Exactly, in my opinion we aint got expansion we've got fragmentation.. I care more about the national game more than any other because this is the gateway for revenue streams.
OK we can accept Great Britain breaking up to get the funding from Sporting England, but the RFL will not be satisfied until they see 2 french clubs and 2 welsh teams in superleague, they have also back pedalled on the overseas quota and currently by my estimate there are 140+ overseas palyers in Superleague.
This "expansion model" is not sustainable as this drastically reduces the no of English players available for national selection.

So for me Nige and Rickys "expansion" means fragmentation, shrinkage of national selection and possible future lower attendances in superleague.

So why does he use "everything" to refer to just 20 odd clubs out of the hundreds playing the sport?

So now, by "everything" you actually just mean the England team?
then add a bit of guess work about what the RFL want SLE to do?

yet the amateur game is better funded than it has EVER been. Richard lewis has just sourced £30m funding which goes SOLELY to the amateur game. To say the grass roots of the sport have been ignored is absolute nonsense, They are thriving,

there is RL being player where RL was never played before, outstanding grass roots development in the midlands, south and london. The Amateur game is thriving now nationwide.

The championships dont represent the grass-roots of the sport, they represent themselves, a group of private businesses running RL clubs of a higher level than the amateur game and a lower level than SL.

maybe the championships will start to thrive when some clubs management and some clubs fans realise the game owes them nothing and that what they achieve and their sustainability is down to their hard work, their innovation, their skills and the magic silver bullet of SL money is just a distraction.

If a championship club is wants to and is capable of being an SL club, they will be. Meeting 'criteria' isnt an issue, its a distraction for those who dont really understand the process. A capable and well run championship club will become an SL club because if they are capable and well run they will achieve what they need to achieve as a by-product of being capable and well run

and IF the rules for the last franchise round had been applied fairly neither would Saints (lost yet another bucket of cash AGAIN) nor others have been in SL either!!!

If ONLY!!!!!

Watch the number of amateur leagues in the coming season. See how many teams

a) Fold
b) Get points deducted for not fulfilling fixtures due to player shortages.

Read the BARLA website and all the local league news you can. You think there is infighting at the pro level









If there is £30 mill up for grabs you can bet your life that somehow, someway the Hetheringtons of this sport will get a slice, maybe not directly but they will.

I agree that that the game is expanding and that can only be good news but the game still has major faults and papering over the cracks dosn't mean the foundations are solid.

if you understood the rules, even a little, you would know this not to be true

Average Championship attendances:

[code+------+----------+--------------+
| All | Thursday | Other Nights |
+------+----------+--------------+
| 1693 | 1954 | 1635 |
+------+----------+--------------+[/code

I have no doubt that if there is a way to politicise an issue, cause a ruckus, the f@ck it up Barla would be more than capable of doing so.

The game does have faults, sadly those faults are the same faults that were in evidence ten years ago, and ten years before that. However slowly but surely the old stagers are losing their grip on the sport and we are fixing these problems

As there are a lot of indifferences on this debate, can I suggest we submit our own individual proposals to make the game more stable, stronger and attractive to sponsors etc. etc. etc.

Indifference?


Most of us are pretty happy with how the sport is moving.....there a just a few compulsive moaners.

Thats because the games are cherry picked


You would find the attendances for the televised games were a lot less than they would have been if they had been played on Sunday.

The Thursday night tv exposure is nothing more than a sweetner.

P and R is right and thats that, the fact the most people who dont want it are all in the top tier says it all.

This has got nothing to do with being anti expansion, or luddite heartland emotions, this is about the sports history and dignity, lets see how some of you anti P and R gang feel in another few years.
The do do will hit the fan when some of todays SL clubs start getting locked out. Then people might realise nothing is sacred in SL, its all about money and marketting and less about Sport.

P&R is still here, and always has been.
The change, to what you are used to between the pro leagues (but no others) is that it is not solely dependant on the onfield results of a single year.
I'm far from top tier, about as far as possible BTW.

As to money, well yes, that's why it's called "professional"

The same Bill Fallowfield who also managed to drive the amateur game into virtual oblivion?

Are you aware of the background to why BARLA came into existence?

Yes!

My point was about something else, but you realise though that Bill Fallowfiedl got the amatuer game shown regularly on the box and even did the commentary.

There was a great opportunity then.

It was probably not understood but even now it isn't by most.

Two days away and a lot to catch up on. Well, I'll give it a go!...


Is that the same guy that was in charge when the amateur game split from the professional game? Yeah, he really looked after the game from top to bottom!

The post you have quoted of me was also me talking to maurice.
If you're referring to my other post, then can you explain which part of my viewpoint is blinkered? What's blinkered is the way you think the line of work you personally are in has anything to do with administration in rugby league at national level!


The amateur scene is better than it has ever been, with more funding than ever and more clubs in more places than ever.
The game has spread across Europe more than ever before thanks mainly to Richard Lewis and his role on the RLEF.

So when you say "everything else withers", what is it specifically you are referring to? Because it seems to me that everything is going just fine at the top and the bottom? Or are you one of these hypocrites that have a pop at people for thinking that SL is the "be all and end all" and then refer to the Championships as being "everything else" outside of SL, blatantly ignoring the amateur game?

What you really want to do is sod the amateur game and put that money into the semi-pro game. Isn't that how BARLA started?


You shouldn't always judge people on one past job. If you did, Sir Alex Ferguson wouldn't have had his legacy.

So the winners of the SL GF are not necessarily the Champions. Maybe just have the game as one of the criteria as to whether the actually go through to the next round. So if the likes of Wakey, Cas, Salford are in the play offs they actually have to win by 100 points to offset their failings off the pitch.

The whole of rugby league? Or just the Championships? Because I'm pretty sure there is a lot he is ignoring outside the pro game!


So we're changing the argument now because the last one wasn't working. OK. Well at least you've acknowledged that Lewis has made decisions that affect the pro game in order to vastly benefit the amateur game (to the sum of nearly £30m). So that kind of goes against your "he only looks after the top and sods the rest".

So let's take apart your new argument...
Super League is a European competition. Let's not forget this. It was not founded as an English competition, and the idea behind it was never for it to be an English competition, so you cannot complain that non-English teams are entering. Even so, there are more English clubs in SL now than there was when it was first founded in 1996. You forget that there are still 12 English clubs (the same as before Catalans entered in 2006). So when you talk about shrinkage, what exactly are you referring to? And there have always been overseas players, so don't blame Lewis for that. He's doing his best to get around the legal system so we have to produce more (something that is finally happening). It's not something that you can implement over night, and it's quite ignorant if you think it could be done.
So the whole "vastly reduces the number of English players available" argument is just something you've made up on the spot for the sake of being against him. Not that it matters, because more English players doesn't necessarily mean better selection possibilities. If there are less English players to select but they're playing in a stronger competition, then chances are they will be better positioned to play at a higher level for England. Of course, there needs to be a balance.

Oh, and a nice kicker at the end there as well. "Possible lower attendances". Catalans are doing pretty good for attendances, aren't they? Yeah, they've had less this year but only because they're having their ground redone (and they've been poor). Crusaders attendances have stood up well in their first year. The only reason their average is down so far is because of the two games at the Gnoll. Not to mention they have barely sold any season passes because of the move, so they don't have much of a core crowd yet. You wait until next season.
Unless of course you just mean they don't bring many away fans? Which is a pretty poor argument if they're bringing in considerably more home fans than the smaller English clubs.

Would they?
Are Saints solvent? Yes.
Do they turn over more than £4m a year? Yes.

Where in the criteria does it say they need to make a profit?

Oh wait, it doesn't. Hopefully that has cleared things up for you and you don't need to whinge about things being unfair in this regard now...

Salary cap infringements, ground?

Something which has always happened and will always happen at amateur level in not only this sport, but all sports at amateur level. These are the challenges that amateur sports clubs have and will always have. We can provide funding as much as we like, and create opportunities, but we can't force people to play all the time. Don't pretend it's something that Lewis has done, and don't pretend it is a RL only problem.


Of course they will. They help fund grass roots. The funding will go to professional clubs in some capacity so they can fund community coaches and development officers to work at grass roots level in their areas. These participants will then hopefully in turn become either RL players at a higher level (thus benefiting the performance of pro clubs) or RL fans (benefiting the income streams). But it will also hugely benefit the running of the game at grass roots.

I don't see what you are complaining about (again!).


And so does every sport at grass roots level. No sport will ever be perfect. As long as they're working towards improving the situation (which we clearly are) then it's a good thing. If you don't think RL is doing what it can with limited resources to improve at grass roots then you aren't paying much attention.

You lead the way then...

Which is a fair point. It's not exactly a good argument to say attendances on this day are bigger than on that day if the games are completely different.


You will find that hard to prove. I think they are very similar compared to other seasons similar fixtures played on different days. But you made the point, so you can prove me wrong if you like.


Which if you didn't have, you'd be complaining that you didn't have it (like you did before you had it). Why they feel the need to sweeten those that will complain either way I haven't the foggiest!


So why aren't you starting a thread to get P&R between Championship 1 and the Conference as well? It shouldn't matter if clubs in the Conference don't want to come up or not. The fact is, it is only right that they do even if they're not ready.


Again, this history and dignity thing isn't an argument. It's a filler that people use who lack an argument. The history of the game has seen promotion via criteria throughout. It's nothing new. The game has always had teams being knocked back or kicked out and teams being denied, not only at the top level but at the 2nd and 3rd tiers as well. I don't see you campaigning for them.


No surprise that PROFESSIONAL sport is about making money! If it wasn't about making money, then how would they work as a business? How would the sport work without money? You tell us, because you're the one complaining about it.

What on earth did that have to do with my post, that you quoted?