Most weekends

This thread sums up why I have no sympathy for Wakefield. On one hand its The RFL are not playing fair, all we want is a level playing field blah blah blah, then in the next breath your wanting to spend 1000 grand more than the rest of the championship and have no problem playing to different rules and being the fat boy on the see saw !!! Hypocrites !!!

But surely other clubs could do it if they could justify spending it? It is open for all sides, is it not? I would hazard a guess that most choose to operate at the lower salary cap because of crowd figures and to save the extra £100k a year.

My point is that I would agree with many Wakefield fans that the RFL make rules to fit its own agenda, and if the 4000 grand rule was open to everyone then the salary cap would just be 4000grand! It would be open only to the club that comes down which in my view leads to an advantage which in this case wildcat fans would only be to happy to take!

Another example was the the changing of the rule on going into admin, the fact is if the rules were not changed to suit then the wildcats would be going down anyway. On the same subject the wildcat fans were going mad that the rule was changed for the Crusaders, but now have a glimmer of hope due to the same rule change.

My view on the whole thing is that WTWC were never in competition with crusaders or Harlequins for a franchise and thus should have discounted them from the start. WTWC were always in competiton with Cas.

The fact is this is Franchising, if it were Mcdonnalds they would choose who they wanted for operational purposes not sentimental ones! Do not get me wrong I do not agree with what is happing in the slightest, but the fact none of the main franchisees are complaining which would suggest to some extent they agree with and see the value to what is happening, the only time you see disagreement is when the rug is about to be pulled.

PS, I still think WTWC may get saved by the crusaders

And on the subject of the championship, the cup final at the weekend was top draw, and way better than both supler league matches for entertainment value.

How will we cope???

1. Thats not a level playing field though is it? Surely the salary cap works in 2 ways to a. ensure clubs don't spend more than they can bring in (which is objective...) and b. , the major point, ensure that one club cannot take all the talented players in the league.

2. How can you not like the fat boy on the see saw analogy?

let's hope that if we do find ourselves in the championship we engage in the spirit of sport and don't act with arrogance and that we respect other clubs.

this means not acting in the same way that the bigger boys in superleague have acted.

an even playing field is what we wanted in superleague, and we should want the same in whatever league we're in next year.

whatever rules/laws are in place, we need to embrace them and get on with it without a fuss.

First off all, we beat you in 1998 get over it, that was a long time ago.

The point you make is valid but couldn't you consider the extra salary cap spend is a trade off for us not been able to qualify for 2015 franchise by not been in this seasons NRC or Championship. At the end off the day all the other Championship clubs will have 6 attempts (in 3 years) at winning a qualification place, we will have 4 attempts( in 2 years).

It really is a bizzare situation that has arisen as far as qualifyng for 2015 is concerned
Just guessing here but it wouldn't surprise me if you get a parachute payment to go along with a higher SC.

Is this the best you have? yeah, it was 13 years ago, find something else as a retort.

And no, its not a 'trade off' at all... the integrity of the competition will be screwed as we have a 'Vibrant League' (as we get told in our 'trade off' for no promotion) played under 2 rule books.

agreed. the rfl have missed a trick here, they should have allowed us into the nrc (as i suspect they'd already decided we were going to be pushed out) this year to stop such pointless bleating next year.

I still think, as long as the off field criteria are met, the demoted SL club should have an invite to reapply for a SL license without having to feature in the two finals. It resolves the issue of only having 2 years (IMO effectively 1 year for reasons discussed elsewhere) to qualify for a SL bid and removes the unfair issue of having £100K more than the rest of the competition to spend on the SC.

Isn't the integrity of the franchise application brought into question when a team has 2 less chances of qualifying? It seems we are playing under 2 rule books when the likes of Fev can have 33% opportunities to qualify for the elite.

That'll be different.

OMG your hard work, first of all well done on 96, we lost no problem to me simple!

And as for not having the same chance to qualify

you had chance to qualify this year and the whole of the last franchise period and if you get removed then that will be on your club. Or put it this way if I said to you at the start of the season, it looks like your going to get chucked out do you fancy going now so that you get an extra year to qualify? what would you have said? The trade off is you had an extra year to make your case for this round of franchises! And were already reaping the benefits of being in the "super league"

Perhaps you could have asked Halifax at the start of the year if they wanted to swap with you for the year?

Not as hard work as you are, it was 98 not 96!

Just for you deeHell, this is how Rugby League works these days!

wakefield need to learn about the public's perception of our club, and put up and shut up until such time as we have our own pr right.

i think there's a case for having a moan, but that we'd gain much more (or damage ourselves much less) by just getting on with it.

ask the average rl fan about wakefield, and we've promised the world for a decade and not delivered any of it. it's not fact, but it's what people believe and so is what we're up against.

meanwhile down the road, richard wright spins and spins and it's always a positive upbeat message that comes out of there. no real substance but despite cas having done virtually nothing with wheldon road, being relegated through being crap twice, they're the newcastle united of rugby league and everybody likes to see them do well. all this from a club that had to be punished becasue of homophobia.

we need to play the pr game, and fighting with or provoking championship clubs in public who are sensitive and rightly upset about the way the game is structured in the uk and europe is not the right thing for us to do.

Spot on my friend! one of the best post I have read on here in a long time.

It matters not owd cock. Once you're down here grubbing about in the silage with the rest of us, you aren't ever going back!!! You're club will get used to it but you will be long gone by then!!

Bloody helll it really hasnt dawnd on you yet has it son, if you think you will be one of the big boys in the championship your deluded, the team you have now wouldnt go the whole season in the 2nd tier unbeaten never mind the part time team you will have next year. You will learn very quickly the last time you were in the championship your crowds wernt great and your away following was mediocre, i would be very surprised if you finished in the top 3 next year

You are beginning to sound like ' Smokey ' , when he was trying to justify the ridiculous situation at the original Celtic Crusaders , in sport there isn't any ' trade offs ' , you cannot say one club has this , so another club can have that to make up for it , it just doesn't work

In the Championship we haven't had a level set of rules for a decade , 1 st it was parachute payments ( it was those that resulted in the much vaunted ' yo , yo ' effect ) , then the salary cap was introduced but we had Crusaders quite openly flouting it , in fact the RFL we actually helping them to do it by paying their players to be community development officers in south Wales , then when they went up , we had Toulouse , excempt from relegation.

So if you now get a payment extra to the rest and a bigger salary cap , we once again will see yet more Championship fans calling it a day

Oh well we may just pack in then, its all a lost cause.


Getting a bit sick of Fax/Fev fans "telling it how it is" you worry about your clubs and we'll sort ourselves out, won't take much to do better that you two.

Oh another ones turned up preaching

" The integrity of the franchise application process "

Are you serious ? , since when has anything to do with the RFL included ' Integrity ' ?

You obviously have been a RL fan very long