Maybe I need to double check my history books, but I was always under the impression that play off football has been around a lot longer than the last two years.

Massive point on that one, as I made in my match preview last week. Saints have struggled in most regular season derbies recently (i.e lost all three easter clashes and failed to win any magic weekend one), yet have hardly seemed punished for that. That never seemed to be the way.

well said

the many posts in this thread are pathetic. you don't see these type of posts on NRL fan forums, or the NFL before the playoffs. There's only Man Utd & Man City who can win the premier league, but it doesn't make all the rest of the games meaningless does it.

What a sorry state this game is in

In the PL they have the CL places, EL places and £500k a place to play for as well as the £60m for staying in the league. If a team such as Chelsea lose a few games then they could miss out on the CL places as well as a few hundred million ££s. If Wigan lose to Warrington on Friday they'll still finish in the 8 and still have the chance to win the competition.

Absolutely nothing. I hate losing and would love the bragging rights over Wire. I'll just wait until August or October so as not to look stupid like the whole of RL has when laughing at Leeds the last two years.

The result on Friday will have NO bearing WHATSOEVER on who wins the league.

I wouldn't worry too much. I'd be surprised if there was as significant a drop-away in support as some posters on here seem to think.

Six pages in and there has still been no explanation offered as to why, if the play-offs are the only important matches, they are by far the worst attended.

1 - The format
2 - The cost
3 - The current state of the World

There's 3 for you.

Don't forget Huey, Dewy and Louie ... there's three more.

So you think the format of the playoffs, the cost of tickets and the economy aren't to blame then?

To get all the above the fixtures have to mean something. Where is the sport if you don't know if a side is trying to win the game? Where does pride fit into the rather cynical approach to the league the play off format encourages?

Remember a few years back when Millward put a Saints reserve side out v Bradford? That caused a huge stink and the RFL (ignorant of their own stupid rule change) tried to fine the club.

Yet these days on here we have people who regularly say trying to win the league is detrimental to your chances in the play-offs so the club shouldn't try to do it.

We even have pundits coming out with things like this:

"St Helens are my tip to win the regular season title as there are major doubts about Leeds and Warrington's commitment over 27 rounds of Super League action and Wigan's squad has weakened dramatically since last year. "

The man is basically saying those two clubs don't give a toss abut the league. From here

[urlhttp://www.sportinglife.com/rugby-league/news/article/480/8455300/saints-alive-in-2013?[/url

If the press are saying that who else thinks like that and how will it affect attendances? As I said earlier I don't think Leeds did try and have poor seasons and for that matter I don't think Wire played the numbers game either but if the perception is that is what clubs are doing it will eventually be detrimental to attendances.

If this sort of thing is cropping up in the press then the RFL (and the clubs) need to take note. The bread and butter of the sport is the league but if it is perceived as a waste of time that is going to cause problems.

It's up to the RFL and the clubs to make all the league fixtures competitive and clubs have IMO a duty to entertain the fans over 27 rounds. The aim should be to win both league and GF but there seems to be a growing perception the league is a 27 round qualifier. Maybe double the prize money if you do or just go back to a top five system or something but there [iis[/i a danger the RFL seem oblivious to.

I've already said in other posts that the cost of tickets and recession could well be causing a slowdown in ticket sales. But that's ticket sales for the whole season - in other words for league fixtures as well as playoff fixtures.

I find that a far more likely candidate than some vague idea that suddenly league fixtures don't matter any more. If that was the case, the play-offs would be well attended compared to league fixtures, and they aren't.

I presume that people can't go 12 months without rugby and so they attend the regular season which can be paid for over 6 months. When it comes to paying £21 for the next 4 weeks just for a ticket it becomes an issue. Especially when the games are live on TV and you can have 8 pints or so for that £21 or the result doesn't actually matter because you get another go the week after.

I have no problem with the playoffs at all, but the format needs to change in order to put more emphasis on the regular season like the old top 5 or even 6 did.

The first weeks in the pay-offs are very poorly attended but I don't think it follows it has anything do with how people decide to attend league games or how important they think they are. The current play off format means week 1 has little importance for the top four sides (they will all be in the frame the week after) so I can easily see why some people would not bother to shell out the cash for that. They may view the play-offs of the be all and end all but the format means it is still easy to justify not going in week 1. Even for the bottom four sides who face sudden death I reckon people will wait and see if they get past week one. For a family of four the cost of attending all play-off fixtures is a lot of cash.

I would say people have twigged what are the important play off fixtures so attend those in greater numbers if their team gets into one of these games. If I am right the attendances (or lack of them) are down to the playoffs being as they are and it doesn't follow attendances should be higher because people decided the league doesn't matter.

I don't disagree that the play-off format is awful and needs to change ASAP.

Don't forget the chance that you'll play the same team a fortnight later in a more meaningful fixture.

So we get rid of the play off structure because "it's called league for a reason". (sic)

By midseason the top three clubs break away from the rest of the ladder. What incentive is there for the remaining competition? I don't think you will find a single player who thinks the game on Friday is meaningless. Over the past few years these encounters have been absolutely fantastic. As your Chairman said last week, stop knocking the game and being paranoid about it, just enjoy what is one of the best on field products you will ever find!

It was only a league system from 1974 till 1997 I think. Before 1974 it was a playoff system and 'championship final'. I wonder what league was like then was it all meaningless and boring?

Rogues can you answer this question?

Hallelujah.

I don't know

Perhaps there own self respect to perform for there teams and supporters?

is that not the essence of sport?

The league / championship wasn't all important. There was something to all to play for most of the season - Lancashire Cup, Floodlit cup, Players trophy, League leaders, Lancashire league, Challenge cup, championship play off (top 16 in the latter days).

Hence you had clubs like Barrow, Workington, Fev winning cups and boosting interest in those areas.

As well as a county championship and full tours.

In fact the Challenge cup was seen as the one to win in those days.

So the same reasons as under a play-off system then.

Not this lame old argument again. Why exactly is that a problem? It's called sport and at the moment the philosophy of the top eight play off resembles that behind school sports day where no one is allowed to lose! Everyone a winner. It seems we can't have any losers in RL. Where, given the top eight is so easy to get into, is the incentive to improve so you finish higher up the league?

If you want to give teams who at some point in the season end up no longer being able to win the league an incentive to play on then do as they do in other sports. Offer more prize money for the higher you finish up the league. Or devise another competition they can qualify for and call it, err, the Premiership.

The idea a league is fundamentally flawed and so we have to have a play off system is ridiculous.

make the incentives to finish as high as possible, greater prize money for the higher up the league. Also if you keep the top 8 as it is, then make it that the higher placed team always plays at home as a reward and the home team keep all revenue from the games apart from the final... That way teams will want to finish as high as possible for the financial rewards.

I can. I am surprised you don't know the answer.

In 1973 there was one large division of 30 teams but only 34 regular league fixtures. So a home and away program was out of the question as 58 fixtures would have been required. A play off system was the only way to decide who were champions in such a large league with a lop sided fixture structure.

The whole idea of doing it that way seems totally bonkers to me which is probably one reason why the playoffs ceased in 1974 and we ended up with two separate divisions where a home and away fixture format became possible.

I am sure the RFL recognized that when you have that structure you don't need a play off to decide who was the best team in each division over the course of a season in the same way other sports who operate the same kind of league structure don't.

So you have two systems for two different kind of league structures. If you have a large league where you have an very uneven fixture list you need a play off system. The ARL in Oz was similar also not operating home and away fixtures so it made sense there as well. If you have a smaller league which allows a home and away fixture format then a play off doesn't make sense.

Now the key point is that with the old pre-1974 championship decided by playoffs the league didn't rival the playoffs as the final arbiter of the best team. It couldn't given its structure so I am sure the fans accepted it for what it was. That is not the situation today. Today we have the daft situation where we have a league based on home and away fixtures and yet we use a system designed for a different league structure to decide the champions when it is not needed. Yes I know about the MM weekend but today teams still play each other home and away so despite the extra fixture finishing top of the league is still a more appropriate way to decide things than a play off.

You end up with things like this when you let people like Nigel Wood run the sport.

The problem is the fundamental hypocrisy in claiming that we shouldnt have a league/play-off system because it leaves large swathes of the season 'meaningless' then proposing replacing it with a simple league structure even though it makes more of the season meaningless for more clubs.

There are many fundamental flaws in a league system, the new vogue in Wigan that it is the ideal is ridiculous, it isnt, there are clearly failings in it. Like there is any system. But as we are picking imperfect systems why not pick one which keeps things interesting for more clubs, judges teams on quality as well as consistency, finishes the season with the best teams playing each other and concludes on a high profile night in front of 70k+ rather than as would have happened last year, with the season being over for most of the teams for a few months and the title being decided in a pretty poor quality game, in front of 8k by a game against a team which finished in the bottom third of the league.