Six substitutes on the bench, no interchanges (once your off, your off) and at least two of those subs have to be 21 years of age or under.

No - there needs to be an element of unpredictability about the game IMO. Running from dummy half is an important element of the game and must remain.

The term 'scoot' was born out of the silly focus on creating an 'attacking' game that allowed hookers an easy ride - Dave Gibbons (?) at Leeds was a decidly average hooker made to look effective for a while because of the focus in 'a fast game.'

No doubt it was some clown from SKY coming up with innovative measures to help the game, but the effects were incorrect play the balls, defenders having to ‘roll away’ like a flange after crunching someone and referees looking to find just about any indiscretion available to punish the defending sdide. The worst offender for this was Russell Smith in my opinion.

The line of what I am getting at is don’t remove a facet of the game that is still important because of a misguided strategy on speeding up the game by artifical means.

I think the powers that be already made a blunder when they removed striking from the ptb. John Neil used to try this quite frequently and it rarely worked, but at it was an age old rule that added unpredictability to the game without ‘’costing’’ too much from the other areas of the game.

Then go watch something else. One less 'FORWARD' pass call to put up with at Knowsley Road is hardly a bad thing.

That's relatively accurate, however entertaining does not always mean the standard of play has to be of the highest order. I have seen plenty of sporting events that have been incredibly entertaining without being of the highest quality and British RL is well known for it. At the same time I have seen some dour sporting events despite the protagonists being of the highest quality e.g. world title fights, RL, World Cup, Champions League etc. Of course when high quality is entertaining it is usually the best entertainment.

I stand by my point that we should not ignore advances in the defensive aspects of play to justify a one-side argument about creativity in the game on the back of one or two seasons.



I'm not sure that referring to an international game and pointing out how great it was is a fair comparison to a regular Super League game. It's logical that the standard should be a lot higher.



I think you should go back and re-watch as many pre-professional era games as possible and not just one of the all-time classics. Defences were rubbish in those days which is why teams were able to set deeper lines. Today's defences are up in your face much quicker meaning you can't shift the ball across the pitch without losing yards. To suggest that we should reduce the 10m line to 5m will only make that worse and not better.

I can't agree with that. All that rule did was make the PTB a mess. I want to watch RL played by players running, passing and tackling each other. The rule you mentioned did nothing other than disrupt play and make the game look a mess.

McClennan, a bit off topic I know but are you doing a preview of the England games.

I always enjoy your Superleague preview (don't always agree)

Yes. Australia to win

Aye, me, Sadfish, Chair and Michael Moore.

NO NO NO!! That was a sh*t rule! Anyone who was unlucky enough to be studded on the knuckles on a cold January day when trying to ptb will agree with me! It used to cause more problems than enough! The 'strike' at the ptb was a way to re-start the game... A link to our rara past & to be fair it was a GREAT day when it was banned!!

Of course the standard should be a lot higher but the standard of their defence should be higher too. By that logic, the game should possibly have been less open with defences more 'in your face'.

However, both sides wanted to move the ball out to fashion chances. That is not because they are better, it's because they are more open, more adventurous and their coaches are probably less negative in their tactics than those in Super League.



Well I have just debunked your myth that you can't shift the ball with modern defences above ( ) as the Australians and Kiwis clearly can.

I accept that making it 5m would initially cause problems but it would quickly become clear that one man drives and scoots were no longer effectual and the result would be that the teams would have to shift the ball about and keep it alive in a way to force their way through.

Assuming that coaches treat the game as a results business, rather than an entertainment one, then it's obvious that a lot of them will look to be as boring as possible by driving it because it gains more yards in a set of six. Take away the 10m rule and this will no longer be the case and good old-fashioned skill, rather than brute force, will suddenly become a neccessity rather than an occasional luxury.

Here's something for those idiots who think that RU has become more entertaining than RL.

rlThe Guinness Premiership has taken its share of criticism over the last few days, not least from the Wales coach, Warren Gatland, who went for the jugular by describing this season's tournament as the worst he'd seen since first coming to these parts from New Zealand.rl

Signed, Lets have good old R/L as it used tb pre super league days, where hookers hooked refs made decisions etc.

...when players couldn't catch, tackle, kick, form a defensive line etc.