1,918,549 fans generated about £29,000,000 in gate receipts (£15 a pop) during the regular season in 2012. If you work on the same again in residuals (shirts, beer, food etc) then you're looking at a £65,000,000 a year industry (including play-offs) with 70,000 regular fans (weekly) spending on average about £850 each a year inside grounds, not counting travel and accommodation.

Television audiences average out at approximately 150,000 a game over a season of 67 games including play-offs, reaching another 10,000,000 or so viewers across the summer months and generates another £18,000,000 in revenue for the clubs....

Why is it the sport is struggling? The better part of £80,000,000 income from the fans and TV alone shows the buying power of those that watch the sport with 10 million TV viewers and close to 2 million attendees, yet last year, the RFL saw fit to give access to these consumers for nothing. Why?

Personally, I believe it is because the RFL don't have a clue how to run a professional sport and specifically, Superleague.

What other revenue does the govening body of the sport generate other than the TV deal with SKY, which is allabout Superleague. I can't imagine the FA relying 98% on the money from the Barclays, neoither can I imagine the Rahs relying 100% on Aviva.

The RFL should, IMO, step back from the SL in all aspects other than to receive a decent % of the TV money to filter down to grass rootsand they should let an independent business minded commission run the top 14 team league.

The game in the UK has stagnated over 17 years at the top level and if it is to truly grow, it needs fresh thinking at the highest level...the kindo of thinking being articulated by the new breed of owners coming into the game....where the clubs have to strive for self sufficiency through cultivating the fan-bases, delivering EVENTS and cease the reliance on handouts from owners.

The RFL, while it has to also govern the semi-pro and amateur ranks, can't objectively deliver this growth.....IMO that is.

The Premier League and Football Association are separately run I believe.

If you lot dump them, then we might as well , if they cant make a success of SL, they certainly wont make one of the Championship , my jack russel could promote the Championships better than Nigel and Ralph, he at least wouldnt force clubs to play midweek for nothing

So no, if you lot go, you can take us with you

As part of a fundamental change in the relationship between the clubs, and between the clubs and governing body, Yes.

As a stand-alone measure, no.

I think we should definitely explore a move towards an NFL style set up, with more distribution and more co-operation between clubs, as well as giving them the power to act as one, and empower them take responsibility and drive the game forward in the directions they want.

It is a coin with two pretty distinct sides though. There would be savings to be made by pooling resources in terms of things like ticketing, programmes, marketing etc, and there could be more distribution in league-wide kit maker deals, possibly sponsorship deals etc which would spread money more evenly throughout the game, narrowing the gap between the have’s and have-nots.

BUT


The only way that would work is by convincing the ‘haves’ that they would benefit from this in the long run, where an improved SL earns them more because it is bigger, even though, in some respects they are effectively subsidising some of the ‘have-nots’. That would likely involve having some pretty clear strategic aims within which some clubs, and some clubs actions and wishes, may not fit.

For instance, the league may, in the majority, agree that London does have a strategic importance, and they are happy to give additional investment to build the game there. They may not feel the same about other areas.

Not until they both (RFL & SL) decide and then agree who the stongest, well supported and best run clubs in the game are. Then this could happen. Say goodbye to P & R though.

When Super League first started it DID run itself - Super League Europe was fundamentally an autonomous body and Maurice Lindsay resigned fro the RFL to take over leadership of Super League. If I remember rightly they even opened an office in London for two weeks with Colin Myler in place there.
The RFL was left somewhat adrift , and the excellent and much maligned Neil Tunnicliffe tried to make a good fist of things. I think that Roger Lewis taking over pushed the two parties back together.
Rudderless is rudderless and I don't think whether the people reside in the RFL or a resurrected SLE would be much different. Let's see how the World Cup team operating from Salford get on before we throw the baby out with the bath water.

In a word, NO!

The FA/BPL rely on TV rights just as much - if not more - than the RFL/SL do.

I reckon superleague will break away in about 5 years as the RFL implodes on itself. The RFl are inept in almost every facit of the game and just don,t have any professional people capable of giving the game the profile it richly deserves.

We might see an 8 team superleague, this will depend on the commercial and marketing strengths of these clubs and how quickly they can surpass the efforts from the RFL.

Superleague has been undervalued since 2007 and hence needs a fresh approach and structure, something that some club chairmen have already mentioned through the media. The RfL don,t really have a clue how to adddress the problem and come up with a new model solution.

Intensity needs to come back in every game, a watered down 14 team superleague does not provide this. So who would be the 8 teams who could showcase our sport in the best possible way to attract quality sponsers, increased media exposure and give the game the profile it deserves.

The problems would come when the clubs decide they don't want to lose players to international fixtures. We need to grow our sport via the national team but the clubs will undoubtedly block this because they want to be playing games themselves.

rlDATArl


With 40%of their season remaining, 8,220,000 punters have paid on average of between 30 and 60 notes each. The exact average is hard to calculate because the EPL dn't publish all their ticketing info together, but even if all tickets were 45 quid each, then that's close to 40% of a Bilion in ticket revenue alone....or 1.2billion over 3 years.....

The Current TV deal is worth 2.5 billion over 3 years......so no, 50% isn't aS reliant as the RFL.........

Individually, many of the bigger clubs do have additional income streams from Global TV rights, but like for like in the UK, League is far more reliant on TV than wendyball.

Also, Licenced products such as England wendyball replica shirts will sell 5000+ times more than England RL shirts.....and the soccer ones are never on offer directly for a tenner.....the RFL rely heavily on the TV money from SKY...The only other major income stream they have is about 3million from the play-offs,which when you take rental for the grounds and the prize pool away is 2 10ths of SFA.


I digress. The point of the OP was that SL, IMO, would stand a better chance of becoming more popular and profitable, without the RFL at the helm.....and I believe the game at Grass roots level would be better run if the RFL weren't so distracted with looking after the likes of Bradford....

Well that is certainly much better put!

Its an interesting idea and it isn't as outlandish as the OP first made out to be.

Just how viable could/would it be though?

The only Championship Clubs directly in competition for fans and sponsorship are Batley and Dewsbury, the rest are far enough apart for it not to be an issue, SL clubs on the other hand are generally competing against each other much more off pitch as well as on