Powell- London
Betts- Widnes

Two who would be out of a job with P&R. This not mentioning Wane and Agar who are British. Next season Paul Anderson will be coach at Huddersfield. Admittidly there are examples to support your claims such as the Hull clubs and Cas. As coaches change less and less it will be harder to see if the trend of employing foreign coaches is increasing or decreasing.

I havent suggested it has failed, because unless you have a clear aim at the start, how can you judge sucess, however it was suggested it would ' advance ' the whole sport, I would suggest it hasnt

Since when has director input not been real money? Does it matter where the money comes from as long as it comes in? It only becomes a problem if clubs don't bother with other potential income then the director well dries up. I would be very surprised if there isn't any director that is currently putting their hands in their own pockets that are happy for the clubs to not try and minimise the amount of financial support needed.

In aly sport, in any league, in any country you will get rich teams, medium teams and poor teams. The aim has to be that the poor teams can still afford to compete, that rich teams are held to a realistic and true salary cap (cough cough SL) and that all teams have enough money to market properly, fund jnrs properly etc.

In NRL you have a team like Brisbane with a revenue of $32million and a team like Cronulla with $12million.

I can pretty much guarantee that franchising saved Agar's job at Hull. He was eventually released because our new owner didn't think he was good enough having had 5 years to prove otherwise. With P&R he'd have been gone years ago.

We've also got two other British coaches at sides that are at the lower end of the table. Would they be there if there was still P&R or would they have been replaced by antipodeans by now?

When would you revoke it? Immediately? What if there's no-one else to come in?


With what money? What if the other clubs aren't happy with the governing body funding a SL club? Would that call into question their responsibility to be impartial?


A remit? It's just a word, it's not a plan. How would this be achievable?
It's about as effective as me saying "I would appoint a new SL Director with a remit to double turnover at all SL clubs".


Doesn't sound like a complete overhaul at all to me. Sounds exactly how it is at the moment!


How would you come to this decision? You're in charge, don't forget. If it's scenario dependent, what scenario would result in what system?


What is classed as real income? Why isn't director input counted as real income? Couldn't a director just sell sponsorship for a ridiculous price and count it as "real income"?

For all you profess to have the answers and slag off the people that run the game, this reply suggests there's a lot left to be desired. There are certainly HUGE holes in a lot of these answers.

SL is not the success Sky, RFL and Clubs are painting for various reasons like
1) Clubs struggling if not getting seriously in debt. Wakefield, Bradford, Crusaders are just the tip of the iceberg. Salford, Cas, London and Hull KR are struggling to not just compete but survive in SL. Even the likes of St.Helens lose a lot of money. Is this really how SL was meant to be?

2) Standards on the field in SL have not seen the chasing clubs move nearer to the top clubs, but rather the top clubs have seen their standards drop. The defence is still as poor by many teams as in previous years. And the intensity of games is still nowhere near what it should be. How many games are real tough and of a high quality similar to an average NRL game? Very few.

3) SL Clubs would still rather waste money on average or less NRL players than invest that money on academy players and bringing through youth. Even clubs like Leeds, Wigan and Hull do not spend enough on Youth and rather pay the kids peanuts and train a couple of times a week. Maybe if the youngsters were full time and do more training alongside the Uni/college work they would be better prepared for RL and standards would be better both for individuals and clubs. Clubs still look for the quick fix rather than spend time and money on youngsters. As per usual Clubs dont take Academy rugby seriously and are now looking to change things because clubs dont want to spend the money or invest in something they dont feel is important. Typical Short term thinking.

4) The Licence procedure is a joke. Its all done behind closed doors and its clear that something is not working when Bradford are giveb a "B" grade and a couple months later are announcing debts close to 2 Million and going in to administration. The Crusaders was also a real joke made worse by the RFL and Nigel Wood personally knowing the problems, but chose to ignore what was going on and made empty promises to people who are still owed a lot of money. I cant say that the licence procedure is a success at all as it still has managed to miss severe problems in the game more than once. Halifax, (amongst other Championship clubs) make small profits and are deamed "ridiculous and not good enough for SL, meanwhile a number of Sl clubs are given praise and a licence and are losing hundreds of thousands a year and run badly. Sorry but that for me is something I cant accept and fail to see how licences have improved things that much.

I think SL needs a minimum standards, not just for clubs wanting to get in to SL, but also those currently in. For instance standards on ground, running of the club, Academy teams at U18 and U23 ( I think U20 should be changed to U23 and all clubs in British SL & Championship forced to run teams at these levels) etc should be part of the minimum standards, but why cant you also have P & R as well? If the Championship club fails to meet the minimum standards then they stay where they are with no relegation. No system is ever perfect, but more should be done to not just improve SL but Pro RL. But clubs like Fax, Fev, Leigh, Sheffield should be given the chance to play in SL if they meet the minimum standards but they also need to work hard alongside Sl clubs and not just left to feel they dont have much chance of ever seeing SL.
I dont think Nigel Wood and Ralph Rimmer are the right people to be running our game. They both have failed miserably when at SL Clubs and have left many unhappy people- some who have never returned due to how they did things at Halifax and Sheffield/Huddersfield. The way they treat people and seem to ignore many serious warning signs is a worry for me. I dont trust them and I know many friends who follow Sl clubs as well as Championship clubs dont either. The RFL really needs another person to run the game IMHO. Richard Lewis for me did many good things and has helped bring in extra money from various places. He was not perfect but probably the best leader the game in the UK has had. We need somebody similar to help the game at many levels and especially have a plan for all levels not just SL. Currently the Championship is a mess and the RFL come out with badly thought ideas like the Rail Cup, the recent Euro games etc. These ideas need to be better thought out and better planned.

I havent suggested that owners/directors cannot/could not put money into a club, just that they would have to spend more/work harder at creating non director income to become more self sustaining, ie like a ' real ' business, rather than a charity, it is that they would be judged on

This is a well thought intelligent post. Well done!

Nice to see instead of the usual bring back promotion and relegation shouting we see.

Read my post again, I didnt say real money, I said real income, income is what you ' earn ' , not what you are given

I don't want a 50 page breakdown. I just want you to add a little substance to what are very vague "solutions" to the game's problems, like "a remit to double attendances".

Here's my solution: Hire someone to make the game better in all areas.

SL has failed because:

1. Club RU has overtaken RL in crowds - this was not the case pre SL
2. We can no longer attract the gates to International matches we did pre SL - eg Wembley and OT test crowds in 90's
3. Fewer people now see RL due to selling our sole to Sky, as a consequence we cannot attract sponsors
4. The column inches in the national papers are at an all time low, even though the summer has fewer sports to report.
5. The game is divided, it wasn't pre SL
6. The challenge cup has been devalued due to the rush to establish the GF


RL is expanding its amateur base in new areas because:

1. RU allows RL teams to play at its facilities
2. RU doesn't ban RL players anymore
3. RL is now not banned in the Armed Forces
4. The RFL is able to access grants to support development