The game needs to strengthen at home before doing anything else. We have 12 sides who currently average 8,500 attendances...we need to figure out how to get that to 15k, which in some cases will mean sold out games and events becoming hard to get to.
Badging a team "Liverpool" and hoping that works is just another "magic fairy dust' idea that the game is often so reliant on. Magic weekend is the only thing we've stuck with and it makes money for the SL/RFL.....everything else is chopped and changed and never given time to bed down.
Before we start dropping pins in far off exotic places like "that there London", sort out Wakefield, Leigh, Salford and Huddersfield...get HKR and Castleford over the 10k average....get Wigan, Leeds and Saints filling their stadiums and then and only then, look at expansion.
Toronto was doomed from the start because it was built on Sand.....Newcastle are doing it right, as London started to eventually do to, but let's get the fans back to games in the pit villages first......find out why the 13,000-17,000 Leeds fans won't jump on a bus to Watch their side play Wakefield. Find out why the good folk of Wakefield aren't interested in watching THEIR side.....sort that out and the Sponsors and TV companies will take note!

The product has to become a lot better for any fighting chance of getting the gates up like that.

I'm not sure how that happens with the current salary cap. The standard year on year keeps declining.

Far from the best post it was nothing but a "wish list"..........

The goals were fair enough but absolutely nothing in terms of how we get there, except we need a "cunning plan"..........

Such a call for a "plan" immediately intimates the wealthy and experienced businessmen who own the clubs, people who have done well in business, commerce and Industry....
.........and their staff at the clubs especially marketing, are all useless.

They are not.

Current salary cap is about £3 million behind Rugby Union and soccer has no cap. If we want decline scrap the cap and go back to one club with all the best players, winning everything. Maybe it's an idea to have an even cap without top clubs able to skew the competition with Marquee allowances - are any of them "marquee" anyway?

Is it the overall "standard" that is the point, or is it the one sided nature of games, when big club meets small....Do we look to make all games competitive or do fans used to seeing their clubs walloping others every week walk away? Do wakey get a few more fans if they win more games but Saints lose thousands if they aren't dominating.

It's a very difficult thing to find the balance and you never know, we may actually have the right balance now.

I've a feeling the clubs see mileage in going all the way with the repeat fixtures of all play each other three times with a 10 club league. The bottom line may not be that fans attending games don't prefer this, but SKY and their audiences do...Because that is where we are at giving SKY what they deem to be the best product and that's another Wigan.v.Saints, or Hull KR.v. Hull rather than Salford against London......

The individual chairmen of each club are not useless or, they wouldn't be sitting in the big chairs at their respective clubs.
However, it's pretty clear that self interest for themselves and their respective clubs, is not taking the game forward and hasn't done for the last few years.
WE haven't recovered from the 3 x 8 debacle, the last major change, that spectacularly failed.

How and who needs to be on board to take the sport forward isn't clear but, what is absolutely clear, is that what we have isn't working (understatement).

The game appears to be failing at every level, for SL right down to the community game, with the only positive of the last few years being the growth of the women's game, albeit from a very low base.

All games competitive would be ideal but not if that is means the quality of the games are poor.

A close tight game doesn't mean much if its just two poor teams. One sided games are not great to watch either but the aim should be to bring other teams up rather than drag teams down.

I look at the overall standard and for me SL games just don't excite me anymore. I have seen plenty one sided blow outs in the NRL this season (more than ever actually) but those teams at the top are still putting on quality and I've actually enjoyed seeing such high skill level even if the scores have been one sided.

The Cap too me is too small for the competitions to get better in quality. The only way to improve is with better players and the cap just doesn't allow it.

On the development side of things who was the last young player you saw and was like "wow this kid is incredible".

Full back now is the glamour position of the game yet how many full backs do you see coming through that blow you away? Who was the last? Sam Tompkins?

Sorry - didn’t realise it was dezzies job to come up with a detailed action plan.
As you rightly say they’re goals to aim for. My point was that they’re not just “fair enough”, they’re absolutely spot on and precisely what the game should be aiming for. How we get there is beyond my pay grade but I do know that rebranding, parachuting teams in from god knows where and mergers aren’t the answer.

Since the inception of the salary cap, only 4 teams have won SL, one of which has since gone bust, which ironically, the cap was supposed to prevent. In that time. Players earn even less than they did in 1996 which is an absolute joke. Anyone who think the cap is working support Wakefield or Salford

Exactly it's failed to make the competition stronger and the salaries for a professional sport are too low.

The NRL will continue to try and take the young talent before they have even played SL or just a few games and why wouldn't a youngster go when the salary they'll can earn in this country even at its highest will be much lower than the potential earnings in Australia.

Take it back another 10 years when there wasn't a cap and only 1 more club can be added to the winning list, fans of clubs are getting peed off with the same clubs winning that's the start of the decline for me, your club has still win the odd few when they don't bottle it, so what you whinging at

It's not at all clear self interest is the problem. The problem is Covid isn't it?

You can't go on about the game "not going forward" at a time when there's a pandemic almost destroying it.

The last TV deal was a monster one and the RFL spent it all on a league system that was just nuts, these chairmen have been working on pushing the RFL to one side and clearing up the massive mess the RFL made of the game.

Six SL chairman wanted to ensure Superleague continued at a high level, admittedly some chairmen broke ranks because they were skint including Wakefield. Just saying it's all a mess because of self interest is wrong. The RFL created the mess and Covid compounded it.

Yet your saying Lenegan, Pearson. McManus, Moran, Davey and Hudgell were interested in nothing but their own clubs? It's not true at all. It was the RFL that introduced the stupid league system and blew a massive amount of TV money in doing so.

How can you state ,in the 4th paragraph, that the RFL created the mess,when only in the 3rd paragraph you suggest it was a 'monster' tv deal: it was the RFL that negotiated the tv deal?

Your mate Lenagan then sailed to the rescue.The cost being,salary for Elstone,costs for Private Equity initiative, and the lowest attendance for Wigan Warriors.

Keep on keepin' on....Mind blowin'!

Spot on every other business football, cricket, union, tennis figures now dwarf what they paid in 1996

Ours is pretty much the same!

If it don't grow you go backwards and that's what's happened

The main reason the hearns didn't get involved was the salary cap can't make money if is limited

As much as i would like to see a 14 team Super League that won't happen until we have a better TV deal
I do like the idea all all non televised games kicking off at 3.pm on a Sunday
I like the idea of a maximum of 4 overseas players that will make certain clubs get serious about developing British talent.
All Super League clubs must have academies and those in the championship who aspire to play in Super League as well
I would only have 1 up and down with P & R and a 8 team play off with no 2nd chances.

Like who? All the SL clubs scrape the barrel of local "talent" to the point where hundreds of kids who will never make the grade are signed up to fill out teams for the small number who can make the grade... Before being rejected in their hundreds......

Remove several overseas players per club who have "made the grade" of the NRL and play lads who currently can't cut it in Superleague only weakens the competition.

You was doing so well, came across with a good point about the salary cap.

Then blew it with the childish swipe at Salford and Wakey.

My bad. I forgot to add Leigh to the group of clubs that have benefited from the cap

Happy for the cap to be scrapped, it makes little difference to Trinity either way other than stopping bigger clubs spending their way into trouble and having to sell their ground, or disappearing altogether.

This. The idea that clubs choose to get foreign players when they have perfectly good homegrown players is ridiculous.

The reality is there isn't enough homegrown players that make the grade and clubs need to sign foreign players. Reduce the amount of foreign players and the game will become a lot worse.

.......Disappearing altogether leaving the way clear for trinity to dominate, you're playing 4D chess

Tweeted by Mick Gledhill an hour ago.
The RFL remodelling and structures meeting has just started. The Championship and League One clubs will not be told what their central funding payments for 2022 after delays in talks with the Super League realignment back to the RFL. Hoping to have more updates later on.


I understand that all 36 clubs are represented at the meeting, not sure if the two french clubs are are there. I doubt any decision will be made today.

Not a lot happened today then

Discussions on the future direction of the game have today been held between the RFL and Super League Europe, and clubs from the Betfred Super League, Championship and League 1.

Subjects covered included progress towards the realignment of Super League Europe and the RFL, central funding distribution to clubs, and potential competition structures and new competitions to help grow the game commercially.

RFL Chief Executive, Ralph Rimmer, says:

“We are all – Super League Europe, clubs and the RFL – focused on the future. All of us involved in these discussions today want the very best for their clubs, players, fans and the whole game.

“The collective approach has been positive and constructive, and there will be further consultation with clubs in the coming days.”

Super League Interim Chairman, Ken Davy, adds:

“The emphasis of today’s meeting was to provide a platform for discussion on several key areas of the sport, which can be the catalyst to drive the game forward in the coming years.

“The whole game approach to these discussions is testament to the importance placed on ensuring we deliver a compelling, long-lasting structure for the whole sport.

“The next two years are absolutely vital for the sport. We need to continue to make Rugby League an attractive sport to supporters, broadcasters, viewers and commercial partners.

“Ultimately, this sport is about the players on the pitch, and the excitement and drama they create.“

Super League and the RFL will make a further announcement as consultations with clubs progress.

https://www.examinerlive.co.uk/sport/ru ... e-21190713 be prepared for more loop fixtures if it goes ahead

https://www.examinerlive.co.uk/sport/ru ... e-21190713 be prepared for more loop fixtures if it goes ahead

Utter sh** why not just have 14 team next year, home away fixtures, then 16 the year after, then split into conferences of 8 in 2024 but thats a leap year so have an extra 7 teams from championship for the last 7 1/2 games of the season relegate 3 sides for 2025 season back to championship but alow 2 championship teams to play in super league but only be allowed to play for 50 minutes each week but only on Wednesdays and bank holidays,

then in 2026 there after we can have a settled 9 sides in super league but no teams from WF post code past this date or Leigh ever again but a mini BMX after a 40/20 kick or instead of a drop out must be compulsory. And if its a leap year 15 sides

The game needs a revolution.