Quote wrencat1873="wrencat1873"In reply to the op,
What do the supporters of RL want and what do the RFL want from the game in 5/10/20 years time and, more importantly, how do they expect this to be achieved.'"
And that's the millon dollar question, right? Because what this forum regularly shows is that supporters have vastly different views on what they want from the sport, and how to achieve it (not that that's necessarily a bad thing).
From my own personal view, what I would like to see from the sport is competitive fixtures, involving the best possible players, playing in front of full and modern stadiums, developing in modern facilities and earning a good living from the sport.
The way to do that is to increase the level of money coming into the sport - from commercial, television and from supporters. Thats the reality of modern, professional sport. Where I think I disagree with some people in this forum is how to do that.
To achieve the above, the game needs to be talking to new audiences - the audiences that advertisers and broadcasters want to reach - and my belief is that expansion and licensing is the best way to do that.
If we want to achieve the above, we need to change the fact that the sport in the UK is strongest in the areas where the economy is amongst the weakest. When we insist that the future of the sport lies in small towns and cities where the High Streets are made up predominantly of bookmakers, pawnbrokers and takeaways, we have no right to be surprised or outraged that the only brands that want to support the sport are online bookies and canned mushy peas.
North America, whilst I agree it should be approached carefully, represents a very real opportunity to do that. Canada and Amercia represent new audiences, in big cities, big media markets and big commercial markets. Yes, they're crowded markets, but I believe RL does offer something of a USP in those areas. A small slice a big pie can offer us more than an big slice of a small pie.
The heartlands of the sport are and should always be important, but we can't continue to permit a situation where clubs can continually vote to make it harder to retain our existing talent by voting against even inflation-linked increases to the salary cap, or where clubs cannot sell tickets without pricing them at rock-bottom prices, where clubs opt out of competing in the World Club series because they don't think they can sell enough tickets, or where clubs don't produce elite talent through their youth structures, without that being challenged.
Different people may have different views on what they want from the sport, or they may have different views on how to achieve those aims above, but that's why I support expansion and licencing.
