Could it be that SmokeyTA follows one of the favoured clubs and will never be in the position of Wakey (cas, salford , hkr, bradford all ground issues as well ).
This 'Im all right Jack' attitude is helping the RFL kill Rugby League as a sport.

SmokeyTA you should be ashamed

What is good for the game as a whole about Wakefield being relegated, another club in a similar position being promoted, and the cycle simply starting over again.

P+R doesnt only stop Wakefield building it stops the clubs around them building aswell. It stops the club promoted building. After 12 years in SL Wakefield have done nothing to address the problems they had when they were first promoted. Franchising gives them the breathing space to do so.

And it isnt people like me who decide we need these 'fantastic' new stadiums, its the paying public. People dont attend Wakefield games because Belle Vue is such a dump, they struggle to get a sustainable level of attendance because people dont want to be standing on a crumbling stand, with rubbish facilities, getting soaked by the rain. If they did, your attendance would be higher, you would have more money, a better team and would be in an all round better position and the stadium issue would be less of an issue.

SmokeyTA speaks sense, what have we done with 9 years in Super League with P&R to strengthen the club off field, and in the 3 years of safety of a licence we've done the same! We've known the rules, just choose to whinge about fairness rather than improve the club.

The RFL didn't invite Pearman into the club. The RFL didn't let Belle Vue become a dump and unwelcoming to new supporters who decent facilities. The RFL didn't stop us looking at a new stadium before we had to sort one out.

In a programme from almost TWENTY YEARS ago, Ted Richardson admitted Belle Vue was not up to scratch. That's the RFL's fault I guess.

Haven't I covered that all ready? You're starting to come across as a bit of a troll now to be honest! For the final time, it means there is something for the bottom teams to play for right until the end of the season and a real incentive to win the Championship! Don't you get that?


Once again sounds a bit like a trolling post...

you are giving yourself up now

What is the 'real incentive' to win the Championship is the same 'real incentive' to win SL. To win. How do you think the RFL are supposed to sell the championships as an important competition when the only importance you place on it is getting the hell out of it?

The teams at the bottom do have something to play for, getting into the play offs. Very very few people want to watch a game to decide which of the two teams has been the test over that season. Why are you so focused on clubs being crap than being good?

Because, at Wakefield, we celebrate the mediocre and make them into heroes. Finishing 11th is a 'great achievement' and we'd rather see players who try but are limited, than, you know, any good.

Would you say they are doing that? I'd say they have chosen which teams they want to focus on and the rest can sod off!



Totally disagree, basement battles are often the most exciting ones of the season. I would put money on the ratings for a Sky match that decides who gets relegated being higher than one that decided who came eigth! It's that that keeps the bottom of the table alive!

I don't understand why you are so focused on developing certain teams and making sure that others can't join the party?

11,000 people wanted to know when Wakey played cas in a last day relegation decider. However I agree that if there is no relegation then nobody would be interested.

You will never change the mindset of any 2 nd tier competition that has previously had yearly P and R and clubs in it that have graced the top flight

On your second point , you seem to be forgetting that for every winner , there is a loser , so yes there will always be a bottom club , always ty teams of varying degrees , nobody ever celebrates it , they never have , don't pretend they have

Very true.

One of the biggest problems of licencing is that its nigh on impossible for a club outside of SL to build the sort of club that the RFL (say that they) are looking for. Realisitically clubs should be self sufficient and the wealth of the owner shouldn't decide how big a club is. Most of the clubs in the Championship cannot afford to run both a reserve team and an academy - some clubs can't afford to run one never mind both. Also the lack of interest in the Championship since they took P+R away has affected attendances and therefore income. The only reason why Widnes are so well placed to apply for a licence is because we are lucky to have an owner who is prepared to fund the organisation until we can get into SL. IMO after the next round of licences, no club in the Champioship will achieve the 2,500 average attendance that is seen as good enough to apply for SL. As far as I am aware, in the last 5 years, Widnes are the only current Championship team who has consistantly managed to average over 2,500. Halifax managed it this year, but only after miraculously acheiving nearly 5,000 for their last home game

.

I think the point that Smokey is not getting, or refuses to take into account, is that without P+R there is very little hope below SL. Smokey and others say that just winning the Championship should be enough to keep fans and clubs motivated, but as Starbug has already said, for clubs who have been there and done it in the past, fans are just not interested in watching their team stuck in a 2nd rate division. This is only going to lead to lower attendances, smaller clubs and probably more clubs getting into financial difficulty. Transport 10 years into the future - how many more clubs are going to the way of Blackpool? Surely a very weak 2nd tier is no good for the game as a whole. How can pressure be kept on SL clubs to keep improving if the threat of relegation is going to be non-existant. We all know that the top 8 or 9 in SL won't be out of SL for a very very long time and even the bottom 5 or 6 sides know they will only ever be out if/when the RFL want to admit an expansion club again. IMO it shouldn't just be Wakey who are scared of going out of SL this time round, Cas and Salford haven't fulfilled their promises of a new stadium and the less said about Crusaders and Harlequins the better. HOWEVER there just aren't the clubs waiting in the wings to take these clubs places in SL and in the future IMO there will be even less potential clubs applying for SL. Licencing is a good idea, but IMO it needs tweaking to make sure the 2nd tier is kept in touch instead of it become ever more distant from SL.

I personally like the idea of a 2 tier SL - 10 in each division. P+R between the 2 divisions with more money to the top division than the 2nd. The RFL could still operate a licencing system for entry into the 2nd tier and maybe strict minimum standards for entry into the top division.

of course you would, because it suits. Either way, P+R doesnt help the championships. It helps one club in the championship with the potential to damage 2 or 3 more (who chase promotion and fail) and damages 1 club in SL (who gets relegated) and damages 2 or 3 more (who need to focus on the short-term avoidance of relegation over any other problems that club may have)
You would probably be wrong. Besides, how often in SL has the two teams who could have been relegated faced each other? once? twice? more often than not its a massive damp squib with a game 2 or 3 games before the end with the two sides in trouble facing different teams. It isnt often that there is a 'game to decide who goes down'

Im not, all clubs can be developed, and can join the party. The only difference is that im pragmatic enough to understand not all clubs can be in the party at once, and not all clubs can function at the top party without building towards it.

yet, 18'000 people will go watch Leeds and Wigan every week.

How many people went to see the other 13 home matches that year? If we focussed on only getting 1k more to each of those matches, then the club would bring in more than twice as much as they did when the fixture list and chance brought us a very rare relegation decider.

Exactly, so an argument which states we should keep P+R to keep the interest up for lower teams is clearly nonsense

Lower teams in SL , or in the Championship ?

So the post you made earlier is clearly rubbish

I dont massively disagree with what you are saying (though i think you over-estimate the importance of P+R, it didnt really affect that many clubs in the championship as there wasnt that many capable of getting promoted) but what you fail to acknowledge is because there is a limited amount of clubs who are able to compete in SL it only affects a limited amount of clubs. It is the elite competition for the game, and very few of those in the lower leagues, in their current form, are capable of being elite, so very few are affected by the limit to the amount who try.

You are right, there arent clubs waiting in the wings to take these clubs places, there just arent. And it is better that we wait until a club is capable of replacing one of the SL clubs than relegating a club for a different club which will simply fail to complete.

The two tier SL wont work for 3 reasons, 1) we dont have 20 clubs capable of being SL clubs. They just arent there. We would simply end up with a SL and championship as we have now, but with some of the weaker SL clubs in the 2nd tier, being weakend by their relegation.
2) we dont have the player pool in the heartlands to sustain another 6 clubs ( 5 if Toulouse are promoted) Hull KR and Wakefield are in SL now and need 10+ overseas players, some not so cracking. Trying to find another 200+ players will simply dilute the quality of both competitions.
and lastly 3) We havent proven the appetite for 2nd tier RL to fans, sponsors, and TV companies.

which do you think? do you think the teams in the lower end of the championship struggle because a competition they cant win doesnt lead to promotion they arent eligible for?

or do you think it would be the lower SL clubs, the ones it actually affected?

So i post something, you agree with it, i confirm your agreement, you dismiss it as rubbish. Trolly Mctroll-troll is getting older and poorer.

I'm quite frankly getting bored with this now. I've never met someone on here so blinkered as yourself.


It keeps the dream alive.


Care to back up your blinkered views?


You clearly don't know much about this do you.


P&R means a different one each year gets the chance. Your way means they have to wait for considerable time to be told to sod off.

I think he is too biased and blinkered by the shiny empty stands of clubs like Huddersfield to be taken seriously.

I think you will find the feeling is mutual.

Dreams dont pay the bills.

It is your assertion. If you want to use it in the course of the debate it is up to you to prove it.

Well maybe you can elucidate me with some other examples rather than relying on one which happened 5 years ago?


One which isnt necessarily ready for promotion, isnt necessarily better than the club it is replacing, isnt necessarily in a position to benefit from promotion, and isnt necessarily going to contribute to SL.

By ' lower ' I meant the bottom of SL and the top of the Championship , ie the ones actually affected by licencing

You posted this




It would look to me as you are in someway trying to suggest that just because we dont have relegation there are now no crap teams , there are always crap teams in every competition , having teams from the bottom half of SL in the play offs doesn't mean they arent crap , a system that means a club can lose most of its games and still be the winners of its competition is a farce