In the 1969 documentary that I mentioned, there is this line:

‘In England, rugby league never left its cradle. It still lies landlocked in three northern counties.’

Is comparing a sport with regional base with one with a national reach, fair? We could blame our grandfathers’ and great-grandfathers’ generations for failing to spread the word further in the UK, but they were up against significant establishment resistance from RU and the most popular sport in the world in soccer.

It's interesting that we consider RU a national sport. North of Leicester Tigers I think there is only Sale and Newcastle in the top division (I could be wrong not being up on my RU) but there are club sides throughout the country. Maybe instead of concentrating on SL the RFL should have put more support into grass roots rugby.

Looks all over for them now.

NFL season starts next week. I'm more excited for that than anything still to come in Super League this year (playoffs, grand final, relegation battle).

We have to get back to all UK Super League clubs playing on a Sunday with one live TV match ko 18.00
Its the only way we will get more fans back into stadiums instead of sitting on their bums watching TV

Another poor quality game this evening. So many errors and penalties.

Turned it off. Penalty or knock on every set. Really has been an awful weekend of rugby.

Great if you are a HKR fan

Or AP. One derby confirmed for next year, maybe 2 with the loop fixture.

And we might get 6th now.

I've watch Burnley's v liverpool after turning off the rovers game after 15 minutes. Don't know why but the games in France always seem worse to watch than any UK ones

why complain you should be used to it

watching a football match,that takes me back 40 years.is it still 11 a side?

Didn’t bother watching any game on Sky over the weekend. I’m with JTP in watching football instead.

How is RU an upper class sport?

if it wasn't supported by the upper class it wouldn't exist.twickers.ha ha I ask you.

Educated people, solicitors, doctors and the like? Do I detect a hint of jealousy? Plenty of people watching RU and RL are "working class", none so blind as them that refuse to see as they say.

Have you ever BEEN to an RU game, are all the people that go to brantigham "Upper Class"?

Ask grand final winners if the game is pants, I will only agree that the game has gone down hill after the 80’s , but I am a rovers fan btw

Long gone are the days of brilliant players playing the game. The salary Cap killed the game. Also if it is summer rugby why does the season start in January?

From my point of view there are a couple of factors about general apathy which have not yet been mentioned.

There is not real stand out, figure head type players in the English game at the moment. Ones a which you’d expect the sporting general public to be aware of if they appeared on something like Question of Sport. In my time of watching RL there has been the like s of Schofield, Hanley, Offiah, Edwards, Davies, Robinson, Farrell, Shorpe, Burgess and to a lesser extent Sinfield. All of which would have been widely recognised on TV. With the lack of a current day player, playing in the UK, the game struggles to get national coverage.

There is virtually no prospect of getting the top Australian talent to come over due to the salary cap difference .

The game now is much more about power and strength rather than craft and flair. IMO this could be putting off some kids from taking the game up.

From a Hull FC point of view, I thing we as fans probably expect too much. We are perhaps no real different from other set s of fans, but fans in general are hyper critical even after wins.

It’s sort of ingrained in us, that we will beat Salford & Huddersfield “no disrespect intended” when we need to, but the realisation is, we are not as good as we think we are, and the shock of accepting this is hard to take.

This league has evened out, apart from Saints, when all clubs on any given day can beat each other, whether this is due to the salary cap working I don’t know. But one thing is apparent, whilst the league is interesting due to an equal competition, the actual quality is suffering all through the game. No superstars emerging, a very poor dynamic at present.

For me the improvements in athleticism and collision, the "dominant tackle" interpretation, the prevalence of wrestling techniques and the pass behind the dummy runner has killed the spectacle for me, and made it impossible for most lightweight creative mavericks to ever shine again. I'm not one of the majority on here that bows down to the NRL, I watch almost every game because I still prefer rugby league to any other sport - but it's stale and one dimensional both sides of the globe. It's probably age but I preferred watching Dockers/West Hull/Skirlaugh in the early to mid 90's.

You don’t watch the NRL

Indeed, I wish SL was half as 'stale' as the NRL

Superstars all over the NRL, and this season as been one of the most entertaining I’ve seen