Well done, thats the first team.. The team that beat you! Do you have any other physical evidence to prove your assumption?

It's a debate about the strength of the Leigh squad and he posted the Leigh squad. Considering Leigh haven't played SL opposition several times in a season since 2005 then what factual evidence are you after?

There is no more factual evidence. The rest is opinion.


I think Leigh will finish top of the Championship and may run an SL club close but still won't get promoted and neither will any other Championship side. I may be wrong. But until the actual games have been played there is no factual evidence either way.

So what do we call demoted Superleague teams? As in the Bulls and Broncos..Evidence shows they are X Superleague teams.What you are saying is they are no good for Superleague.Yet Leigh have beat them both up to now..

Its not a debate about the strength of a Leigh squad..Its quite clear everything being said is pointing to weakness in everyone elses team.

Championship teams. Until they're promoted or relegated again. Then we call them either Super League or Championship 1 teams.



No what I (and others) are opining is that no current Championship team, be that Leigh, Bradford, whoever, is good enough to get promoted under the current system. Hardly earth shattering to suggest a team in a lower division with a significantly lower salary cap and, in some cases, part time players would struggle to beat teams in a higher division.
Not to mention that Leigh are an ex-Super League team too.



Very nice. Leigh could beat every Championship club, including ex-Super League clubs, by 60 points this season and still not get promoted. It's the current Super League clubs Leigh (or any Championship club) have to beat. They might well beat them and get promoted. Good luck to them. However it's hardly a strange or outrageous opinion to think they won't.


It's clear that people are suggesting that clubs in a lower division might have a not so good team as those in a higher division.
You can take it as some kind of bizarre slight against your club or the Championship if you like but it'll just look a bit paranoid.

I'm all for Leigh getting promoted in to SL.

BUT, just because they are dominating the championship and beating ex-SL teams doesn't mean anything. Even if they beat Salford in a one off game it still doesn't mean anything. The 8's league will be totally different from the championship and Challenge cup games. On paper 2 championship teams probably have a chance at coming up and that's Leigh and Bradford. Picking the 4 bottom teams in SL at the moment, they all have players who have performed at a higher standard. Even if Wakefield go the season with only two wins they still have players that can put in a "final" winning performances. So on the day Leigh might have to play 4 big matches against SL players that don't want to lose their jobs.

Personally I see this as the first year in a several year development, which might not see a promotion for a few years. Unfortunately I think a lot of people expect instant promotion and relegation otherwise it's going to be a failure.

Sorry m8. If you were all for Leigh getting the promotion.. You wouldn't have made your last statement.



Do you see yourself being at that the bottom 4 coming the middle 8's?? Is that what worries you?

I think all the Championship clubs need to see this season's Middle 8's as a learning curve and not a disaster if they don't go up at the first attempt. Leigh have made such big strides, relatively speaking in the last two or three years that it's tempting to think promotion will happen. All that has happened, is that we now get a shot at it, which is brilliant, but it's still a long shot and has to be when you consider how many years and how much money all the current SL clubs have had to spend over the last decade. It would be extremely embarrassing to say the least for a current SL side to drop out through the Middle 8's, heads would have to roll.

On the other hand we now have a situation where two Championship clubs can lay claim to bigger support than a number of SL clubs and it's probably been a while since that has happened.

Lol. Do you think everyone who reckons no Championship team will be promoted this year are scared or worried about playing Leigh?

Spot on. Leigh or Bradford or someone else might do really well, or a SL club might implode, and the Championship club is promoted. But I think, because of a couple of good results/performances for Championship clubs in the Cup in recent years, some Championship clubs fans are very much underestimating the size of the challenge.

haha, I think I might of worded it a bit wrong. I'm worried that people will see a none promotion this year as a failure with the system. In my eyes its not a failure, as its a work in progress.

I'm looking forward to it, as the championship clubs will be playing out of their skin to get in to SL and the SL clubs fighting for survival. So on paper it should be some good matches. Nice siege mentality from you though

I'd say yes..

Tbh, the Middle 8 could go to form and the 4 SL clubs finish in the top 4 spots with the Championship clubs filling 5th-8th.

But that still leaves a one off match of 4th vs 5th at the end and in a one off match even when the SL team will be favourites, anything could happen. Won't be no pressure on the Championship club, will be massive pressure on the SL club (who won't have experience of big finals to draw on, at least the likes of Leigh can look back to recents finals at that level)......8 times out of 10 the SL team would win IMO, but as Sheffield Eagles proved in 1998, it doesn't always go according to script.

The Championship sides don't even need to win a game against the SL sides in the 'league' format......all they need to do is be the best of the Championship sides and finish 5th and win that one off "Million Pound" game and they're up.

I think people are forgetting. It ain't the top 4 sides that get 'promoted' to SL. It's the top 3 sides and the winner of a one off game between 4th and 5th.

Indeed.
If one or two clubs finish a long way behind the rest in SL, they will go into the middle 8 with very low confidence compared with the clubs at the top of the Championship who will be fired up and full of confidence.
The big unknown question is, how the Championship clubs will cope with 7 games in a row, with higher intensity, against full time opposition.

I still despise the concept but, the games will be an interesting watch.

Of course, the sting in the tail is that, even if a club wins promotion, they will very likely be back in the middle 8 the following season which isn't much of a reward.

The bit the super league fans are not grasping is it gives a clear passage for any club below super league to progress,its not a boom and bust its a steady growth were you can keep hold of your players,they grow and each year they know what they need to do to compete.the crowds increase bringing more money into the club which in turn means the club can sign up better youngsters thus improving themselves.if you ask any Leigh fan is it much of a reward to only end up in the bottom four of super league next year they would snatch your hand off.....cannot wait for the middle 8 games with Wakefield both hulls and Widnes playing at Leigh

It isn't a clear passage, it's dangling a forlorn hope in the naively grateful faces of Championship sides. The sort of steady progression you advocate would see you stuffed in every game, hell you'd probably struggle to get in the top 4 of the Championship. To have any hope a championship side needs to take a punt at a fair few players who are almost but not quite superleague class. Steady growth of your existing players isn't going to get you remotely competitive in the middle 8s.

And once you've made the decision to have your Lee Gaskell's and Moi Moi, you've probably got two good years at sustaining full time promotion chasing. Thereafter any decent players will leave and, in my opinion, the club falls back from serious contention.

I know everything is rosey in the Leigh garden, but at Bradford we know if we don't get up this time or next, we might never under this faux promotion system.