How has this been lost.....

English RL needs more high profile matches (e.g. a Yorkshire v Lancashire series) and the England RL team needs to play high profile matches at home, every year. Simple as that.

As a supporter of the England RU team, I know I will have a minimum of 7 or 8 matches to watch every year that will be played at Twickenham or in the same time zone (Wales, Scotland). Unfortunately it's virtually impossible to get tickets for Twickenham so my support is restricted to watching on TV and perhaps buying a replica shirt or other merchandise once in a while. The point is that I feel part of something and I put a bit of money into the game.

How many home games have England RL played this year? One, against France. That is not enough. Of course we also need to tour Australia and NZ as often as they come here, but in my view it is essential that at least one of them comes here every year for a three match series. I also firmly believe that a three match Roses series is essential to give those people who don't have a club team in their area (which I imagine is a fairly high % of the country) another high profile RL event to watch. I don't buy all that crap about it being too parochial.

There has never been so much sports coverage on TV as there is today. Whilst this is a good thing in many respects, it also means that individual sports have to work harder to get their product noticed. Back in the 1980's and 90's when GB matches were shown on BBC Grandstand, it was often a choice of watching that or some American show on ITV. Nowadays people have the option of changing to any number of other channels, so if your product isn't delivering, the audience will be gone. And when I say delivering, I'm talking about things such as playing in big, packed stadiums (which means RL fans supporting the game). I don't care what sport it is, I am far more likely to watch it if it's being played in front of a packed crowd in a famous venue. Or if the teams involved are notable ones. No disrespect to either team but Halifax v Widnes isn't a game I'd add to my sporting diary. Lancashire v Yorkshire, however, is!

Until RL grasps this basic fact, it will carry on as it is. Which, incidentally, is absolutely fine, providing you're happy with how it is and you're not one of those who whinges continuously about what RU is doing. RL is a perfectly good sport played by teams predominantly in Lancashire and Yorkshire, with the occasional international match thrown in. It's survived like that for 100 years and it will do for another 100. There's only a problem if it has ambitions beyond that.