Seems to me like relegation is used as a scapegoat for clubs making bad decisions.

Agreed.

If you want to discuss the subject do it like a grown up.

No it’s not actually. Well not solely. It’s a series of poor decisions that go back a few years involving both Hetherington and Sinfield and possibly McDermott added in with a bit of bad luck.

And that’s not the point.

Clubs make poor decisions all the time. That will never ever end. Poor decisions aren’t always poor decisions at the time they are made.

Stop making this all about Leeds. If London go down, have they made poor decisions? It would seem they’ve made some good ones.

As I said to Cokey. Clubs make bad decisions all the time. They will continue to do so.

When we have only 14 professional clubs can we afford a structure that actively helps reduce that number?

What bad decisions have London made this season?

The main point is that, by not having relegation or, more impotently, not having the opportunity of promotion, the game had royally screwed over all of the clubs outside of Super League AND prevented the future inclusion of the N. American wanabe's.

Therefore, after discussion among ALL of the clubs, "we" had the all new 3 x 8 structure, which, despite some of the drama that was created in the "middle 8", was an absolute disaster and thank goodness, this was consigned to history.

However, allowing clubs to gain promotion is the right thing for the game, albeit, it's massively painful and damaging for any relegated club, although, they do of course have the chance to regain their spot should they achieve promotion in future.

The game does need to re visit funding for the Championship, which has to be more evenly spread and let's be honest, this conversation is only taking place because Leeds are in danger.
If the bottom 34 clubs were KR, Trinity, Salford and Huddersfield, nobody (apart from their own fans) would give a toss whether they went down (or out of business).

Our sport is dominated by the needs and wishes of the top 4/.5 clubs and the rest have to fall in behind them, which as they are the main drivers for income / investment, is probably right.
Largely, they (including Leeds) have got what they wanted so, to start moaning that relegation is wrong is just a little sad.
Your argument is not one of principle, more to do with self preservation.

Yep.

I agree with al lot of what you say but still think licensing is the way to go.

Assumptions are being made that with a franchise system it has to be a closed shop. It doesn’t. If a club has the ambition, the infrastructure and the finances there is no reason the franchised league couldn’t be expanded. We have a system now that some teams play others 3 times. If SL grew we’d end up with some teams playing others only once. Doesn’t matter with a play off to determine the winners.

Once the league has grown enough to support two mandatory full time leagues then in can be split with promotion and relegation re-introduced.

I see the point that some have made that some teams are relegated because of poor decisions on their part but that’s not necessarily the case. The current system effectively pushes clubs to spend beyond their means to try and avoid going down.

The problem with franchising/ licensing is that it tends to be a smoke and mirrors situation, where different criteria are allocated different "points", therefore allowing those controlling the allocation of licences to skew the criteria to suit their agenda and again, with the likely influx of N. American clubs, who have loads of cash but no foundation, just how do you score them ??

Plus, with franchise/ licensing, you are still effectively putting two fingers up to the Championship clubs.

People forget that RL is a sport and as such success should be decided on the field of play and not just by ticking boxes on a checklist.

Promotion/relegation was only brought back because it was deemed "unfair" to prevent Championship clubs from progressing.

Indeed, on any criteria based list, London would be nowhere near SL and yet, this season, having been promoted (and written off pre season) they have been a revelation.
Ironically, it is their success that has caused some fans to moan about the spectre of relegation when, pre season, "everyone" was happy with the format as they were "certain" that London would be straight back to the Championship.

They are without doubt the team of the season and Ward has done an increddible job, on a shoestring budget with a wafer thin squad

All of this will intensify greatly if/when Toronto are promoted as they seem to have plenty of cash to throw around and one would expect that once promoted, they will be here to stay.

TOUGH, it's called business. Widnes gave Dennis Betts a coaching role and bought a plastic pitch, hardly a loss to the game.