Licencing has been around for four years! If it was forty, then maybe I could see the problem.

Regardless of whether P and R or franchising was in place, the majority of clubs would still need financial backers to stay in business, whether through a sugar daddy or RFL assistance. Thus, the assumption that some fans are under that promotion and relegation would be more likely to keep clubs afloat is irrelevant, since in almost all professional sports in this country, not just rugby league, it is very difficult to operate for a profit. Crusaders, Wakefield and Bradford were really the victims of poor management; their financial downfall wasn't caused by the system itself, although in fairness, the RFL should have been stricter when inspecting them.

What the franchising system does demand and encourage is the development and maintenance of young talent in the LONG TERM (which seems to be an alien concept to many posters), and we are already seeing the fruits of that. Such an incentive just didn't exist before franchising, as survival was the only goal.

So England are going to win the rugby league world cup cos franchising is working?

Why would you think that?

I think that the game is in a worse state now than before franchising and that anyone who disagrees needs their head examining.

The lack of buzz surrounding the game is very evident this season, interest levels are dropping by the year

I think the game is in a better state now than before franchising and anyone who thinks different needs their head examining.


The buzz around games is getting better and better, and spectator levels are growing both at the games and on TV.

Interesting how few Championship club fans are for franchising.

They cant see the benefits for the whole of RL, all they can see is how it impacts their own club.
they would rather live in the boom and bust that nearly devastated the game than a slow, steady growth.

Clubs making massive losses and the lowest sponsor incomes for years, the game needs something to boost it. If it rains heavily next November the game in this country could be in real trouble.

Lowest sponsor incomes coinciding with one of the worst recessions in memory? Funny that. Not at all surprising that marginal sports such as RL suffer out of proportion in bad times either.

Meanwhile, crowds seem to be holding up pretty well, and there are far more talented young British players in the game than there were even five years ago. I'm sure Huddersfield would have held their nerve and backed the likes of Cudjoe et al if they were threatened by relegation. One bad season and they wouldn't have reverted to type and signed a few more Aussies to bolster their side. No, really.

Exactly, as soon as the Giants were safe from relegation they began to bring more and more young players through, and now have a back line the could grace any club in te comp.

Leeds have had that luxury for years and so have brought through the brightest and best, same for Wigan and Saints - all able to mix the very best internationals with the brightest youngsters.

None of which is thinkable if you languish in the lower half of the table fighting off relegation.

Given that attendances yet again are on the increase this year and the buzz has been pretty phenomenal this season I'm surprised you can even suggest that.

Franchises are hopefully here to stay. We need to be a sport that allows its premier teams to develop talent. There's a debate to be had about the number of teams in the competition (twelve appears to be the optimum amount) and a few other things but not on franchising as a concept. Tinker with how it works maybe but going back to P&R will just turn the tail end of Super League into football where teams invest in players, not to develop talent, but to avoid relegation with no care whatsoever about individual player development.

Wakefield, Salford and London dont seem to be showing the same progress despite languishing in the bottom half of the table year on year without the threat of relegation hanging over them.

That's because they still have the threat of relegation over them.

Hth.

Oh, were you thinking P&R was gone?

Given their location, London are doing better at producing players than most SL sides. Wakefield have emerged from near oblivion, and have a fair number of homegrown players elsewhere in the comp - some as a direct result of their financial issues. Perhaps Salford have focused more on stadium development - the only club apart from Sts that has actually delivered one - and can now start to look more at player development?

Personally I can't stand franchising, it just has too bia a whiff of artifice around it.

But linking Bradford's current plight to franchising is tenuous at best.