I don't know who you think is going to 'improve everybody' other than the clubs themselves, but competition is not going to come from clubs like Leigh and Featherstone no matter how much money you want the RFL to throw at them.

You dont mention the contradiction, you stated that on field shouldnt decide who is in SL, then say its the most important thing

Make your mind up

I meant current SL clubs and their fans

Yes but people dont pay 20 quid to watch amatuers do they?

Which club do you follow through the turnstiles Headhunter?

So were f***ed then arent we

Just watched Crystal Palace play Sunderland at a packed to the rafters Selhurst Park ,the Eagles fans didnt stop singing all match

The romance of sport

It isn't a contradiction. SL should be full of teams that are capable of being competitive. Promoted teams are unlikely to be competitive, they have to assemble a squad from scratch at short notice. Clubs with extremely saturated catchment areas are also lot less likely to be competitive, which is what we're talking about with the majority of Championship clubs. Promoting the winning Championship team each years is far more likely to result in uncompetitive teams than a sustainable system. It also means that the Championship will have one dominant club every year.

Crystal Palace shouldn't be in the Premier League. They're too small. They'll never win it and they'll never be as big as Man U.

That's the mantra round here isn't it?

But football is totally different because of the nature of the sport, and because Crystal Palace are a full-time operation that are bigger than most if not all of the SL clubs. They are portrayed as minnows because football is so dominant but the reality is that their turnover is likely to be considerably more than all the RL Championship teams put together. It's not a relevant example at all. The equivalent in football would be like promotion and relegation between the Championship and the Blue Square Conference.

And yeah, clubs like Leigh aren't ever going to be competitive in Super League. They were promoted and got absolutely smashed every week, and that's probably the best they can hope for in terms of their ceiling. If you think otherwise then you're kidding yourself.

So once again, where's your options?

And why is what youve put at the end a problem ?

Their turnover will likely be more than the whole of SL, never mind the Championships, and why is that?

Because football lives on raw emotion, because that is what sport is based on, lose that, and your sport is dead

Wakefield, Hull KR, Castleford, London, and recently Salford are or have been in financial trouble. Huddersfield, leeds, Widnes, Wigan, Hull and Warrington rely on cashed up investors. Don't you think it's time the game woke up and realised that it cannot compete as a fully professional organisation. The game might just have to downsize to survive.

As such, clubs such as Featherstone, Halifax and Leigh might be the norm for SL not the exception.

The SL is in serious danger of implosion. Unless the big boys agree to some form of revenue sharing and that's not even remotely a possibility, then there must be some lowering of standards to ensure survival.

Cas haven't been in "financial trouble".

We haven't been into administration, nor have we needed bailing out.

Tell what position Huddersfield are in this season. They were promoted to SL. Tell if Hull KR have made the top eight. They were promoted. Castleford are above several appointed SL clubs. They were promoted and the same goes for Wakefield.

So your thesis isn't proven. Promoting a championship club is not likely to result in a less competitive teams.

On the other hand London were artificially placed in SL. How have they been doing this last few years.

So were Catalan....but they don't fit your pit village plan for the game!

Didn't Catalan finish 14th and last in 2010? Just behind London in 13th?

And Leigh were relegated and failed miserably in SL and finished bottom. Oh wait a minute, Catalans finished bottom also.

Headhunter - do you attend Rugby League matches? Do you consider yourself to be a fan of any particular club?

And unlike Leigh they had a three year advance notice that they were going to be in SL, were able to plan and recruit accordingly and still finished bottom.

Catalan also finished last in 2006 but a pit village who were promoted to SL finished above them were relegated instead.

Quite right. Also Hull and Salford were promoted from the division below.

Yep....then made the play offs the following 3 years whilst London continued to be hamstrung by the cost of living in the south and the RFL's ignorance of good business practice in forcing Ian Lenegan to stop investing in the club, leaving us in the hands of a hobbyist with not a clue how to run a sports business.
The benefit to us having the hobbyist by the way is that London are 100% debt free....not even an overdraft whilst Wakefield are doing a Bradford, Bradford are doing a Bradford and there are other clubs in the north not looking too clever. Fev's owners offer of 7 figures in escrow is about as much use as a chocolate tea-pot.....Modern Clubs need to have an income of 5 million minimum...7 if they want to challenge for honours!

We don't want to challenge for honours to begging with. Survival has to be the target first year.... Gradually building slowly to increase expectations to a top half finish. With a food coach even a part time club can beat a full time club, look at when we best Cas. We could compete to finish mid table with the other bottoms clubs then build slowly on this progress.

As a fan, that is what would get me excited about being in superleague for the first season, the chance of staying up like hull kr.

So is headhunter still blatantly dodging the question as to which team he supports?

Oh yes, he sure is.

It's not the club he supports that's important - it's whether he attends any matches in the guise of a diehard fan. I'm not saying he isn't allowed an opinion if he isn't a fan but it would explain a lot if he came out and said "actually, I don't watch any games and my heart doesn't belong to any one club".

His posts and his attitude answer my question to be honest. It's obvious and his lack of understanding about club Rugby League and the passions that run through these clubs from Chairmen to fans is something that is completely alien to him. He's only feeling half the story.

Travelling 200 mile round journeys on a cold wet afternoon and shovelling hard cash through the turnstile window gives you a different perspective on the game than the one Headhunter thinks exists. 37 Chairmen and countless club officials wouldn't exist for a start. Without that passion this sport wouldn't exist and yes, maybe that's a big part of the problem as passion and romance often gets in the way of sensible business decisions. But that's Rugby League and it's something that Headhunter clearly can't understand and it's something that the franchise system clearly cannot cater for.

He is a RL fan, not a lifelong supporter of any particular club, he doesnt have those colours running through his veins , he doesnt feel the emotion, the hurt , the elation , to quote a famous scribe " He is more machine than man now "



But as I posted yesterday, watching newly promoted Crystal Palace fans stood singing for 90 minutes yesterday, it is raw emotion that runs proffessional ( ie paying to watch ) sport, it is that which pays for it

Rugby Union is different in that its history hasnt had a century of rivalry between clubs, therefore it is less emotional than football and RL, even American sports all being relatively modern and not being localised dont produce the same feelings

We are what we are, we have what we have, its no use wishing for what you dont have, but we can and should be working much harder to improve all that we do have, no matter what the structure is, because it seems to me this is just another attempt to find a magical silver bullet to solve all our problems

It wont