Jean Douche craves attention but brings nothing to the table that warrants it sadly he will derive some weird satisfaction on each and every response to his ill informed comments, even this one, no doubt he will be sitting at his keyboard in his 'lemon' stained underwear and salivating at another reaction to him. My first and last response to the waste of space Jean Douche the only way to get rid of him is to ignore deny him the satisfaction of the response he craves.

Hey Rick. Come clean young newbie. Do you support Wakefield, Salford or Leigh?

Ignoring his nonsense only works for the posts that are not quoted. If you rise to his very obvious bait then please stop quoting him.

Yes indeed, you are correct - I will not quote him let alone reply to him as it appears if you make any reply at all, even a series of of insults, it somehow satisfies him or her?

Self moderation ruling the day? Good stuff

Back on track and under self moderation Gents?? Nigel Wood let them in without asking Superleague if that was OK. Wood had a new job lined up at the RLIF so he was never going to be the one to say "no" which would have ruined his "Internationalist" credentials. Superleague stood by and said nothing at all, probably thinking it would never be a problem for them. However the removal of salary cap restrictions below Superleague allowed TWP to buy their way to the top.

What the RFL/Wood did with the ridiculous league system and the raising of the cap was to stuff Leigh and their owner in favour of a fantasy. However please let's not shoot Nigel as he looks to be making amends by supporting Bradford's revival. In a couple of years we may have Bradford, Widnes and Leigh pushing for SL places under the new deal with the ridiculous American dream episode behind us.

Crucial for the future of the game this deal, but sadly cant see anyone but SKY being interested and that of course means a lower price and I think we need at least a few games with another broadcaster to spark some different interest.

Have said for years that teams should be banned from playing while a TV game is on to maximise viewing figures.

Do HullKR really need to face Wakefield on a Friday night at the same time as the Saints-Salford grand final rematch in round1 for example? Other weeks its even worse with 4 or 5 games going on while the TV game is on.

Union showing how its done again, 75k in Twickenham, live on Channel5 at prime time. And seems a decent game for once, a 30-30 draw.

Sky aren't stupid, and they know that they basically keep SL running as a full-time professional sport. They'll have done their sums and know what they need to pay to keep it that way. If they reduce funding, then they run the risk of further diluting the quality in SL. The alternative is that they don't bother to bid at all for a new deal, which would pretty much see a return to a semi-pro game across the board. I'd expect that one of the conditions they insist on in any new deal is that other games can't take place at the same time as a televised game. I'd also hope that they'll include one Championship game every week.

My daughter was there (again). She first went 7 years ago when her employer bought 100 tickets at a fiver a pop....... Her friends had such a fun time the following year they booked a restaurant for a prematch gathering, which becamme an anual event and this year 22 of them shared a box at TW2 Towers with a meal and drinks at £100 a pop. She has no interest in union AFAIK, but attends trailfinders a few times a year when he beloved chelsea are away............the trick was that she was on an email list that first time and quins immediately contacted her for feedback..... She was given 2-4-1 deals for any game at the stoop that year, an invite to the clubs open day the following season and when she booked for 15 people the next year she got a free quins bobble hat.......
.... Compare that with the RFL and the marketing of the challenge cup final.......... And im ashamed to say that even as a casual broncos fan, she gets no incetivised offers from trailfinders..... They just take her £25 and expect her to come back.... She spends more on 1 game at the bridge than a ST for london, but the club, like the RFL dont have a clue.

An excellent, pragmatic well thought out post. I only differ on your idea that "SKY don't bother to bid". Why an English Sports channlel would not renew the contract thus losing customers and disenfranchising a game British people do love and admire I can't think? It's their bread an butter to pickup sports like RL and it's worked for them for 24 years.

In 2006 Richard Lewis wasn't happy and thought we could be more than what we are and thus attract new audiences and expand the game to attract new broadcasters. This led to Les Catalans, Toulouse, Toronto Wolfpack and now New York, Ottawa, Timbuktoo etc. We've had 14 years of this stuff and nonsense so I would hope that with the new SKY TV deal we can just get back to basics and fortify the game back into what it's successfully been for 124 years - a Northern Rugby Union with a better set of rules that creates an alternative rugby in the sporting TV calendar.

The last deal is something we can't fairly expect again, as I don't feel we delivered that value anyway, but even a 25% reduced deal should secure us enough to carry on giving to the great British sporting public. That means giving them good old Northern Rugby league with the odd London appearance, a "basics" we must really now get back to concentrating on.

Pretty much my thoughts on it I think that the biggest negotiation it to get no exclusivity give sky a select bunch of games then auction off other packages to amazon bt bbc etc. I think that must be what the pe firms would be brought into do as that's the only real place for them yo make money on adding to any possible deal.

Disagree that they are teaching us a lesson, disagree with Axey as well. If we had as big a game as Union and were as strong in the capital as union I may agree if we didn't get the same deal, or attract the same number of fans, but we are not as big nor do we have anywhere near as much interest in the capital.

Judge us on how much we get for how little we are, not how much a much bigger game gets.

Can't argue much with that.