It is criminal that he seems immoveable from his position as CEO of the RFL. (no size joke intended)
It strikes me that his #1 priority at the RFL is self preservation and I can't see the game moving forward until he is replaced with someone with more business acumen, even if that be someone from outside the sport.

It's tricky. If you make it easy for the CEO to be ousted you leave it at the mercy of the current whims of the clubs. Which isn't good.

I don't know the ins and outs of the relationship between the clubs and the RFL as to whether there is a means by which the clubs can remove him.

Though, despite a lot of whining at the RFL in general in recent years by the clubs I don't remember too much aimed directly at Wood or attempts to get rid of him from the clubs.


I'm convinced whoever is next has to be from outside the sport. We're insular enough as it is, we need someone with contacts and a reach outside the sport.

more than contacts and reach, the new person must have vision to take the sport outside of it's comfort zone.

The leadership of the RFL has to be from someone outside the sport.

Richard Lewis did a damn good job, but many of his desirable reforms, like licensing (which gave us Catalans), have been scrapped in favour of the tried and failed policy of P & R, which reflects the wishes of the less important M62 clubs in the Championship.

Toulouse should have been licenced into Super League, and financially strapped London should have been retained under RFL control (like Bradford and like the Gold Coast Titans are in the NRL). The SL roster as it now stands and as is likely to change (if at all) is not attractive to corporate investors, who want a national and international competition. With licensing we could have retained London in Super League, along with the popular and important Bradford Bulls, and put Newcastle and Toulouse in (which most fans on here want anyway) and had a much more attractive product.

All of the above is beyond the comprehension of a provincial accountant.

Population (2015)
• Greater London 8,630,000
Sundays attendance: 350.

A long failed experiment.
As for France, boot Catalans out of SL and play in a French league under RFL control, eh?

You are a real genius aren't you? Catalans, the only non-M62 team in Super League, and a great success, you want to boot out of Super League? Absolute genius you are.

If you insist on playing with it at least get things in perspective......

12,000,000 people in London and no chance once it became obvious to small towns that Ian Lenegan might own 2 teams and Leigh might not get the chance to replace Wakefield, which on a scale of 10 -TO - 1 on the sporting conscience is about minus 12.


The people that count in sponsorship, marketing or advertising couldn't point Leigh or Wakefield out on a map for Christ's sake......

That 8,630,000 figure will include people living in an area like Crawley, which is the best part of 90 minutes travel fro The Hive.

On that basis, do you think it's an outrage that Castleford don't attract more supporters from Hartlepool? Or that Leigh don't attract many fans from Wolverhampton?

Stick with your Foxy Bingo sponsors. Leave the RBS and other global brands to snap up sports with a expansive vision. The RU world cup is about to start. Undertake a compare and contracts exercise with the RL world cup and see which you think is better. (Not the product the event).

The main point about Nigel Wood is that he has no method or apparent interest in guaranteeing expansion of the game. Licencing is the only method of guaranteeing expansion and growth.

If Toulouse is restricted to a tiny salary cap such as now exists in League 1, it will have less chance of promotion to Super League than the M62 teams that don't have to travel every other week.

We know which is better (off the field), nobody has disputed that. But you could transplant the entire RFU/IRB marketing team into the RFL and it would make very little difference.

It doesn't matter how much noise you make or how much you try to woo sponsors, RBS aren't going to sponsor RL in its current form because it only gets them limited exposure to people they don't give a sh|t about.

RU gets them exposure to people with money and who live in the right areas.