Consider the last season of the three players aboveIf Owen Farrell is the future of English RU success then good luck.He is not fit to lace the boots of such great RU stand offs as David Watkins, Phil Bennett, Jonathan Davies, Chris Carter, Carlos Rogers or even Sharp.

He is from the long line of nonetities who have graced British RU with their kick first, run never approach like O Gara Jones,Wilkinson and the very forgettable Scottish excuses for stand offs.

He dosn t make a break or a mesmerising side step to set his threequarters in motion with mental strength. He needs physical ability to do that and all he can do is kick. He is run averse. His first instinct is to heave the ball downfield. His astute passing, which you praise but I have never seen, is practically useless if he never shapes to run and the defence can just key on those to whom he passes.

Don t give me that age and experience guff either. Alex Murphy and Roger Mollward were playing against and beating the Aussies when they were teenagers. Farrell is playing the kind of earth shattering stand off brilliance expected of a 35 year old just selected to manage things because there is no one better.

You might be right in saying Farrell might make a loose forward.Thats what Sinfield does for leeds. He might be listed as stand off but he plays as a link forward. The person playing the traditional stand off role at Leeds is Mcguire, you know, devastating place, making breaks, setting up chances for his outside backs on the end of the breaks, you know, things Farrell cannot do. '"

If you don't link it to tangibles like fan revenue, youmay as well just doaway with the cap,as rich owners will simply buy trophies......as I said, Viable Business plans, not projections and the like.

On Farrell being well regarded - so is Mick Ford, Neil Kelly etc they hardly starred in RL and if they could get a job in RL they would be back in a shot. Noble is another one - no one in RL wants to give him a job but he can get work in RU.

England have never had a foreign coach so Lancaster was not really competing with Mallet as you well know. You mentioned Leeds struggling the point of a good coach is to get the best out of the players - can you really say that about Lancaster's time at Leeds?

The point about Farrell was would he be any good in RL - the answer to that is no - he speed of thought is too slow - in RL he would be much closer to the line his decision making would have to quicken considerably also how would he defend against big centres two/three times in a set!!

Greater spread - if one owner goes he takes it all - it is unlikely you whole crowd would go on mass. Most clubs will have fans who have been going considerably longer than any of the owners have owned the club.

True but you lose 2000 fans and your losses become just as great as most owners (London aside) are putting in each year, and it's not unheard of to have avg attendance fluctuations of 2000 a season depending on performance.

gutterfax's scenario also doesn't take into account expense. One club could have 4mill income and be more profitable than a club with 5 mill income depending on how much they are spending on ground hire, coaches, directors scouting trips to Australia etc.