The promotion and relegation system does not work. Championship clubs cannot make it to Super League against even a weak Super League team with a much higher salary cap.

Major corporate sponsors are not interested in funding a sport which has a tiny geographical profile, in this case along the M62 corridor.

The only way rugby league can become popular and get funds at the level of the NRL at least, is to drop P & R and institute franchising with a truly national and an international perspective.

The franchises should be awarded to clubs which have a 10,000 seater minimum stadium and an active junior competition. The best clubs to award franchises to, from the perspective of TV deals and national and international sponorship are:

Wigan
St Helens
Warrington
Leeds
Bradford
Hull FC
Calder United

London
Newcastle
Sheffield

Catalans
Toulouse

Toronto
Montreal

The competition should be renamed Atlantic Super League.

The Canadian teams will have to be stocked with Antipodean and English players at the beginning (as is now planned). Within ten years they should have a majority Canadian player roster thanks to development of Canadian juniors, as now exists with French players at Catalans, and should also exist with French players at Toulouse. The same methods should be used with new USA team ventures.

Future franchise additions to the initially 14 team competition should come from southern England, Wales, France, and the USA. If there is a sufficient player pool there should be no fear of increasing the number of teams over time up to 20, or even 24. If the number was to be 20 I would be looking at having one more team from Wales (Cardiff), one more from southern England, two more from France, and two more from USA. If the number was to increase to 24 then I would look at 4 more teams from the USA.

The days of parochialism are over. The game is atrophying in poverty under the Nigel Wood "P & R on the M62" administration.

Only a truly national and international franchise system will attract big corporate sponsors and get the lucrative TV deals that are enjoyed by rugby league in Australia, and by other sports in Europe and North America.

Hi Maurice

I just don't know where to begin.

The teams dropped from Super League (Huddersfield, Wakefield, Castleford, Salford, Widnes, Hull KR) should have a place in a revitalised Championship, that could also include another team from London, one from the Midlands, and two more French teams, as well as Leigh and a few of the better existing Championship clubs.


Toulouse and Toronto are showing the way for expansion. The RFL must follow and become a proactive modern business along the lines that i have outlined.

Try beginning at the beginning.

Bring back franchises!



I'd go for the following...

Subway
McDonald's
Wendy's
Dixy Chicken
Nando's
Spud U Like
KFC

Dunkin Donuts
Starbucks
Taco Bell

YO! Sushi
Hungry Jacks
Red Rooster
Eagle Boys Pizza

Délifrance
Brioche Dorée

There's just too much twaddle to dissect.

And I can tell you now "Calder United" is a non starter.

Last year's challenge cup finalists featuring a French hooker just extinct in Jeans wonderful world

John Boudebza and his team mate Kevin Larroyer could play for Toulouse or Montreal under the new franchise system. That would be truly wonderful.

Chat , get banged.

I'm currently reading a 1000 page biography of adolf hitler but it is all that that has given me a headache...

Swap Huddersfield for Bradford and I am with you all the way

Seriously though why no Cumbrian atoms

I thought licensing was a good model for a majority of Super League clubs.
It gave clubs the chance to blood British talent and build for the future.
Now sport being what it is you are always going to get some clubs who can't compete over a period of time, so when a club in Super League get's into money difficulties replace them with a club from the championship and the Super League club put into the championship.

Pity we can't get some of them onboard as sponsors

What? No 5 Guys? You're talking rubbish

or maybe Super (with minimum away support) League, should be a great atmosphere that.

They all personally sponsor Nigel Wood.

their is a lot of problems with super league but you are not going to solve them go away please the only thing i agree with is drop P&R that makes sense

We get call on being the Nandos Wolves,

Yeah bring back franchise and watch clubs go bankrupt again,remind me how many went bang under your beloved franchise and how many under the current format

remind me again how many new clubs under franchise ? Compared to now were clubs have and want to join ,funny how it's the team at the bottom who want to bring back franchise

yeah let's go back to pointless games after 4 weeks of a season zzzzzzzzz

I quite like the idea of bringing London back into SL - after all it worked so well last time.

They are well placed to get back on merit.
They only need to beat Leeds in the M8's and they will be on their way



Seriously though, the only way for the sport to expand, without it taking most of this century, is to go with some sort of franchise system but, we scrapped that model 2 years ago.
Another piece of brilliant forward thinking by all involved.

Clearly, there needs to be some serious thought on the best way forward for the game and this needs to be have input from clubs and fans alike.

The inclusion of Toulouse, who look pretty strong and 2? Canadian clubs, is exciting but, do we expect them to make the grade for SL or, are we just "waiting to see" what happens.

IF the sport is going to develop and IF we are to have additional clubs in SL from other countries, then there will be casualties from the heartland clubs (or we run with an expanded SL) but, yet again, there is just no dialogue from the games administrators.

Expect the usual "mushroom" style, kept in the dark and regularly fed with s4it"

P+r does not work in RL.

We just seem to love the romance of some of the village clubs being able to make it into SL.

Thank God we don't have one up one down like so many want. We could lose 200k a year spectators that frequent the Rhinos to be replaced by Broncos who play on a park field or a suburb of Wigan.