I said when the 8's system was announced that it was only the illusion of P&R rather than the reality. The top Championship teams are at a disadvantage from the off for several reasons:

1. The standard of refs below SL. Now many on here will bag on the ref's at SL games, but the performance level of refs in the championship is much lower, meaning a much slower pace of the game, meaning the Championship clubs have to struggle to get up to speed when playing SL clubs in the middle 8 or get mowed down.
2. There is the financial gap between them. Not just in terms of central funding, but in terms of available salary. £800k is a big gap when you think how much the average player is paid plus there's now the marquee player thing but only for SL clubs. Surely it would be fairer to take the average salary of the bottom 4 SL clubs (which should be easy to work out, given we have a live salary cap) and say that rather than the £1 million cap limit, Championship clubs can spend up to that average providing that they can prove their income streams will cover it.

The whole concept is very poorly thought out and as you rightly say, the disparity in income in the Championship next season may well pave the way for a club to gain promotion (if indeed it does not happen this season) but the whole of the league will be skewed massively in favour of the top 2 clubs, who, as you say, romped the league anyway.

So far from every minute mattering, the competition (Championship) will be utterly pointless next season.

Also, the bottom 4 in SL are heavily disadvantaged in terms of recruitment for next season, which will ensure that they remain as the bottom 4.

It has it's faults, but something had to be done to return the chance of promotion to the middle order clubs, this way it gives all the lower tier clubs a target, however it does away with the nonsense that the weakest top tier team is simply replaced by an even weaker team, the lower teams have to PROVE they are better than what they would replace.
No it's NOT going to be easy, and it shouldn't be, but unless we introduce a divisional NFL type system I don't see any other way.
Perhaps we could have gone with a straight play-off between the Championship winners and the SL wooden spoonests, I don't know, but this is what we've got and it's the same for all, so lets just get on with it!

Confirmation that you don't actually know what a 'dead rubber' is.

You may also like to ponder on the fact that history is littered with ruined men who put their shirts on a 'dead cert'

For the last 10 years I've gone to 75-80% of cash games, this time around in the super 8s I've attended 1 game of the 7 due to the lop sided Thursday night TV games. And I think the crowds pretty much reflect that it isn't ideal. I wouldn't say either the super 8s or middle 8s have been extra exciting, in fact, a bit of a damp squid. That's not to say the semis and million pound game won't be

Agreed
It's a pity that Billy Eve isn't posting attendance figures, as they appear well down on last season, offset slightly by slightly improved attendances from the top 4 Championship clubs.
Although, in past seasons, the play offs in SL haven't always been well attended, it would be interesting to see the total numbers of species through the turnstiles compared to previous seasons.

The main "winners" in the new format are Sky TV and although the possibility of someone getting promoted has been a positive, the new concept hasn't helped supporter numbers, unless we start counting armchair viewers.

Hull kr's crowds during middle 8's have stayed consistent with sl crowds on the whole.

Is there a single sport that has managed to solve the apparent problem of "dead rubber" games?

Whilst such games are never ideal, we seem to be quibbling over what seems to be an inevitable part of any league-based sporting competition.

This isn't an issue of structure, this is an issue of how competitive clubs are, or are allowed, to be.

One thing that i'm surprised the clubs haven't made a fuss about is the growing number of SKY Sports Xtra games being streamed online. This started as an experiment mid-season, but seems to have grown and grown as the season has gone on, and it only takes a few hundred to stay at home and stream and the clubs have lost a lot of income.

Streaming is undoubtedly the future of broadcasting, but i'd be interested to see if these games were even worked in to the new TV deal, if the clubs are getting compensated etc or is just a thing that SKY/The RFL are forcing on the clubs.

The RFL/SL let the genie out of the bottle. There is no chance of getting it back in. He who pays the piper calls the tune, even if it's out of sync, timing and tone.
It's what the few wanted and the rest have to lump it.
It's unlikely to change anytime soon, if ever.
I await the next "framing the future" type debacle with increased lack of interest.

While i agree with you I do hope that sky keep the streaming has people like me and hundreds more who can not get to many games get to see more so sky please lets have more

I really like it and want to see it remain for many years and improve as teams get used to the concept and how to approach the season.

As long as your ok !

It's an interesting conundrum for the game when the games main sponsor is happy with falling crowds, just as long as their viewer numbers increase ??

This is when the game requires strong management at the top who have a plan for the future wellbeing of the game and that can take the game forward which, despite the fanfare at the start of the season, we appear to be going backwards.

There is no problem with the extra games being shown. In fact we should get as many as we can shown through whatever mediums we can.

However set against a background of falling attendances and struggling clubs and a structure that has fundamental issues already and hasnt provided the promised benefits it's smacks of a game which doesn't know where it is going.

It seems many in our game saw the new TV deal and return of p+r as a panacea, and reality is slowly dawning that the huge problems we are trying to ignore just aren't going away.