whatever faults football has, yesterday was about as good a sporting day as i have witnessed and i know that not every premier league campaign finishes with quite the same bang but for me (a rugby league fan with no more than an interest in football) yesterday's action in the premier league made our playoff system and the way we hand out our main prize look ridiculous

i say break with the NRL tradition, scrap the playoffs and hand out the main prize to the top of the pile at the end of the last game... besides, we already have a fantastic and historic knock-out competition that is open to everyone from bank quay bulls to leeds to catalans

yes this has been discussed at length but after yesterday i thought i'd bring it up again and yes i am a warrington speccy still bitter about last year

The more teams in our play offs the less intensity in our game, top 8 is ridiculous in my opinion. Would prefer a top 3, league leaders straight into the final with second playing third. A top 3 means there would be a scrap all the way to the end of the season to get those 3 places.
Would also bring relegation back every second year, first year giving the promoting team to settle in super league. Also there would not be 100% guarantee of winner of the championship going up if conditions are not met. This means the threat of relegation is there for the super league teams.
Could also create some minor comp for 8 teams out of the grand final.

I have to agree, I've said on other posts about the culture of doing enough to make the 8 then hope to 'peak' for the important games. I'm not sure that gives the earlier rounds of the SL the same value as the equivalent in the Premier League.

Last year's Super League champions won 15 games, lost 11 and drew 1 compared with top of the table Warrington who won 22, lost 5 and drew 0.

The champions should be the best team throughout the campaign, although Leeds played fantastically well in the play offs and final, I don't think you could say they were the best team over the 27 rounds.

The problem is people's perception

I think Wire were the league champions last season, Leeds won the playoffs

The Grand Final works and is a great spectable and event, but the Playoffs don't really work, the crowds are poor and the top 8 concept just rewards mediocrity.

Why no have a playoff between the winners of the League and the Cup, admittedly it's a problem is someone does the double and cocks up my concept.

I suppose with the current no relegation format it does leave little interest in what goes on between 14th and 6th as you would imagine these clubs have no chance of coming close to winning it at present.

Possibly the incentive of higher financial reward per place in the final table, however you run the risk of opening up the divide between top and bottom.

I do enjoy the excitement of the play offs and the final is fantastic, just not so sure about crowning the best team over 3 or 4 games as opposed to 27.

I would agree with scrapping playoffs and bringing back relegation and promotion, I think that it's vital for the survival of the game.

I really do think that the franchise system has caused crowds to drop everywhere but for maybe the big teams at top end of superleague, but lets be honest, how do the RL expect to gain support for a London team, who play at the same ground as the RFU old boys club and every season play for nothing! they can't get relegated, they're not good enough to even challenge for a playoff spot, so what do they have to attract new fans? At least if they were fighting to avoid the drop into Championship there would be some sort of draw for the crowds. (I'm not picking on London, just using them as an example of how the licencing system isn't working).

It's the same in the Championship, it's all well and good competing for the leauge title, but when there is no promotion for a club that are probably better than at least 4 clubs in the Super League, and a team that finishes mid table get a "license" what incentive have the fans got to go and support the teams. Again, I'm not saying this as a bitter fan, I don't support Fev or Halifax, I am saying this as a Rugby Leauge fan who is increasingly concerned that the licencing system is doing more damage than good.

Come on RFL drop Super League down to 10 clubs and bring back, top of pile wins the league and bottom of the pile goes down, you know it makes sense!!

I think the biggest problem is fans only moan once their team has won the LLS, why should it be changed because they suddenly feel hard done to?

I liked the play-offs when they were the best games of the season infront of good crowds.

5 team play-off.

P+R with the bottom team in super league playing the team who wins the championship.

Yes yesterday was a great sporting day but & it is a big but! there are lots other seasons where the competition has been over four or five weeks befor the last weekend. The Scotish premier this year is an example of that. I am a fan of the play off's, we should as a game stick with our plan. The grand final is becoming a major sporting event & has been said many times it ensures that the champion won't be known untill just before nine at night on the last night of the season, the main advantage of that is that the game can be sold at premium rates to advertisers fans & sponsers. As a sport we can not turn away money. The only people who have issues are mainly fans of clubs who don't win the competition.

How about this then, keep playoffs, but have top 6 in playoffs, drop number of teams in the league from 14 to 10 and bring back promotion and relegation.

That way most seasons, everything is still to play for right until final day of season for every single team, you never know it could have some right drama where the bottom 5 teams are fighting for last playoff place and any one of them could end up going down.

I've said this myself in the past. A contingency for the situation you describe could be 1st v 2nd? Personally I agree with the many posters who say top 8 rewards mediocrity and diminishes intensity and this was certainly exacerbated by last years result. I certainly wouldn't like to get rid of the playoffs altoger as I think the GF is an amazing end to the season. We just need to find a good way of marrying the spectacle with a just reward.

Absolutely bang on

Play-offs should be top four with the top team going straight to the final, third and fourth play-off to meet the second team in the SF, third team has initial home advantage.

Bottom side in SL plays off against top side in Championship for promotion\relegation.

Simple.

The team finishing top would have three weeks between games, they'd be undercooked.

Not simple.

Top 5 is the ideal system, there is the issue of dead rubber games outside of that though.