m.wigantoday.net/sport/wigan-war ... -1-5098595 Lets hope he takes a print out of some of the posts on this board from the last few weeks. As well as a real fans view of the current state of the game it might give the RFL a few ideas.

m.wigantoday.net/sport/wigan-war ... -1-5098595 Lets hope he takes a print out of some of the posts on this board from the last few weeks. As well as a real fans view of the current state of the game it might give the RFL a few ideas.

Well one thing has been stated at Amateur level meetings is that the RFL have admitted YES ADMITTED ! That they have not promoted the sport enough, i hope that this simple admission is a step in the right direction for the sport as a whole.

I appreciate that SL clubs and the RFL have to manage the relevant clubs/sport however please do not continually ignore the paying customers views as there is a lot they can do to both help and hinder the sport.

Please RFL work with us (Fans), we know we cannot do everything but we can have a damn good try !

The specifics will be the interesting thing.
That's of course if we are ever told what has been discussed, which is a major part of the RFL/SL's problem.
IL is right that we can improve, including Wigan. For instance, our captain re-signed on a five year deal some time ago but the club did not inform the fans! This was massive as Lockers is such a vital part of the club and the squad.
There are too many features implemented which are unpopular throughout the game yet the RFL/SL persist with them.
Until they open regular lines of communication with the games supporters then things will continue to hamper the progress of our sport.

Didn't want to create a new thread on the same lines but Hull FC had a fans forum last night and a few snippets regards the future of SL were released: viewtopic.php?f=34&t=540005&tsmp=1352366818&start=60 Quote ="tommyfromhull"Just got back too. The club has an unbelievable buzz about the place, the players, owner, coach, off-field progress, everything. Brilliant. Main points were: -Chase, Prince and Miller were only ever our three targets. -Prince was 99.9% signed. Looking for schools in Hull for his kids. Brisbane offered big offer at very very last min. -We're still on the hunt for a 7, but have taken a "back-step" from signings. -Away shirts out in Jan. =#800000-Promotion/Relegation and 12 teams in SL looking likely. -Only was England can improve is by playing Exiles and having more players in NRL. -Ellis is a beast. Whiting is champion and always in Gentle's 17. Galea has point to prove. -Seymour is staying. Gentle sees him as a 6, with him, Heremaia, Horney and Holdsworth all potentially playing in the halves. -AP is the man. He genuinely wants Hull FC to be the biggest and best in SL. Wants 7-8 Hull based players in the team. =#800000-RFL are a farce. '" Quote ="Staffs FC"Interesting when AP said he thought that some SL chairmen might finish up on the Board at the RFL. Wonder if he might consider it ?'" viewtopic.php?f=2&t=540019&tsmp=1352367241&start=20 Quote ="number 6"intresting to hear tonight at a fans forum held by hull fc, wigan and leeds were strong advocates not to raise the salary cap! pearson also stated that the previous regime in charge should be embarrassed with the last sponsorship deal with stobart with the widnes owner/chairman strongly to blame for a very poor decision costing clubs valuble income, even went ot say that the vikings chairman could've been mistaken as a representative of stobart!'" Interesting!

Didn't want to create a new thread on the same lines but Hull FC had a fans forum last night and a few snippets regards the future of SL were released: viewtopic.php?f=34&t=540005&tsmp=1352366818&start=60 Quote ="tommyfromhull"Just got back too. The club has an unbelievable buzz about the place, the players, owner, coach, off-field progress, everything. Brilliant. Main points were: -Chase, Prince and Miller were only ever our three targets. -Prince was 99.9% signed. Looking for schools in Hull for his kids. Brisbane offered big offer at very very last min. -We're still on the hunt for a 7, but have taken a "back-step" from signings. -Away shirts out in Jan. =#800000-Promotion/Relegation and 12 teams in SL looking likely. -Only was England can improve is by playing Exiles and having more players in NRL. -Ellis is a beast. Whiting is champion and always in Gentle's 17. Galea has point to prove. -Seymour is staying. Gentle sees him as a 6, with him, Heremaia, Horney and Holdsworth all potentially playing in the halves. -AP is the man. He genuinely wants Hull FC to be the biggest and best in SL. Wants 7-8 Hull based players in the team. =#800000-RFL are a farce. '" Quote ="Staffs FC"Interesting when AP said he thought that some SL chairmen might finish up on the Board at the RFL. Wonder if he might consider it ?'" viewtopic.php?f=2&t=540019&tsmp=1352367241&start=20 Quote ="number 6"intresting to hear tonight at a fans forum held by hull fc, wigan and leeds were strong advocates not to raise the salary cap! pearson also stated that the previous regime in charge should be embarrassed with the last sponsorship deal with stobart with the widnes owner/chairman strongly to blame for a very poor decision costing clubs valuble income, even went ot say that the vikings chairman could've been mistaken as a representative of stobart!'" Interesting!

=#FF0000We pay the smc 500k a year rent Bulls pay the rfl 90k a year rent WTF posting.php?mode=quote&f=34&p=17182663&tsmp=1352368100 That makes the Wigan deal at the DW look very good indeed.

=#FF0000We pay the smc 500k a year rent Bulls pay the rfl 90k a year rent WTF posting.php?mode=quote&f=34&p=17182663&tsmp=1352368100 That makes the Wigan deal at the DW look very good indeed.

Quote ="Rogues Gallery"=#FF0000We pay the smc 500k a year rent Bulls pay the rfl 90k a year rent WTF posting.php?mode=quote&f=34&p=17182663&tsmp=1352368100 That makes the Wigan deal at the DW look very good indeed.'" Yeah noticed that but couldn't remember the rate we paid.

Quote ="Rogues Gallery"=#FF0000We pay the smc 500k a year rent Bulls pay the rfl 90k a year rent WTF posting.php?mode=quote&f=34&p=17182663&tsmp=1352368100 That makes the Wigan deal at the DW look very good indeed.'" Yeah noticed that but couldn't remember the rate we paid.

Talk about being totally underwhelmed by that. He won't say what he wants to push for. It's all a big secret and so the rest of the article is speculation.

As to the prospect of P&R returning this is just more tinkering around the edges. How will this get any more money into the game? The last time we had it relegation was a financial disaster for a club and any efforts made to assemble a squad based on home grown players was set aside as clubs tried to being in ready made players to avoid the drop. If they did produce any players they lost them as they all became free agents once a club went down.

What they really want to look at and focus on is one thing - getting more money into the game. Period.

If they could do that then they could start considering things like P&R again. Maybe they could subsidise NL1 so they could have a bigger salary cap and relegation would not be such a financial problem. It would just be a sporting issue as it should be not cause clubs to have the team dismantled.

I hope the Chairmen at the meeting don,t read the news in the Sydney Morning Herald while
they are eating their cornflakes,otherwise they will choke on them.

The news out of Sydney this morning is that the NRL players Union have had several meetings with regards to getting the NRL Cap increased,thereby giving them increased wages.
At present it is a max of $5 million per club,the players are asking for as much as $6.2 million. The clubs say it will stay at $5 million and some clubs may have to move players on.

The NRL are to give each club a grant of $7 million for the coming season and this will be reviewed at the end of the season.

Of this $5.85 million is to cover the cost of wages for all grades at the club,the balance of
$1.25 million is to cover the cost of restructuring in the clubs,which the NRL is calling for.

Talk about Princes and Paupers,the difference between the British RL and the NRL is like asking the football Conference to compete against the Premier League.

Quote ="MattyB"Didn't want to create a new thread on the same lines but Hull FC had a fans forum last night and a few snippets regards the future of SL were released: viewtopic.php?f=34&t=540005&tsmp=1352366818&start=60 viewtopic.php?f=2&t=540019&tsmp=1352367241&start=20 Interesting! '" It will be interesting to see which teams the other chairmen will want to throw out. If Lenegan wants Toulouse in SL that would mean 3 teams getting the chop. I have a feeling this could get messy. It just sounds to me that we're going to go back to how things were before franchising, it all sounds very 'progressive' Not a fan of P & R either, but it seems the flat cappers have got their way.

Quote ="MattyB"Didn't want to create a new thread on the same lines but Hull FC had a fans forum last night and a few snippets regards the future of SL were released: viewtopic.php?f=34&t=540005&tsmp=1352366818&start=60 viewtopic.php?f=2&t=540019&tsmp=1352367241&start=20 Interesting! '" It will be interesting to see which teams the other chairmen will want to throw out. If Lenegan wants Toulouse in SL that would mean 3 teams getting the chop. I have a feeling this could get messy. It just sounds to me that we're going to go back to how things were before franchising, it all sounds very 'progressive' Not a fan of P & R either, but it seems the flat cappers have got their way.

Does seem odd that under P & R Widnes would not have got into SL.
Also now they are in, if there had been P & R they'd have been relegated.
How P & R will help the game by increasing revenue or levels of competiveness I don't know.
Widnes had 16 - 18 months notice and still couldn't compete, so how is a club with 3-4 months notice going to compete? Answer, they are not!
If the RFL/SL want to increase revenue they first have to start with their existing competitons, SL, Challenge Cup, Play offs and Grand Final.
So lets see what they come up with in that regard.

Whilst we are at it, there's a headline on the BBC site with regards to the RFU plans for their world cup in 2015. www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-20220920 Quote The RFU is to invest £26m at grassroots level to capitalise on a predicted increase in interest around the World Cup, with £1m being allocated to train 6,500 new referees and coaches and recruit 5,000 rugby volunteers by 2015.'" Quote With this new internal harmony, the RFU has set out to refresh its sponsorship strategy during 2012, signing new deals with Canterbury, BMW, and O2, among others. Mr Ritchie says this new clarity at the RFU has enabled it to sign fewer sponsorship deals than before, but which run "narrower and deeper" throughout the organisation. "The BMW and O2 deals are not just about sticking a banner around the stadium," he says, pointing out that those deals also include fan, community and academy strands to them.'" The gap between the two sports set to widen even further.

Whilst we are at it, there's a headline on the BBC site with regards to the RFU plans for their world cup in 2015. www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-20220920 Quote The RFU is to invest £26m at grassroots level to capitalise on a predicted increase in interest around the World Cup, with £1m being allocated to train 6,500 new referees and coaches and recruit 5,000 rugby volunteers by 2015.'" Quote With this new internal harmony, the RFU has set out to refresh its sponsorship strategy during 2012, signing new deals with Canterbury, BMW, and O2, among others. Mr Ritchie says this new clarity at the RFU has enabled it to sign fewer sponsorship deals than before, but which run "narrower and deeper" throughout the organisation. "The BMW and O2 deals are not just about sticking a banner around the stadium," he says, pointing out that those deals also include fan, community and academy strands to them.'" The gap between the two sports set to widen even further.

£1 million to train 6,500 referees and coaches, works out at £153.85 each do you think they've got their figure correct?

Quote ="MattyB"Whilst we are at it, there's a headline on the BBC site with regards to the RFU plans for their world cup in 2015. www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-20220920 The gap between the two sports set to widen even further.'" Most, if not all of that grass roots cash is likely to be their Sport England funding (or whatever it's being called this week). Last allocations were RU £31.2m RL £29.4m. Lets not slit our wrists just yet.

Quote ="MattyB"Whilst we are at it, there's a headline on the BBC site with regards to the RFU plans for their world cup in 2015. www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-20220920 The gap between the two sports set to widen even further.'" Most, if not all of that grass roots cash is likely to be their Sport England funding (or whatever it's being called this week). Last allocations were RU £31.2m RL £29.4m. Lets not slit our wrists just yet.

Here's an idea to make SL better IL. Stop voting to preserve the CC, get your hand in your pocket and get some Marquee players back into the game.

It's this kind of player that used to get us excited at Wigan. No-one want's to watch mediocrity, no matter how much the "average" player may or may not have improved.

It's players like Boston (who, let's be honest would probably get picked up and dumped on his arris by someone like Hall, as wingers have changed since "his day". This is exactly the point I am making though, for in "his day" he was exceptional, a player who would bring in supporters and excite the crowd. It doesn't matter that in absolute terms he would now be playing for Leigh, in his time he was standout). It's exactly this relative argument that holds today. Supporters want to see stars, stars relative to their contemporaries. A better standard of player leads to a very dull game if every player is at "that" standard.

This holds as much for any sport as it does RL, and is one of the prime reasons why the CC is flawed, but that's another story.

I'm not actually sure of the point that IL is making (if indeed there was one at all) in that article.

What a waste of two days.

Let's have a meting to discuss the last meeting.

What a waste of two days. Let's have a meting to discuss the last meeting. www.sthelensstar.co.uk/sport/100 ... _s_future/

What a waste of two days. Let's have a meting to discuss the last meeting. www.sthelensstar.co.uk/sport/100 ... _s_future/

Quote ="Rogues Gallery"What a waste of two days. Let's have a meting to discuss the last meeting. www.sthelensstar.co.uk/sport/100 ... _s_future/'" All clubs with reps on four different working groups? So four fourteen man (at least) committees with each clubs rep no doubt trying to look after the interest of their club? Isn't this just four times worse than it is now? The clubs need to agree with the RFL to a structure and the qualifications to be in SL and then completely back off and agree to be governed by it. The clubs need to be dictated to. Instead with reps on all four committees this is just another way of ensuring their continued involvement and they need to realise unless their clubs are up to snuff their clubs continued involvement does not mean this is what is best for the game as a whole. This is just another way to see things like a salary cap increase voted down.

Quote ="Rogues Gallery"What a waste of two days. Let's have a meting to discuss the last meeting. www.sthelensstar.co.uk/sport/100 ... _s_future/'" All clubs with reps on four different working groups? So four fourteen man (at least) committees with each clubs rep no doubt trying to look after the interest of their club? Isn't this just four times worse than it is now? The clubs need to agree with the RFL to a structure and the qualifications to be in SL and then completely back off and agree to be governed by it. The clubs need to be dictated to. Instead with reps on all four committees this is just another way of ensuring their continued involvement and they need to realise unless their clubs are up to snuff their clubs continued involvement does not mean this is what is best for the game as a whole. This is just another way to see things like a salary cap increase voted down.

That is, without doubt, the biggest load of garbage I have ever read on this forum. You obviously never saw Billy play. He was world-class then and would have been world-class today. An all-time great of the game, who would not be "dumped on his arris" by anybody from any era.

Quote ="Rogues Gallery"What a waste of two days. Let's have a meting to discuss the last meeting. www.sthelensstar.co.uk/sport/100 ... _s_future/'" The most worrrying part of the non-event is this: Quote No firm decisions were taken on future policy but RFL Chief Executive Nigel Wood said the discussions with the clubs were a fruitful and positive contribution to the ongoing Policy Review [uthat he is leading[/u.'" I wouldn't let Nigel Wood run a bath.

Quote ="Rogues Gallery"What a waste of two days. Let's have a meting to discuss the last meeting. www.sthelensstar.co.uk/sport/100 ... _s_future/'" The most worrrying part of the non-event is this: Quote No firm decisions were taken on future policy but RFL Chief Executive Nigel Wood said the discussions with the clubs were a fruitful and positive contribution to the ongoing Policy Review [uthat he is leading[/u.'" I wouldn't let Nigel Wood run a bath.

We need strong leadership (almost dictatorship) in the game right now. Sadly it's not going to happen.

I actually think we need someone from outside the game to take on that role.

Richard Lewis?

Quote ="MattyB"Didn't want to create a new thread on the same lines but Hull FC had a fans forum last night and a few snippets regards the future of SL were released: viewtopic.php?f=34&t=540005&tsmp=1352366818&start=60 viewtopic.php?f=2&t=540019&tsmp=1352367241&start=20 Interesting! '" Also, the bit about the only way England can improve is by having more players in the NRL? What a lazy and short sighted thing to say that is. Surly, the long term goal has to be to improve the standards in SL and for the clubs to produce a higher quantity and better quality of English players, and to improve junior competitions?

Quote ="MattyB"Didn't want to create a new thread on the same lines but Hull FC had a fans forum last night and a few snippets regards the future of SL were released: viewtopic.php?f=34&t=540005&tsmp=1352366818&start=60 viewtopic.php?f=2&t=540019&tsmp=1352367241&start=20 Interesting! '" Also, the bit about the only way England can improve is by having more players in the NRL? What a lazy and short sighted thing to say that is. Surly, the long term goal has to be to improve the standards in SL and for the clubs to produce a higher quantity and better quality of English players, and to improve junior competitions?

That might make sense to most people on here but this is the RFL we are talking about! The things you mention are perfectly sensible but would mean changes and (say this quietly) spending money on the game.

Or just send the best of out talent to the NRL and let them improve them - a much cheaper option! Job done.

Uncle Mo didn't go down well as a dictator, boy do we need someone like him (or him 30 years younger) now.

To be fair its not just the RFL involved in these decsions. Its the people running the clubs as well.