying Saints being the worst SL champs & a reflection of the game), does this then mean that British coaches are making the game mickey poor or is it something else?

It's something else.

It's that a lot of fans are stupid/have short memories/just like to whinge. Anyone saying the standard is worse in SL today than say 5-10 years ago needs to go and watch some games again from that period. There were gaps in defences that even I could get through and I make some very strange noises when attempting to stand up these days.

The standard is always improving. Sometimes very slowly, sometimes in different ways and sometimes not by as much as it does down under but it rarely, if ever, gets worse from the previous year.

It may (was, in my opinion) have been better to watch but it wasn't a better standard overall.

You have it right. I think people are confusing standard with style. I dont think the quality of players is the problem but how he game is played/reffed.

You watch a game from several seasons ago and several different areas will lead to a team winning a game. Nowadays is just seems that whoever wins the sole department of controlling/slowing down the PTB will win the match. The outcome of a match seems to reliant on that one issue and whilst an important area of the game it's not one that is exciting to watch.

I'm sure I'm not the only one but I find myself so focussed on what's happening with the tackle/PTB when I watch a match and I honestly can't say I did that several years ago.

I agree with that, the tackle/ruck/ptb has become by far the major issue both for teams and refs. I don't throw all the blame at the refs though (despite there being far too much inconsistency and leniency from the refs in my opinion) I think it's partly just how the game has gone.

The continual increase in player fitness and athleticism has led to far quicker and more powerful defences. Plus the offload and dummy half scoots were such successful attacking tools a few years ago that defences naturally clamped down on them. The increased fitness and athleticism allowing teams to keep a stable defence whilst getting 3/4 men into each tackle.

It's why we've seen problems with obstruction this season. It's been attacks trying to find a way to counter the good defences. The only or best way teams seem to have gone for is to use second man sweep plays with plenty of dummy runners in order to send a load of options at a defender and hope he makes the wrong decision. But that usually means 1 or 2 men running in front of play and sometimes they get the timing wrong. (OT all the fuss over obstructions was almost 100% the fault of players and coaches getting their plays and timings wrong rather than the refs in my opinion.)

To be honest I'm unsure as to how things could be changed to open the game up a bit (I think it does need opening up, whilst games from 10 years ago were of a lower standard they were much better to watch in my opinion), it's why on the Leeds board I suggested bringing proper scrums back, something that I'd been opposed to in the past.

I think the refs clamping down on holding down and interference would help, especially with the new marker rules which I think are good.