Carter wants loop fixtures because it's easy for him. The more he can flog the talent, with as many games as he can get away with, the less effort he has to invest in actually trying to sell the games he has. He says that the 'short notice' of the eights system makes it hard to sell tickets, yet there were 16 days between the fixtures being announced and Wakefield's first home game - ample time to come up with a sales strategy for that event (as evidenced by much smaller clubs like London Broncos, who have been actively promoting this game with a part-time operation).

Carter is undoubtedly good at what he does, which is bean counting. There is nothing wrong with that, but let's never pretend that he is in any way a visionary that can take the sport forward. His MO is protectionism and cutting the costs, not seeking out the opportunities.

And this whole proposal by Elstone and crew is about protectionism. It's about removing risk for the smaller clubs, allowing them to bumble along investing as little in business growth as possible and reducing their cost base without consequence, and for the bigger clubs it is about how much of the pie they can take, rather than how they can make the pie bigger. Anybody who doubts Ian Lenaghan's motives behind this simply needs to look at Wigan's accounts and take note of the reporting of an "operating loss of £605,286" due to a "significant reduction in sponsorship income" due to a "loss of a major sponsor" - on top of the previous year's £180k+ loss.

The Rfl and super league really need to get this right. Get it wrong and the game will haemorrhage more and more fans. Nobody wants loop rounds. Every fan simply wants straight round robin home away fixtures, nobody wants more than a top 5/6 play off’s. nobody wants any more than 1 up one down. Its simple nobody wants convoluted fixture list or convoluted play off p&r systems. I do not care whether its 12 or 14 teams but i just want a full home away fixture list printed in november so i can plan work/leisure/hobbies/holidays around my RL.

You need "loop" fixtures, because without them, you have 11 home games and 23 in total.

That does not give a sustainable income stream.

But having loop fixtures means lower crowds people stay away more and pick and choose what games to go to more. The shorfall can eacily be made upby a bigger average crowd and more big event once a season head to head games.

You've asked everyone connected to the game and every RL fan then? There's quite a few I know personally and posters on this and other forums who would disagree with you on at least one of the things you suggest aren't wanted.

Only if you assume a zero-growth model. If that's what we're doing, we should probably pack the whole thing in now.

Clubs need to focus on how the sport generates more with less, not with how thinly they can spread the jam.

Nobody will agree on everthing, i personally think franchise is better than p&r but some people think it should be a fundamental right. Some owople think 1/ teams some 14, sone think top 4 or even top 3 sime lks ne favour 5 or 6 teams. But answer me this do you no anybody who favours playing everyone home and away then another round playing everyone once plus an extra magic weekend round, thus playing one side minimum of 4 times. Its a convoluted ludicrous idea.
And i would wager that most would agree and be in favour of a system close to what i suggest. No body wants loop rounds and very few at all want a mid season spit.

Out of interst what is the one main point you and others disagree on.

There are no assumptions in my post.

There are 12 teams in SL. That means 22 home and away games + Magic. That's a fact without loop fixtures.

No club can survive on 11 games of income!

Less games will not mean more people coming - you my find less come in fact, as attending games is a habit that could easily be broken.

I like the 8's, but it's car crash excitement. By all means do away with it, but you then have to artificially create another set of fixtures to replace them.

Just go with 12 in Super League. If it went to 14 teams then each existing SL club would have to give up about £1/4 million of central funding. Not worth it just for two extra home games.

No, stick with 12 clubs top five play-off for the Old Trafford Grand Final - BUT WITH ALL THE TOP FIVE PLAY-OFF MATCHES (except the Final of course!) BEING DECIDED ON THE AGGREGATE SCORE OF TWO-LEGGED, HOME AND AWAY MATCHES.

The old top 5 format was the best play off series that we've had and did, quite rightly, favour those sides finishing in 1st & 2nd (until Leeds trashed the party).
This will mean that the remaining 5 (or more if we increase the numbers) wont have any further games but, this was a better system which, quite rightly, put the emphasis on the run in to the grand final.
One major issue with this would be fewer games for Sky, which could be a huge stumbling block.
Maybe all the sides that dont qualify for the play offs could have a new end of season cup competition, which would give them something to play for and give sky some additional matches to fill our screens.

That’s why we should have 14 teams in Super League

Which requires the acceptance of Sky, as their current contract specifies the league set-up, and this can't/won't happen before 2022 (next contract).

I too would like a 14 team SL, but the bigger division then needs 2up, 2 down = bottom down, top up, "MPG" between next to bottom and 2nd.

That would be fun.

For 11th upwards, that's still only 27 fixtures...a minimum of 3 more needed to sustain income.

Everybody hates repeat fixtures, except repeat fixtures against the bigger/better/more famous* clubs attract more fans than the first fixture against the smaller/worse/unattractive* clubs.


Change the structure again, why? It makes no difference if the clubs are poorly run and keep losing fans/revenue/good players* and there is no central funding/structure to get out into communities and get kids/more people playing the game in the long term and no plan to expand the international game, the only product that we could sell to a bigger/broader/richer audience in the short term.

*delete as appropriate.

14 Club SL, no auto promotion/relegation. Strictly down to criteria - finances, personnel, stadium, marketing plan, 5 years business plan etc. If clubs fail in these areas then no membership of SL end of! Too many lazy, poorly managed clubs in SL who lack true professionalism off the park!!