So what if more than one team qualifies? Theres nothing to stop the qualifying clubs going boom and bust mid way through the season in an attempt to better their qualifying rivals. On top of that you'll have struggling Super League clubs going boom and bust trying to avoid that bottom spot by splashing the cash on a wave of mid season signings.

Basically you'll still have the P&R mentality pre-2008 which worked wonders, didn't it?

2 SL clubs have gone bust since P+R was removed (one of them twice), both languish at the bottom of the table - it makes no difference if you get relegated or not, clubs still have to spend money to be succesful!

Definitely the franchise system, for the long term future of the game.

All these new grounds springing up are a direct result of this system, as are the much improved youth development structures, particularly within those clubs that have previously been up and down like yo-yos, and had to rely on short-term signings to try to either gain promotion or avoid relegation.

as yourseIves then

Exactly, the franchise system is encouraging teams to strengthen across the board which in the long run can only be a good thing.

P&R but with minimum ground standards, a bit of a izastion of both.
The RFL would understand about that.

I'd have a mixture of both, 3 year point added up, lowest going down, that 1st season is always going to be a killer for whoever comes up.

If we'd got p&r then Cats wouldn't be fifth now. And I don't think that would be a good thing. No promoted team would ever get above being a yo-yo team.

So why not address the difference in salary caps rather than introduce a ridiculous franchise system?

I'm not sure the RFL has £10 million to spare to bring the Championship salary cap up to SL, and reducing the SL salary cap would be a disaster.

Franchising for the medium/long term until there are 14/16 top flight clubs who are sustainable and relatively competitive on and off the pitch. Plus a Championship where at least 4 or 5 clubs are capable of replacing SL clubs. At that point and only at that point should P&R be re-introduced.

If we still had P&R clubs would still be throwing money at imports, paying lip servce to youth development and possibly even less time to ground improvements. If it wasn't for the license system would Saints, Salford, Castleford and Wakefield be building or looking to build new stadiums? Would we have extended Craven Park?

Too many second rate Antipodeans in the whole of UK rugby-RFL and RFU me thinks.

If it was up to me I'd have a play off between the Championship winners and the Super League bottom club and judging by Batley, Leigh and Halifax's performances against Super League clubs in the cup, there could be a close game.

In a game for Super League survival? A fully pro team versus a semi-pro team? £1.6m versus £300,000?

The Championship club would be mullered. Every time.

There might be a 1.6 million salary cap but how many teams in super league are actually fulfilling it?

I reckon that if you were to put Leigh/Featherstone v Wakefield/Crusaders, there wouldn't be much more than 2 tries either way.

Franchising hasn't stopped Clubs overspending either has it?

I voted for P&R though I wanted to say 'other'. And it would be the best middle ground compromise there is. It occurs every second season...

Promotion and relegation...there is no arguement or debate in my eyes

Spot on. I've already made those points, which are always ignored by the pro-P&R brigade.

I think I favour the franchise system at the moment as it does seem to allow spending on youth, stadia etc. An earlier poster mentioned keeping the above until there were several teams/clubs at the bottom of SL/top of Championship who may be interchangable. This would be a good thing. Only way of telling tho', would be the Challenge Cup and that depends on the draw and is subject to freak results etc. Bit of a bummer, really...

Wow where`s the link to that.

What year did framing the future come into being?
What`s the overseas quota for SL clubs including exemptions ?
Youth structure.......Chuckles .... NRL pension funds from certain clubs.

HOw on earth can any Championship compete with the money the SL clubs get, if the money was shared between the team in all three leagues we would see fairly.

Correct
Promotion and relegation doesnt work it doesnt do anything other than allow one crap club to be replaced by another crap club. oh and make the Ar$e end of the league look exciting in the last month of the Season........

franchising is an excellent idea it got Cas and Wakey off their backsides embarrassingly shuffling planning applications around in an effort to look good then they got told that Licences can be taken away if they dont pursue the works........ great stuff, so we will have two more new stadia as a direct result ...

the onlything wrong with Franchises is we look like dicks with the welsh farce. Plus Londons a bit crap too and should be ditched but somehow we bend rules for them.......

How many Championship teams are able to spend the full Championship salary cap? Obviously not Leigh for a start. Even if the bottom SL club were only spending half the cap and the top Championship were spending the full cap there would still be a huge gap of half a million pounds. Not to mention the larger overseas quota. You simply cannot have a playoff game like that when the leagues are so far apart in terms of the rules.

I think in a game to determine their survival in SL that Wakefield or Crusaders (even in their current sheeeet position) would stick 40 or 50 on Leigh or Fev.

So almost twice as many people favour P&R over other ideas.

Maybe the RFL should do some ground work with regards to what their consumers want?