Whilst I agree about clubs overspending to stay in Super League I disagree about 1 up 1 down being good for the sport. Too much of the season would be meaningless for too many teams. The current 8s format keeps the season going for everyone.

The balance between giving the clubs some consistency in terms of being able to plan for the future with some financial certainty and keeping things exciting is a tough one.

I'd still be in favour of Franchising, to give them the knowledge that they are not about to lose their revenue streams, and add new franchises when appropriate based on open and transparent criteria. However this doesn't address the stagnation that can occur at the lower end of the table and the lack of interest this brings. We've still only had 4 teams win SL (Leeds, Wigan, Bradford, Saints) and I think it's almost mission critical that someone else breaks that cycle (Warrington or Cas look most likely).

If we did go back to Franchising, how do we keep it interesting to those in the bottom half of the table?

Bang on the money. Its a ridiculous format and as you quite rightly say the game doesn't have the finances for it. We have to have stability for clubs to bring in sponsors money but at the same time give others hope of joining the elite. Not easy but this current system is not the answer.

Does it really matter if its interesting at the bottom half? Does the Nrl suffer from this? No. What does matter is getting money into the sport and attracting the stars into RL. The game is going backwards under this system

After Huddersfield Win & Catalan Draw - There is now a 3 point gap to 8th - Its a must win game, or its the middle 8s.

6
Catalans POINTS 19 + 2 = 21
Salford H - WIN
Wigan A - LOSS

7
Huddersfield - POINTS 19 + 2 = 21
Castleford A - LOSS
Wakefield H - WIN

8
Wakefield POINTS 18 + 2 = 20
Leeds A - WIN
Hull H - LOSS
Huddersfield A - LOSS

9
Hull KR POINTS 13 + 4 = 17
Widnes A WIN
Warringon H LOSS
Hull A WIN

10
Leeds - POINTS 15 + 2 = 17
Wakefield H - LOSS
Widnes H - WIN
Salford A - LOSS ?

11
Salford POINTS 12 + 2 = 14
Castleford H - LOSS
Catalans A - LOSS
Leeds H - WIN

I'd actually say it does matter. The reason is that if we persist with only having 3 or 4 teams capable of winning the competition, we are going to stifle the growth and development potential of the remaining clubs (without even entering into a discussion about if they can grow themselves). All the top players would only want to play for one of the clubs that can win the thing, meaning you get blowout scorelines and a lack of interest in the sport as it's not competitive. Sponsors are really interested in being associated with winning, as this gets their brand and message to a bigger audience, so if we look at tonights opponents Wakefield, what chance do they have of attracting significant sponsorship if they have no chance of winning something?

We have to look after every member of the family, not only the fortunate ones.

spot on

This doesn't appear to be in an issue in most other sports especially the biggest sport of all soccer. There are only 4/5 teams capable of winning the PL, only 2 teams in Spain capable of winning La Liga etc.

Clubs which generate greater revenues shouldn't be stifled by those who want/can't invest - that is just a race to the bottom. One of the reasons the standards are so poor is because the salary cap is prohibitive to growth.

Next you will be saying all revenues should be pooled and shared out equally - so Leeds who generate the most give some of it to Salford/Wakefield etc. It simply wont work.

@Homer Simpson
Hull FC are that inconsistent there's every chance they won't win at Wakefield.

yes it keeps it going for everyone but its to the sports detriment, if they want a 'million pound' (way to sell our game short with that name!!) then have it against the top team in the championship and the bottom of Superleague.

Not having much to play for in the after stages of the season would actually help teams not hinder them, it means they can plan properly for the season after rather than panicking and buy over rated Aussies in the hope of saving themselves. the sooner its gone the better.

yes sponsors are interested in winners, but what we are doing is making it difficult for 3-4 teams from the top flight to plan for the season after (sponsors, ticket sales etc) because of the uncertainty the middle 8s create, we are basically trading the stability of 3-4 top flight clubs for an 'exciting' end to the season, we as a sport cannot afford to do that. Lets say Leeds finish 9th and have a terrible run and go down (I don't think that happening) who does that benefit? We cannot as a sport risk losing one of our top clubs (be it Warrington, leeds or anyone else) because they had a bad season and finished 9th

Who mentioned Salary Cap? That's a whole different discussion. I'm not talking about pooling money from one club to another, I'm talking about giving clubs a fighting chance to build and execute a plan that would deliver growth. If they can do that, well again that's a different discussion but those governing the game have a responsibility to all clubs, not just a select few.

Agreed, the trade at the moment is not sustainable mainly because so many clubs are unable to predict their next financial year with any degree of certainty.

The only way to grow the game in my view is by increasing the stability of the clubs in the premier competition and then growing the number of them over a number of years. If we lose one or two SL clubs, the playing strength of those remaining might increase slightly, but the overall participation and interest in the sport would decline and that could easily be a death knell for professional RL in this country.

The only way you can grow is to deliver better entertainment - players fans want to see - the salary cap prevents that.

Clubs have had years to develop these plans how realistically is that going to change - what is going to change?

Cas aren't suddenly going to increase their crowds to Leeds' levels it simply will not happen, neither will Wakefield.

Delivering better entertainment is definitely a growth factor, but not the only one. Clubs need to consider alternative revenue streams and how they can maximise them. I get that Cas and Wakefield don't have the potential audience of Leeds (no one does) so it's not realistic to expect them to consistently get 12-15,000 through the gates, however they could both add another 1,000 which would be a huge increase in their income in % terms.

To take the discussion back to Franchising which was my original point, this would give the clubs enough financial certainty to properly invest in youth development and create the playing pool that would support their futures. At the moment precious few do this, and some don't even run an academy. We have to start by giving some certainty, this is what any business (sporting or otherwise) needs to be able to plan.