2015 holds probably the biggest changes to Rugby League's structure since 1996. Potentially we could see Rugby League in the most radical structure of any leagues, and we will at least see the allure of relegation to liven up the competitions bottom.

What's everyone hoping to get out of the restructure? Everyone's preferences? Personally I think 12-12/8-8-8 is the best system that can deliver competitive matches throughout. It'll also allow continued improvement for clubs.

How do you get that? how are the top 4 part time teams going to compete with the bottom 4 full time teams?

A SL of 10 teams playing each other 3 times will increase the weekly intensity with a three year licence, then a lower league of 10 with an opportunity to apply for a licence in yr 3.

How the hell can the games governing body be trusted to award a licence ?
Although the current system does have some plus points, especially the introduction of young British players, the farce of grading the 14 SL clubs is just an embarrassment.

Apart form that, the 2 x 12 and 3 x8 is a done deal :CRAZY

There are people who still favour a licensing system?

Really?

Licensing if done properly is the best way forward imo

1 up, 1 down for me.

The split is a just another RFL "innovative fantasy land idea"

I found it very interesting the other week on SL backchat that (Gareth Walker i think) said that the RFL spent 90 minutes discussing and explain the "split" option to the championship club, yet spent a few minutes explaining the other plans. I also heard that the RFL promised extra fund to the championship clubs if they vote in favour of the split.

If the RFL are so hell bent on getting this idea through the door, why didn't they tell everyone what was happening in March instead of dragging it on for months. I'm all for having an all game debate, but quite frankly it was never a debate, it has just been months of the RFL trying to convince the clubs to go a long with their idea. Then if/when it goes belly up, the RFL aren't accountable as they will claim the other clubs voted for it. The RFL are desperate for this idea to go through, but won't have the nuts to put their head on the block and make the decision themselves.

I don't think it will work, the second league under the "super 8" will be a disaster, the championship/part time clubs like Featherstone, Sheffield, Halifax won't be able to compete as they will still be a part time team. The relegated clubs won't really be bothered about playing for the trophy as it means nothing. I know some people keep saying as a player, you always want to win any trophy. Players don't pay bills, fans do, and will fans want to pay money to see their side comfortably beat the part time clubs, then try fight it out for a "taking part cup"

As a fan i would not be interested in watching that, it would not entertain me. I would not be bothered if my team then won the trophy of the second tier, the team have not achieved anything.

I would support them and go to every game still if they were relegated to the championship however.

P&R would be OK if the lower tier were all FT but as they are not the promoted team simply morphs into the relegated team from the higher league not sure what that really adds.

If the last century is anything to go by, Wigan will continue winning Challenge cups.

Great less ft clubs and the chance for some poor sap to yoyo up and down. The chance to see ft clubs thrash pt clubs for half a season. Can't wait!

If they want to reintroduce automatic P&R then they should do it properly, that being straight one up-one down. Yeah, clubs would go bust, we'd have totally unsuitable clubs in Super League, the standard of the league would go backwards and the sport would be ridiculously unstable, but that's what P&R is all about. Don't introduce some contrived BS, either keep the successful and logical license system that exists at present or introduce automatic P&R and allow things to run their course.

Licensing could have worked if the RFL had actually enforced the rules on a few clubs and be seen to be fair. Licensing has enabled teams to develop and play youngsters without threat of relegation, it's made several clubs improve or build brand new stadia. Licencing did done good stuff, but as with everything the RFL do, they never stuck with it.

Yep, add me to that list.

Until you have two full leagues of Fulltime professionals P & R in any format wont work. Licensing, if done properly, is the current and only way at the moment that the Sport can stop free-falling. The awarding of licenses has been very suspect but the benefits of bringing new stadia and young players through has made up for it.

Like to see the split option trialled for 2 seasons, for me first part of season would have more intensity than what we have at the moment.
Second part of season might see one part time club breaking into top 12 the year after, Featherstone for example.

I'm not overly concerned. But stating the rfl should just impose a system shows a lack of comprehension about what the rfl can and can't do.

The chairmen control the game.

The rfl can't impose a system even if they wanted to.

That power was sold at the advent of SL.

Looking at the pros and cons of both licensing and P&R, for me licensing, whilst far from perfect, has been the better option. It has delivered a league with reasonable quality from top to bottom and genuine competition with the lower teams beating the higher ones often enough to prevent any over confidence, or to put it another way, basically there are no real 'easybeats', as the old [and presumably future P&R systems seem to throw up.

I do wonder about how season ticket holders of the clubs who get thrown into the division with championship clubs are going to view the 'value' they get from their tickets with all the clearly very uncompetitive games that will bulk out the back end of the season. I know from past experience that whilst it is OK to win the odd game by fifty odd points, it does pall quite quickly and leaves you wanting some competition for the points.

This kind of statement really irritates me when discussing the games changes. Supporters of licensing always talk about boom and bust like it happened every year, realistically how Often did it happen during P&R??? They are always quick to use examples, Martyn Sadler even used one 20+ years ago.

Yet they always fail to mention that 4 clubs have gone bust in the short spell of licensing. Wakefield and Bradford may have gone during in P&R anyway. But you see my point.

The game was in good shape and kept on improving IMHO, I feel we have stagnated during the license system, yes clubs have shiny new stadiums, but they are less people watching and much less intensity matches and quite frankly some embarrassing performances.

If you want to see London win another 10 games over the next 3 years, then vote licensing. Personally I don't, I want to see competitive rugby.

I pay for my season ticket to see what happens on the field, not read in the paper what happens in the board room.

If you only 10 licences then London would not get one - and if they did they would have a much stronger squad than the one know of never-was-bees ex NRL players.

I'm all for licencing or even full on franchising if we had 10 or 12 clubs worthy of being in such a league but we dont,we only have 5 or 6 at most.
All licencing has done is protect failure and bring standards down

I don't really like licensing because no matter how badly the likes of London play every week, they have a pretty good chance of being kept up anyway. I think with teams like Widnes licensing has been good for them because they have slowly built up and they have a decent enough fan base, But ultimately if licensing is going to stay it needs to be less teams. Even losing 2 awful teams means theres a bit of extra cash to spread about and help other clubs possibly compete more. It can work if done properly. Which would mean the RFL pulling the plug on london too and admit they are flogging a dead horse.

P & R would be good in a sense as it would give the lower teams a kick up the back side and a reason to perform every week and try and win. (of course I'm not suggesting teams don't try to win now... but there's effectively a lot less on the line for clubs at the bottom at the moment if they lose)

The bad thing with P & R is it's most probable the team who comes up will just shoot straight back down again and spend every week getting tonked. The only way to change that is to pump more money into the championship, which is never going to happen.

Have we had the full info on what happens after the split into 3 x 8 set up.
At a rough guess if the season starts mid February, then depending on cup ties, the split will be mid August.
It isn't practical for each group of 8 to play each other home and away so I assume they'll only play each other once, which isn't very balanced.
Will we still have a play off?
Will the play off winners be champs or will it be league leaders.

Apologies if this has already been explained but I seem to have missed it.

S57

Don't know where you get that from; doesn't appear to have done Premier league / Football league soccer any harm.

Both divisions in football are full time and get millions to pay staff with. A bit different to Wigan and Batley.

This year London, Salford, Widnes and Castleford would have split to join Fev, Fax, Leigh and Sheffield.
London are the worst team in SL this year without a shadow of a doubt (if not in the history of the comp) and they have comfortably dealt with Sheffield and Fev already....the 12-12/8-8-8 plan is flawed on so many levels, but specifically on the full time v part time basis.

1 Group of players will be at work Monday to Friday whilst the others will be training, recovering in state of the art facilities and being prepared for a game at the weekend.....this is not the Challenge cup where a team will step up for a big game...this is every weekend league fixture stuff.

And that is why the entire proposal is nonesense and as such I cant even believe it is being pushed the way it is. Unless all clubs are full time and get similar levels of funding then it simply will not work. As there is not enough money in the game to raise the salary cap and sustain 14 teams then there certainly isnt to sustain the 24 full time teams that would be needed for this to work.