... Ralph Rimmer.

An inspired choice. Who would have thought after scouring the earth for sport administrative leadership they needed look no further than the Ops Director as the best person for the job. Same old same old.

We are totally doomed, jobs for boys!

Jobs for the boys.

Why would he leave - do the job badly for a few years and you get a £500k pay off....

Just watch the sport fly, now.

I mean, just look how he gets the people of Huddersfield to turn up for home games....oh, hang on.

What a predictably insipid, middle of the road, pedestrian choice.

He is Marks & Sparks courdroy trousers
He is George Ezra & Ed Sheeran's adopted offspring
He is green tea, camomile tea and any other of thay herbal dishwater
He is Gary Barlow's sock drawer

Harsh. Very harsh, miaw.
That's below the belt to Ralph. No man should be compared to the ginger bearded goblin.

Back on thread. What happened to the chance of young Hearn having some input on our sport?

All the better then, that Superleague appointed Robert Elstone, who is a far more knowledgable and experienced sports management executive and has the credentials to take the sport forward.

I can feel a break-away coming

In his short time already he has secured a move to one of the best sporting hubs in Europe for the RFL, has got Hummel on board with the England team kits, and has just landed a £10m investment that he is putting towards the grassroots game.

He's doing a very good job if you ask me.

With Robert Elstone now in place all Commercial aspects of SL will fall to him and presumably the team he will assemble, including TV deals, sponsorship, marketing etc etc. The RFL role is now not as big as it used to be, I guess they will now 'focus' on the international game, leagues below SL and the grass routes - I agree though, hardly an inspired choice.

To be fair on Huddersfield's crowds, at least 90% of the blame there needs to rest with Huddersfield themselves.

The Doc on twitter made me laugh out loud with his spat at the RFL.

He's got a decent website set up for the 2021 RLWC already: https://www.rlwc2021.com/ He's got a proper England RL online shop too: https://shop.rugby-league.com/#

He's got a decent website set up for the 2021 RLWC already: https://www.rlwc2021.com/ He's got a proper England RL online shop too: https://shop.rugby-league.com/#

Quote ="Psychedelic Casual"He's got a decent website set up for the 2021 RLWC already: https://www.rlwc2021.com/ He's got a proper England RL online shop too: https://shop.rugby-league.com/#'" There's £10 of his £1/2m earned already. Way to go!

Quote ="Psychedelic Casual"He's got a decent website set up for the 2021 RLWC already: https://www.rlwc2021.com/ He's got a proper England RL online shop too: https://shop.rugby-league.com/#'" There's £10 of his £1/2m earned already. Way to go!

To be fair I'm sure the RFL had a huge shortlist and spent lots of time interviewing before they gave it to the bloke they know.

In all fairness I don't know the guy or what he has done, good luck to him. It's about time the RFL started getting the game in order I hope he achieves a lot.

Isn't there supposed to be a new structure for superleague on its way from next season , a two division one or something ?

It's all a bit complicated, as Avril Lavigne once sang.

A few years back we had SL Europe where all the RL chairmen managed the SL / Sky relationship and the money. The RFL stepped in and took some of that £ for the lower divisions and focussed their efforts towards repairing grass roots RL eg getting SL clubs to renew their contacts with local clubs, running the SL Academy system, encouraging clubs to bring on their own youth rather than simply buying new players all the time etc etc. I think that was all sensible thinking by the RFL, but......... they neglected / were unable to handle the money side of the RL business. Their negotiated sponsorship deals were very poor ( Eddie Stobart ?) and the international scene - where they could have gained cash from TV rights, was neglected. Instead they farted around with the structure of RL promising that gates would be improved. So Nero fiddled whilst Rome burned and we have had no improvement in attendances with a consequent effect on club finances. That resulted in the SL chairmen becoming increasingly frustrated.

So now it looks as though the SL clubs are taking back control of the money and responsibility for promoting SL and negotiating sponsorship. Part of that might result in a new structure for next year. Unfortunately we now have 12 chairmen who may choose to argue about the best financial way forward as opposed to one body (RFL) deciding the most financially incompetent way forward. Add in the Championship clubs who fear loosing their money from the RFL, not to mention the ability to get into SL, and you can can quickly see that we have a very messy jam pot with lots of angry wasps buzzing around.

That's all JIMO.

I agree. It's so easy just to criticise. I don't know who was interviewed and what went on. Perhaps there are lots on the forum who really know what's going on but in reality there are a few who know nowt ... but love a good moan.

Haha, made me chuckle that...

But seriously, along with what I posted on page1 (secured a move to Etihad Campus, secured £10m funding from outside investors for grassroots RL and got Hummel on board with the national team too), he’s making a lot of positive moves for me

I might have posted two seemingly insignificant websites above, but it’s two things we didn’t have previously. We are counting down and promoting the 2021 WC now, last time round we never even got a sponsor and tickets didn’t seem to be promoted until the year leading up. And we’ve not had an England RL online store before, it’s better than not having it.

The move to the Etihad Campus, where the Institute of Health & Performance is already on site and soon-to-be MMU Sports Institute University opening on site in the coming years (as well as Manchester Rangers who have long term SL plans playing on site too), could be huge for this sport! If the RFU had secured that move we’d have all been saying what a wonderful opportunity it was for them and how much further ahead and forward thinking they are over us. But we’re the ones who got that move to Manchester