If in doubt, bag the RFL.

Has Clint been reading RLFans on his days off? He sounds like the sort of disaffected soul who blames the RFL for all the ills their club is suffering, of which the VT has more than its fair share.

In the week where Keith Senior has shown without argument that players should really keep their mouths shut and stick to what they know, it's nice to see he's not on his own.

He's totally right. Why should he shut up about it just because his opinions aren't positive and because they don't fit your fan boy viewpoint?

The sport in this country has been run appallingly by the RFL.

Appallingly you say?

If you think this lot are appalling, wtf did you make of the shambles that preceded them from the likes of Lindsay and Oxley?

The RFL is a much more stable, productive organisation now than it has been at any time since I started watching the game in the early 70s.

That doesn't mean it's well run.

Is the playing field as level as in the NRL? No. Is the standard on the field improving? No. Are the finances of the clubs improving? No.

As he says in the article it's time the RFL brought in an external body to do a review of how things are done.

How are any of those things the "fault" of the RFL?

If clubs are stagnating, or going backwards, through poor management what is the RFL supposed to do for them?

It exists to look after the health of the game as a whole, right up from under 6s mini/mod league to the international game. If you genuinely think the sport hasn't made big strides forward under the current management structure then nothing I say is going to influence your opinion, but I suggest you're in a minority.

Your opinions.

Every single one of those points could be debated.

The RFL need to be working towards the grant = the salary cap then insist all clubs spend max salary cap. Only then will we see an even comp. May mean some hard decions about cutting the SL back to 12 clubs but that should be the goal imo.

They really couldn't. The RFL do the bare minimum in keeping the sport ticking over and nothing more. Crusaders has been an unmitigated disaster and so has the entire franchise system. I'll bet that has cost millions and has resulted in clubs like Wakefield, Castleford, Salford and Harlequins remaining in Super League.

In place of who, exactly?

If those four clubs you mentioned were no longer in SL, who would replace them?

Leigh? Barrow? Halifax?

Aye, the sport would be much, much stronger with those big names dining at the top table.

If you're advocating getting rid of them and running with a ten-team elite competition, ask yourself why SL is currently 14 teams and how much input the RFL had to that decision?

Correct Andy.

But you can look at things in perspective, unlike Saddo.

I'm not interested in the politics. Get rid of the chaff.

Most of what he said made perfect sense, IMO.

He did well at identifying the problems - including the serious lack of money in the game (funny no-one has identified that before, mind...).

He did less well at proposing practicable solutions, but then so do most of us on these forums.

With regard to the argument about the lack of money in the game, surely it's the RFL's responsibility to bring the high-level money into the game, ie TV rights, competition sponsors, Sport England funding, and I fail to see how people can argue that hasn't been massively successful over the last decade. Or have we really got such short memories?

If you want to indulge in traditional RL navel-gazing, look no further than the clubs for the majority of the problems. How many clubs continually and historically fail to develop players, fans, finances, grounds, administrators, coaches etc etc? Yet still they have a major say in the running of the game.

Finally, if you think RL has bad governance then you've never looked closely at RU, cricket, football and many others ... what's wrong with simply enjoying the greatest game with all its strengths, weaknesses and differences?

We always getter better viewing figures than the Union club game and I hope the RFL are using that to there advantage.

Does the RFL produce an annual report showing playing numbers, jnr registrations, income of RFL and SL etc?