It has been a poor season due to the fact that a poor tackle (i.e a tackle where a defender is 'carried' by the attacker) can be mitigated by a series of grapples, holds and locks on the floor. At times the game as become like Greco Roman wrestling.

IMO SL has gone too much from tick rugby - where the likes of limited players like Higham were made to look good, to a wrestle fest.

I don't know what you're all whinging about to be honest.

Yes, we would all like Wigan to be better but looking at SL as a whole, I think this has been a great season.

We can go on and on and on about 'standards' but if every team played the perfect game of RL, then every match should end up 0-0, every team will complete their sets, every team will kick 40-20s off every set and no one will get past defences.

In some ways RL is a pale shadow of its former self. There are no characters, hardly any inventive players, nothing off the cuff (save for Thomas Bosc's double kick through to score) and our players are like robots.

But as was said before, Saints's strong start then collapse has been a joy to watch. Who would have predicted that Huddersfield would do so well? Who would have predicted that Hull and Bradford would do so badly? All our teams are capable of beating anyone else on their day, any one of four teams could have nicked 8 on the last weekend, and there's no daylight between 2nd place and 6th.

The competition is very even these days with no matches being deemed a foregone conclusion before a ball has been kicked. Isn't that what we all wanted?

we had our first major success for 35 years, so not making the playoffs implys there is room for improvement at wire. so no, your wrong that was not what i was saying at all. suddenly you bring finances into the debate, me thinks your trying to prove a point i was not even debating. when it comes to changing criteria, pot /kettle/ pie springs to mind! face facts if wigan were winning everthing you would not have posted this thread at all? as for how the aussies view us, that wiull never change regardless of the state of the game...wich will survive for generations to come! despite your moaning

i so agree with what you've said...spot on!

that makes no sense what so ever! you view the world through pie tinted glassess, i feel that if wigan had played well, you'd view this season differently that's all. tell me i'm wrong and i'll tell you it's an opinion one that you cannot contradict unless you can change history!, i've watched every wire match and all the matches on sky and i enjoyed the uncertainty, the fact that leeds and saints aren't gonna win week in week out, the good and bad. and the ugly aspects of the game. but to quote the aussies stop being a whinging pohm and hope that next season is even better!

I don't care at all hwl the aussies view us. I'm talking about our game compared with theirs. It is about how I view their game compared with ours that I base my opinion on, I'm not saying our league hasn't been as interesting this year because League Freak told me so!

i was not even replying to you! master bates, read the previous posters comments before you lambast me! why would i care what that 'tard says about the english game ffs? your boring me now!

We've had an awful season. We've been dire in parts, yet we've still managed to get in the top 6... I think that does suggest that yes, the league is poor.

Never heard that before

Couldn't agree more.

the superleague salary cap is supposed to make the league more competetive.this season has been the only season since its conception that any team in the playoffs can reach the final .all i can see is superleague is starting to work.

Not sure how it's 'changing criteria' to bring up the financial health of the game in a conversation about whether SL is an improvement on went before it.

To me, financies etc, are a vital issue when you're discussing the state of the game. To you, I suspect it's a part of the subject you don't want to discuss because you know it'll disprove your point.

And don't try to hide behind this Aussie pig-ignorance thing. What they say doesn't really matter. You know we're nothing like the force we were on the world stage in the early 90s, when we came within 2 minutes of winning the Ashes and were even closer to winning the World Cup. The fact that Wigan were dominating the game back then is evidently clouding your judgement about how good British RL was in that era.

The problem with this season is plain and simple and lies at the door of the salary cap....Yes granted its been the most competitve year ever, but in terms of standards the worst as the salary cap has dragged the level of the league down to somewhere not a million miles from a national league level.

The problem is that 8/10 teams will not admit this as either a) they are two blinkered in the fact that they have managed to compete this year because of the salary cap to notice the declining standards OR b) they simply dont care about declining standards because they are finally being competitve. Teams and supporters from Castleford, Huddersfield, Wakefield, Warrington, Hull KR, Salford, Harlequins etc are bound to say the league is better whether it is or it isnt simply because they have all had their best seasons for years and have been able to compete.

Unfortunately as majority rule we're stuck with the cap, and this is the reason the majority voted against an increase in the cap this year.....they would all rather be playing in a competition that is more like the national league than the NRL and be competitve than challenge themselves and play in a comp more like the NRL with 5/6 super teams. The majority of SL lack ambition.

You only have to go back 5 years to see the decline in standards....while the SL as a whole couldnt compete with the NRL, at least 5 teams could have competed and/or beaten NRL opposition on their day.....yet look at the position now....IMO there isnt one SL team that would get close to an Austrailian side at the moment....look at leeds in the WCC for a prime example yet they have been head and shoulders the best team in SL all season!!! Sydney Roosters have just finished bottom of the NRL if they were to play Leeds next week IMO that match would go either way!!

The problem with the current decline in standards in SL is it is self perpetuating.....standards worsen so that international RL becomes less and less viable, and it isnt an option to play the aussies in any meaningful game as it just destroys the credibility of the game.

Therefore, to keep everyone interested and to keep the league going we further reward mediocracy with a stupid play off system which includes teams who have lost more games than they have won!! WHY? because everyone needs something to aim for. In order sports the top of the league are champions while the remainder play off for positions in the league to enter world and european competitions to keep the interest alive for those who cant keep up with the top of the league- yet we create a circus of a play off system because there is no other competition to motivate teams to play for but the super league because a world or european tournament isnt viable due to the fact the aussies / kiwis etc would obliterate us!!!

Unfortunately SL has been reduced to a standard not much better than NL1....competative yes, but this year has seen some of the worst quality and most boring rugby for years!!

Exactly, nobody is complaining about the league becoming more competitive, it's the standard of play that is concerning. Even the 2 best teams in the comp would get smashed by their teams of 3-4 years ago.

The league is even-ing down, not up, IMO.

Hmmm, wasnt the original point of the salary cap to stop the lower teams spending too much and going bankrupt???

Super League is not starting to work in the slightest. There's only been a handful of games this year on TV worth watching and (although this IS due to Wigan's performance) the games Ive managed to get to have not generated the same excitement as the last few years (nothing to do with results but the skill level on show.)

I dont want Wigan or any other team to win every game or every cup BUT I do want "Super" games full of skillful players being paid what they deserve. I'd love a competitve league but, like in Australia I'd like one thats competitive for the right reasons.

I hoped the point in the Super League was for other teams to catch up to the levels that Wigan Saints and Bradford were at 13 or so years ago instead of dragging these teams down to the same level as the so called lower clubs.

To say Super League is working is a blinkered view held by fans who put their team above the game. Our international side has become weaker and weaker every year since the salary cap came in and I'd love to see another World Club Challenge in the format of 1997 then we'll really see if the "Super" League is working...

This is just absolute tosh. Superleague is better than ever. The game has however changed. John Wilkin writes a very good article in the times about how rule changes have sloweed the game down. timesonline.typepad.com/rugby_le ... eague.html The salary cap is working the rule changes are not. I watched hundreds of wigan games from early 80's to mid 90's and it became so tedious to win every week. Let's keep the competition up but change the rule back

This is just absolute tosh. Superleague is better than ever. The game has however changed. John Wilkin writes a very good article in the times about how rule changes have sloweed the game down. timesonline.typepad.com/rugby_le ... eague.html The salary cap is working the rule changes are not. I watched hundreds of wigan games from early 80's to mid 90's and it became so tedious to win every week. Let's keep the competition up but change the rule back

Quote ="wigsey"This is just absolute tosh. Superleague is better than ever. The game has however changed. John Wilkin writes a very good article in the times about how rule changes have sloweed the game down. timesonline.typepad.com/rugby_le ... eague.html The salary cap is working the rule changes are not. I watched hundreds of wigan games from early 80's to mid 90's and it became so tedious to win every week. Let's keep the competition up but change the rule back'" Actually you can't have watched hundreds of games from early 80's to mid 90's and become bored by us winning every week. We were not as dominant as you're trying to portray, go back and look through bilko's site if you don't believe me. You must have missed Widnes's back to back league championships in 87/88 and 88/89, or 'mission impossible' in 90/91 when Widnes could have won it agian, or it going down to points difference with Saints in 92/93, or the 3 way points difference decider with us bradford and Warrington in 93/94 (the same year we were utterly spanked against Cas in the Regal final, and pushed us within 4 points in the premiership final)

Quote ="wigsey"This is just absolute tosh. Superleague is better than ever. The game has however changed. John Wilkin writes a very good article in the times about how rule changes have sloweed the game down. timesonline.typepad.com/rugby_le ... eague.html The salary cap is working the rule changes are not. I watched hundreds of wigan games from early 80's to mid 90's and it became so tedious to win every week. Let's keep the competition up but change the rule back'" Actually you can't have watched hundreds of games from early 80's to mid 90's and become bored by us winning every week. We were not as dominant as you're trying to portray, go back and look through bilko's site if you don't believe me. You must have missed Widnes's back to back league championships in 87/88 and 88/89, or 'mission impossible' in 90/91 when Widnes could have won it agian, or it going down to points difference with Saints in 92/93, or the 3 way points difference decider with us bradford and Warrington in 93/94 (the same year we were utterly spanked against Cas in the Regal final, and pushed us within 4 points in the premiership final)

Actually I did go to that many games. What a ridiculous comment.

Missed 15 games home or away between 84 and 94. Even went to the sevens the locker cup and the Isle of man games. Turned up at Workington once for a friendly when Hanley got six when there were only about 50 Wigan fans there.

From 89 onwards 90% of games were 40 point plus massacres. Yes it was exciting when all the players were injured and there were about ten games in a month (not exciting for the bank balance though) and occasionaly there were tight games.

Widnes had a couple of good years before they virtually went bust. Granted they were good opposition. Having one other strong team doesn't make a good league though.


Don't get me wrong it was great Rugby to watch and it was great to win everything but as you get older you realise that but sport is a competition not an exhibition.

But week in week out it was pure dull.

A great example turning Bradford over by over 70 points in a challenge cup semi at Burnden Park

As for the JPS game at Headingly that wasn't exciting we were expected to murder them and got spanked. But no excitment before the game because we knew we couldn't lose to that shower.

So if you did go to so many, how come you're saying most of the games were 40 point massacres, because quite simply they weren't - go back and look at the records if you don't believe me. Yes there were some massacres each season, but there were also some games where we got spanked, and plenty of other much closer games. For example that same season we got spanked by Cas in the regal final, we also got spanked by them 0-46 away, lost 22-35 away at featherstone, lost away to wakey, hull, hull kr, sheffield - we ended up winning the league on points difference in a 3 way split with Bradford and Warrington, and we won that because our defence was so good overall, Bradford had actually scored 4 more points for.

Honestly i'm not trying to have a go, but truly your recollection doesn't stack up against the actual week in week out facts. Bilko has done some tremendous work on his site, and it's a great resource, go back and look through the week by week results.

What you seem to be saying here is that, as a Wigan fan, you'd sacrifice your club's dominance for the sake of the game overall. A laudable standpoint, but while your club's dominance has certainly been sacrificed, I'm not sure it's done the game much good.

There were some positive spin-offs to Wigan being the top side for so long. To start with, they set standards based on the NRL rather than on the stone-age British rugby of the 1970s, and other clubs had no choice to follow. Thus the British game came on in leaps and bounds due to Wigan's dominance. In addition, there was the glamour factor, which wasn't just confined to Wigan, though Wigan started it at that time; this attracted many big-name players to the British first division. For a brief time, some of the best players in the world were plying their trade in British RL. And if you don't think that matters, look at the strength added to the Lions by the likes of Martin Offiah, Jonathan Davies, John Devereux etc. Around that time, GB were as close to beating Australia as they've ever been since the early 70s. As well as that, the game needs characters to attract the attention of the media and the wider public. Even RU converts who didn't work out - the likes of Scott Quinnell, John Gallagher, etc - still attracted a lot of publicity. Foreign internationals like Inga and Botica had a similar impact. Even foreigners who toyed wth the idea of converting but never actually did - Jonah Lomu, David Campesi - brought us to the world's attention. We had our own home-grown names - Offiah, Edwards, Lydon. All these people were well known far beyond the confines of RL, though under today's circs I doubt that any of them would even be in RL. Most likely, thanks to SL's salary cap, they'd all be at Sale

I don't wish to reopen the salary cap debate, because these days it serves Wigan as much as anyone else in that we've no longer got bottomless pockets, but it's been an integral part of Super League, so it's relevant to the conversation. Yes, it's been instrumental in levelling out the standards of the teams, but there is an argument - as illustrated by recent Test match results - that these standards have been levelled down.

That may be okay for some pundits if it means they get more evenly matched games on Sky, but IMO there's a bigger picture. We have far fewer players now, and almost none of a standard required to compete with the Aussies. I'd love to be proved wrong on that last point, by the way, but I doubt I will be.

The amount you can pay a player, has no impact on his skill level!

Would paying Sam 80k a week make him a better player?

Its not how much we can pay players that has reduced the skill set, rather what they are being coached.

Look at what was said about Ellis when he went to the NRL, and how much Huds have come on this year, with the same salary cap they had last year.

Whilst im against a wage cap in any industry, it cannot be blamed for the lack of skill in most teams. That is the coach's fault.

It can be blamed however, for very skilled players leaving the game if they get better offers elsewhere.

You may say that hasn't happened much yet. But it's cost us one or two, and several more than that in Australia. (Eastmund is the next one being touted to leave; and we only kept Sam because we were able to up his wages significantly - will we be able to do that next time?).

You're right that we have generally very poor coaching in Britain. But to take action that may prevent you, in effect, recruiting or keeping hold of the game's very best players is short-sighted IMO.

Does anyone genuinely believe that if we'd had an SC in the late 80s / early 90s, the wonderful stars of that era - the Offiahs, Hanleys, Lydons, Goodways, Bells, Mylers, Davieses, etc - would have been in RL for long? I doubt we'd have seen them for the dust.

It would attract more rugby union players to our game or (dare I say it) top Aussies.
We do need the Bostons, Mantles, Sullivans, Offiahs to strengthen our domestic and international game.

I dont disagre with you, I am against a wage cap in any industry, if my boss told me all i could ever earn, was what i was earning now, id find a new job also, but many people seam to think that just paying them more, means we get better players, which is completly wrong.

The only thing that will improve the players, is better coaching, which hopefully by this time next month will be done and dusted, with a properly qualified backroom staff in place.

In terms of competitiveness in Super League then the cap is working. In terms of improving the quality then it's not working at all as the World Cup and no doubt 4 nations will prove.