I take it that was written with your tonge firmly in your cheak? (I hope anyway)

Ray French has been removed as lead commentaor (now Dave Woods), last season saw record viewing figures for sky, the last sky deal was for the largest amount ever and they got the least for it (no internationals, pay extra for wcc etc), London support themselves (well David Hughes) and Catalans have been one of the real success stories in the last 10 years.

Was everybody moaning when British RL were signing Australias and union talent?

What goes around.

Instead of promoting and training our youth we've found stop gap players and now were paying for it.

Neither us or Hkr will have uk players first choice at 6 or 7, intact were pinning our next hopes on a 15/16 year old.

I don't think it'll be completely a mass exodus of English talent to oz. Remember reading the thoughts of an nrl chairman. His take was most clubs would carry bigger squads than they do now so they can use their best players more sparingly, e.g. not feeling need for origin players to back up, his example was gallen and how with bigger cap and bigger squad he may only play 20 games a yr be fresh for playoffs and international's and how they could pay their elite players more, keep union afl etc away. Some English talent will get poached but don't imagine oz clubs will spend fortunes on English players and neglect their own talent pool. That said only losing a few will hurt our competition. Hock Briscoe and only a couple more would leave a big hole

Agreed. (apart from the bit about Hull benefitting obviously).

I'm amazed that the RFL only try to sell two of our games a round to Sky. I really do think its time they made a big push to increase the amount of games on the TV. I don't buy into the whole philosophy that empty stands are creating a negative impact, because it certainly hasn't to people like me and you.

If the RFL had more ambition about them, they would have over 50% of the weekly rounds on TV, with at least one game on terrestrial TV. Easier said then done but without the "extra" financial gain from TV revenue, it is going to make it difficult for this country's elite to become real forces in the Rugby League world.

Extending the cap can't be an option right now as the clubs would have to make up the difference and they aren't strong enough for that. In an ideal world the RFL would strike a deal or deals which means every SL team can spend upto the full cap without administration just around the corner.

Better the NRL than RU - 20 or so of our best in the NRL and the England/GB team will be much stronger, which would hopefully feed back into interest in the domestic game. With the Aussies paying the wages of our elite players, our second tier players will be on better money and we'll probably attract and retain a few more. The standard of SL will drop a bit, but personally I watch for entertainment/excitement as much as quality. If it got really bad we could go to 12 teams, but better challenges for our best and more opportunities for the rest - it isn't best case, but we can adapt and make the best of it. We have to.