To me that is effectively just a re-election system. Wigan or Leeds, for example, in the unlikely event of them finishing bottom would be re-elected, but a smelly failing club could be binned and another given as much of a chance as was deemed appropriate.
The value of licences as an objective and useful tool turned out to be minimal. it basically came down to a vote on newco Bradford, and then nobody wanted to then dignify the pretence of a mini-licensing round. A vote would be quicker, simpler and more honest than all this messing about with assessments and applications.

Quite simply there are no Championship clubs anywhere near a viable SL level , and there wont be any in the foreseeable future [ 10 years ] so the answer is ?

It certainly isn't giving clubs a year excemption as then you just damage another club , there is no ' fair ' way of doing it , the only option is to spend money on the Championships , but we dont have the money , so basically SL will continue much as it has done , possibly slow laborious growth , while the feeder league slowly declines

The support numbers will remain static as SL gains new fans , but Championship clubs lose them , all the while the sport loses ground to other entertainment industries

How exciting

RL? , no we'll have SL to watch, but it'll never get any bigger/better and will always struggle

Wasn't a superleague club beating by a championship club recently? I.e. Featherstone and Castleford

Wasn't a superleague club beating by a championship club recently? I.e. Featherstone and Castleford

8 pages in and no mention of the fact that there is a probable reduction in the number of SL clubs next time around and the criteria for clubs to be culled/ relegated will be to say the least contentuous.
The game as a whole is struggling for investment and while the state of the ecconomy is well doccumented it is disappointing that our Aussie counterparts can secure a staggering sponsorship deal and yet we haven't even got a sponsor for our premier competition.
Many of the games commentators, including some club chairmen/ chief execs. are brokering the idea of a 2 division (each with 10 clubs) SL and allowing promotion/relegation between the 2 tiers.
The question is how to decide the make up of the leagues.
Obviously the likes of Featherstone, Halifax etc would move into the second tier but who would you drop.
Would this be performance based, or use some different criteria ie finance, facilities, community etc.
FWIW SL does seem a little more competetive this season, in so far as, there have been plenty of unexpected results and many close games, plus of course a number of blow out results and at the moment (assuming Salford continue to make progress), all of the teams in SL have a chance of making the top 8.

The success of the sport hinges, not on the playing field, but on the ability to attract investment and if the current big wigs are not up to the task, then we need to find some people who are.

No i didnt



and as i pointed out to you, only 3 clubs in the lower league are actually affected by the change to franchising. Dewsbury arent because Dewsbury wouldnt be promoted through any system.

Keighley were getting low crowds long before SL was even thought of, lower than now. They were getting low crowds long before franchising.

Les Catalans won 8 games in their first year. Not 2. 8. 8 is a lot bigger than 2.

Ill point this out to you again, very few clubs in the lower leagues are actually effected in any way by franchising, even fewer negatively. Barrow, Batley, Dewsbury, Featherstone, Hunslet, Keighley, Whitehaven, Swinton and York, even under P+R, even had they won the GF, wouldn’t have been promoted So whether we have franchising or P+R doesn’t effect them.

Ah, so it's not the RFL's fault then if it's inevitable? Thanks for clearing that up.

Proper ray of sunshine.

The thing about SL2 is are you spreading the Sky money among 20 full-time teams or just having a smaller 'real' SL and re-branding the (still semi-pro) second tier?

the income from Sky isn't enough to fund 14 teams to spend up to the full cap so a 2 tier league of 10 + 10 wont have equal funding, the lower 10 will be more like the worst 4 teams from SL now and the best of the rest from lower divisions......with a lot less funding than the Top 10 teams

I think this is something that would have to be negotiated with SKY (or whichever broadcaster had the TV rights)

One of the many problems that we have is that, the big boys in SL are looking for a larger slice of the current SKY money, plus the clamour for more "meaningful and intense matches" which, in fairness wont happen until every game is vital for qualification for the playoffs.
So, really we are talking about the lack of investment, plus the greed of the larger clubs.

What we should have done imo, is to promote the top club from the championship each season (providing that they hit "minimum SL criteria"icon_wink.gif until there are say 20 SL standard clubs and then split the league into 2, either as east and west conferences, or have the best performing teams in SL1 and the other 10 in SL2.
This does rely on TV money but, IF the game is attracting larger TV audiences it is not unreasonable to expect a better sponsorship deal.

Finally, which ever path the game goes down, there needs to be agreement in advance so that adequate planning and preperation can be made by all of the clubs involved.

Sky wont pay decent money for the 2nd tier. Whatever viewing figures these SL2 games get, they will be less than that same game if it was SL1. The same with attendances. All SL2 is is sop to some clubs who aren’t capable of being SL sides.

The conference thing does make sense, especially with the play-offs and GF and would be worth it just to stop whining from Wigan, There aren’t however, sadly, 6 clubs in the lower leagues which could sufficiently contribute to SL to make a 20 team SL sustainable. Some would argue there isn’t the player pool for 12 heartland sides, id slightly disagree with that, but I certainly cant see any kind of argument that we could support 18 heartland clubs. Then we come to fans and sponsors. Wakefield and Cas are about 4k each away from where they need to be, Fev are about 9k from that. Are there another 17000 people who will attend every week in the Wakefield district? I don’t think so, are there the sponsors to help support three teams in that area? Again neither of the two we have are bringing in big bucks to from sponsors, why assume that would change if we added another? Unfortunately our game si too constrained at the moment for any expansion in the size of the league, through the addition of new heartland clubs to be anything other than cannibalising the existing fanbase.

IF the rfl were to move towards that kind of set up, they should look at the two most obvious expansion clubs, Toulouse and Sheffield and tell them to prepare for admission in 3 years time, then speak to the heartland clubs and any other possible expansion areas and tell them to put together their bid for Super League, if out of that we can find another two clubs who will add to SL and not simply cannibalise the existing fanbase, whether they be expansion or heartland clubs then we expand to 18, if not, we expand to 16.

I like the idea of two conferences - perhaps each of 8 teams more realistically, though I think we're more likely to shrink than grow in the short-term, unfortunately.
Your last sentence is the really important point, IMO. Whether we like it or not, we're approaching a major crossroads and there doesn't seem to be much acknowledgement of it from the top.
iirc it takes a two-thirds vote among SL clubs to change anything. That is currently 10 of 14 and it is a struggle to see that level of consensus for any option at the moment, so we might just drift on with a pared back form of licensing, which'd be de facto franchising.

I think that it goes without saying that if there is a SL1 and SL2 then SL2 would have less funding than the top division, although there would certainly need to be a higher level of support than the current 2nd tier receives.
However, if 2 confrences was feesable, then funding should be equal, which would of course require additional "investment" from sky.

Going slightly o/t for a moment.
With RL being played mainly in England and Australia, should the RFL take its begging bowl to our antipodean cousins ?
In England, we pretend that we would like a strong international game and this is one of the primary reasons in the development of Catalan and the possible inclusion of Toulouse at some poiint in the future.
As things stand, especially with the $billion Aussie deal, the game in Europe will fall further and further behind and there is a strong possibility that eventually the Aussies just wont be interested in coming over here.
It's like a lottery winner making new friends and not bothering with the "old school". Lets face it, they are the "haves" and we are most certainly the "have nots".