Non of those "mitigating circumstances" make any difference at all to the ability to count away support with a reasonable degree of accuracy. Actually I'm surprised that clubs do not do this anyway. The proportion of any given crowd made up by ST holders, pay on the day own supporters and away supporters would seem to be pretty useful information in running the business.

I never mentioned selling tickets "cheaper to away fans".

Anyway, without getting into the minutiae of a hypothetical argument I'm saying that incentivising clubs to encourage more of their own travelling support is a good thing and to me easily as valid as the 40% of capacity for attendance. The "mitigating circumstances" around that franchise point don't seem to bother you too much e.g. Distance from ground, quality of the ground, price of the ground, percentage of home fans...SIZE of ground.

I dont like the 40% rule tbh, think its daft

To be fair Away support should not be counted on the franchise, I go watching Widnes all over the country because i want to watch them play, not because it may gain us some brownie points with the RFL.

On the Subject of the 16 clubs issue. For me the RFL need to step away from making any hard decisions until nearer the time that the franchising process is coming to a head. Sure they can outline the multiple things they will be looking at in each applicant but things like The number of teams and where they come from and go from should be made closer to the time. What we need is as many teams playing top flight Rugby as possible, and anyone that has a solid application should be accepted. Its easy enough to work out a Fixture and league system where upwards of 30 teams can play top flight sport, Just look at America.

We should also Award the highest amount of points for Youth structures when considering applications. This is the single most important thing we need to get right, if we can get 20-30 clubs working hard at getting Kids playing, Training and improving. Then we might start to make some headway on the international scene, which will automatically make the sport easier to sell to TV and the public. I would be happy if a third of points awarded we awarded on youth structures. But i may well be alone on that one.

I Would also be happy to see more french teams in the competition, in fact i think it is desperately needed. Perfect Scenario would be where we have 3-4 French clubs in the competition, And the French Federation deals with a TV deal for them. The British clubs and their tv deal is sorted through the RFL. This way the french Federation could distribute its TV deal monies with Its SL club and hopefully use any extras to strengthen its domestic league and groom clubs for SL inclusion one by one. The RFL could do the same with its Monies, So long as we are all working from the same salary cap then i dont see much of an issue.

Money is not the only reason i would like to see More french clubs in SL, The Catalans club need a local rivals to compete with on the national stage. Something for the fans and the french media to get their teeth into, sure it was great having the Famous Wigan club visiting and would put bums on seats but each year it becomes just another game. Then its not the famous Wigan pulling in the Crowds its just another Game against English Opposition. But some local Rivals would fire the imagination each time they met. I love the Widnes - Wire Derbies, the games against saint's, Wigan and Leigh. With the exception of Leigh they are the things i miss most about being in the championship, that firecracker atmosphere that really draws you in and gets old men singing and young kids concentrating.

I dont expect people to agree with me but there are many issues here and the RFL have a hell of a job keeping things together, You have me and my flatcapper friends that still love our clubs no matter how much we are told they should die. They have the need to expand the game, and it is something we need, they have limited Funding issues. They have to deal with the complete lack of enough talent to do the sport justice on the international scene. The sport needs to keep advancing and changing to to meet the demands of the its fans, and the worst thing we can do is not let clubs in that are doing the right things and bringing kids into their club and working with them. Just like we cant punish clubs just because there isnt room and leeds dont want a pay cut ( only used leeds as an example of a big club, relax ).

For me a club should only be expelled from SL for one reason, Financial meltdown. If that happens they should be relegated at the end of that season and forced to re-apply. On the basis that to get a franchise they already ticked the Youth/Stadium/Support Boxes, and so these should be a given for a SL club ( Crowds Vary dramatically with success and so should only be scored on having the potential to reach a minimum acceptable level ). I personally wouldnt want to see salford destroyed as a club so Widnes can get into SL, and relegating them would probably destroy the club. When for a minor cut in TV monies Both clubs could enjoy the Big games. And with an expanded league you have an expanded audience and an expanded youth system. And then you never know what the future might hold. Next time i visit Elland Road i might come away after watching England Beat France in the 4 nations final.

I will probably still have cramp in my knees because it's a **** hole, but maybe next time i will be too busy talking to my kids about the match to care.

So why is home attendance reflected in TWO franchise points? Because the RFL recognise that high attendances have many positive spin offs.

Boosting travelling support can add to these benefits.

I personally think the whole licensing criteria system is completely phoney and doesn't achieve what it is meant to achieve: that is a reflective grading of a rugby league club to compare with others.

Let's use an example:

Say a club has 9,000 average, plays in a 23,000 capacity stadium that isn't premier standard, averages top 9, has 7 home grown players, turns over £3.5m, has recently been insolvent but is good now, hasn't broken the salary cap and has clubs close to it. They only achieve one point for stadium above 12k and one point for not breaking the cap, but are really close on all others.

Now compare that to a club with a 4,800 average, plays in a 12,000 capacity premier ground, averages 12th position, has 3 home grown players, turns over £2m, isn't insolvent, hasn't broken the cap and has no-one near them. They get 6 points (12k ground, premier ground, 40% if ground full, not insolvent, not broken the cap and no-one near). That's a B grade license, yet they haven't really achieved anything on or off the pitch that is worth mentioning.

To me, there shouldn't be a "one point for this, no points for this" criteria list. It should be "you get so many points for having this level of one criteria" sort of situation.

Also, not having a 40% full ground shouldn't be worth as much as having a decent average attendance, or having a decent turnover. Certain criteria should be worth less than others. If you turn over £10m+ like Leeds, that shouldn't be worth the same as turning over £4m. If you average 9k spectators, that shouldn't be worth the same as averaging 3k.

Is the Boots n All '10 points' system actually being used? Certainly a 10 points system wasn't used last time, and I doubt the RFL would be stupid enough to implement such a flawed system. The point for being solvent particularly was a joke, how can an insolvent club even exist? I honestly think that Angela Powers misinterpreted a press release somewhere and that most of what she said was made up.

If that's the case , well done to the RFL for letting their main financier make a total arris of themselves , then again they have tried the same with League Express , martyn Sadler states how unhappy with them he is in this weeks edition over the Toulouse fiasco

I very much doubt they used this system, and Angela Powers is a complete idiot (baby changing facilities anyone?). But the RFL in all their glory haven't come out to correct anyone or to try and explain the system.

They will when they decide what it will actually be

You think the RFL should, or have any right to control Sky's programming? Get a grip.

I didn't say control , but ringing them up and telling them that they've totally missunderstood the criteria and then actually explaining it to them , yes

What interest would they have in doing that? One of the principles that this country is founded on is a free media, the RFL cannot go round telling TV channels what to broadcast or that their programming is 'wrong'.

2 things

1 Stop saying I have suggested the above when I havent

2 Stop ' acting ' thick , you manage to achieve it without trying any harder

Oh and one last one , stop trying to be ' Smokey ' he isn't big and he isn't clever

well they have explained the system people have just chosen to ignore it because the 10 point system is easier to understand and to argue over points about

The 10-point system was used for grading licenses once awarded (into A B or C) the licenses applications themselves were judged against four key areas. The question of whether they'll do that again, or use the grading system, now that it's in place, next time is, I think, moot at this point.

Of course, the 10-point system, especially as misused by Sky, allowed people to pretend there was a 'pass mark' which would mean a licence or not for anyone reaching that score, rather than licences going to the top 14 applications, judged more qualitatively than quantitively, which were then graded