this is why I think the responsibility for youth development should be taken away from SL clubs. The players development should be taking priority at these young ages. They should be being taught skills and playing at an appropriate level for as long as possible.

Andrew Johns wouldn't stand out if his team is getting 40 points put on them by bigger and stronger sides. Youth RL and amateur, and development level is too often decided by giving it to the early developer and watching him skittle players and the focus changes to stopping children who are the size of men with children who are the size of children when they will catch up largely naturally anyway. The bigger players don't learn how to play when they can't just walk through a player a quarter their size and the younger ones don't get chance to learn their skills.

We need small sided games focussed on skill, more touch and pass and flag at the youngest ages, size and weight leagues whilst some lads are physically playing catch up, more and better skills coaching at a young age, and better funnelling through a system.

SL clubs have only just really been given responsibility for youth & junior development, since the reduction in Sport England funding a few years ago meant the end of the RFL development officers.

But the SL clubs have little influence and no direct control over the junior leagues. They are run by the leagues themselves. Quite how BARLA and the RFL interact with these leagues I'm not sure but the clubs themselves have no power over them.

The only thing the SL clubs can do is attempt to influence individual coaches through Coach Education and to try and help increase participation through involvement with amateur clubs.

As Bren2k rightly points out the big problem is with the leagues themselves. Unfortunately the league officials don't monitor or enforce the game anywhere near strictly enough. At least in part because they become far too friendly with club coaches and officials. (As an example a year or 2 ago I reported some pretty poor behaviour by coaches at an u12's game to a Yorkshire Juniors official only to be told it can't have happened because the person in question is a "good guy".)
There is also a problem with club officials who, like the league officials, don't monitor or enforce their own club properly. To the point where I've seen junior coaches drinking at the side of the pitch. The problem isn't confined to junior ranks either. The reason I stopped playing RL at the age of 16/17 was because of the behaviour of amateur clubs 1st and 2nd teams. On far too many occasions when I played for the 2nd team the 1st team (ours when at home, the oppositions when away) would be watching. Which wouldn't be a problem if they weren't drinking, swearing and taking the mick out of the opposition. That, plus the aggression and intimidation on the pitch put paid to amateur RL for me. So I went to my local Union club where these things didn't happen.

If I hadn't been from such a staunch RL family I'd probably be a Union fan.

That's a sad thing to read.

Junior leagues, in my experience, have absolutely no oversight of, or interest in, player development; they run league and cup competitions based on a system of fines and sanctions for disciplinary matters and, for example, forgetting to send a text message in by a certain time to submit the results of a match. If they have any involvement in player development, it's usually adverse, in that their complicated, convoluted player registration and transfer rules, designed I think to stop super-team building (which still happens anyway) actually prevent young players from getting out on the pitch - sometimes for months at a time.

It's got nothing to do with SL clubs and everything to do with the RFL - they need to get hold of the amateur game, especially at junior level, and whip it into shape; until that happens, the game will stutter in terms of being an attractive option participation wise for young players of all abilities, and in nurturing those players who have raw talent.

Something I know Brian McDermott has been striving to do at Leeds, in the face of pretty much wholesale apathy from local amateur clubs - at least at the outset.

Very much so. It's something I applaud him for and it's something most of his predecessors weren't really that bothered about.

I have to say the apathy isn't quite wholesale but unfortunately it does seem to be the same people turning up.
They usually seem to get 40 or so amateur coaches turning which is great. But when you think of how many clubs and age groups there are out there it's not all that many.

The bit that annoys me most is this though - a couple of times a year the Leeds Foundation take their Coach Education sessions "on the road" to an amateur club. They have the u19's training and Chris Plume and the other academy coaches/conditioners etc are all available to explain things and answer as many questions as people are willing to ask. It's great stuff as far as I'm concerned. However that is rarely backed up by the "host" amateur club. There's usually a token coach or 2 from the host club in attendance. There were even coaches taking training sessions whilst this was happening. Now if I had the opportunity of watching Leeds Rhinos academy train and to question their coaches at my club I'd have every single coach possible there, every single player over the age of about 10/11 there and anyone who had training that night would either have training cancelled to watch the u19's or at least break off for half an hour. I've just been gobsmacked by the lack of enthusiasm from some clubs.

I'd also make it into a big event that would pack out my club's bar and get a load of cash in.

But then my niece does keep telling me I'm weird so maybe it's just me.

we should be funnelling players through super clubs. Not necessarily super teams but super clubs. We should harness and invest in those clubs who can and do do the necessary things to get players through.

There good amateur sides out there doing great things, lets reward them and see if we can get others to follow.

There's a big difference between super-teams, whereby all the best/biggest young players are induced by hook or by crook to sign for a particular team, so they win everything that year - and a super club, which I assume means a well-run, professionally organised club, with teams of all age groups, that caters for mixed abilities and encourages players and parents to be respectful etc etc.

Your solution is one way - but it reduces the number of community clubs and probably reduces participation as a result; I think I'd rather see *all* clubs have their capacity to be super maximised, by giving them proper resources, support and oversight from the governing body; take some central funding off SL clubs so that community clubs don't have to beg, borrow or steal and attempt to nurture the future of the sport on goodwill, overstretched volunteers, unsuitable morons, or the largesse of a few Dads who own businesses and end up sponsoring the team their son plays for so they can buy a kit for the coming season.

It's a big job - but the top tier of the game will always struggle when the lowest tier is in such a mess.

Wasn't that the whole idea of Service Areas, that the best kids would be playing against and training with the best?

Yep. But it was struck by the curse of amateur rugby league. Ego. The Service Area coaches were picked from amateur clubs. Those coaches then had a habit of picking players from their club. (Not all obviously, but too many times). Also it unfortunately seemed to just further the problem of "playing to win" and "picking the big kid" rather than developing skills.

From what I've seen of the Embed the Pathway scheme I'm very much encouraged by that, though I've already heard reports of clubs and coaches trying to abuse the new system of Development Days already.