We don't have 10.

Club sport is not supposed to be as intense as Representitive. It's there for enjoyment for the fans, and for rugby we don't need a tiny core of strong teams unless we want to keep within the limits we have always had.

I'd rather see a diluted pool of 16 drawing from many potential areas than have a core where everyone has to move to if they are any good.

If you are talking like that then we have 4 IMO. 5 when saints have their new ground.

The rest...

Bradford
Hull KR
Catalans
Hudds
Crusaders

Are all good enough really, especially once Hull KR get a stadium sorted and Bradford get their crowds back up.

After that I would say Widnes and One of Wakey or Cas would be next.

i love the idea of a genuine ten team european league [with room for expansion in the near future].
manchester,covering gt manc
liverpool covering merseyside n.wales,chester
leeds
hull
a.another from yorkshire
london
cardiff
bordeaux
toulouse
mille.
at the moment there's about £17million a season split between 14 clubs.
if that was distributed along with french tv money amongst the above clubs within a few years this league could be worth £30 million a year in tv rights alone and with increased advertizing revenue and gate reciepts could be worth £50 million+ a season.
as i said above i love the idea of a genuine european league.leigh centurions on a tues/weds evening then on a saturday go watching the best rugby players in the world in manchester or liverpool.

"at the moment there's about £17million a season split between 14 clubs.
if that was distributed along with french tv money amongst the above clubs within a few years this league could be worth £30 million a year in tv rights alone and with increased advertizing revenue and gate reciepts could be worth £50 million+ a season."

Right Mr Murdoch, we,ve got a new plan ... we are going to have less games you can show ... no don't run away as the reduction in advertising will be matched by the increased number of Sky licences ... honest ... but some games need to be offered to the French television ... look you're not listening ... the amazing Wigan v Leeds would replace Salford v Quinns ... I know you already show the first but imagine better sides ... oh ... so you are pulling the plug ... yes we can manage on less money (thinks: back to part-time for all but 3/4 clubs) ... yes the exodus of players will improve Union (Murdoch thinks ... better for the more widely accepted games).

Meanwhile Smith tries it with BurgerKing: the reduction in size of burgers and chips means more time in preparation but McDonalds laughs to the bank.

Sheesh ... business please. Oh, Sky DOES call the shots OR we would not have gone full-time.

dont forget it would'nt be ten teams for long,other big cities might like a peice of the action.hopefully the international game would grow much quicker and dont forget the challenge cup.loads of potential for more games.
then theres the eng/brit domestic league made up of the town and small city teams.even more games for tv.

Sadly, the requirement of rugby league the business doesn't fit with the expectation for England to be competitive at international level.

Northern hemisphere players do play too many games in a season and their off-season is too short in comparison to their southern hemisphere counterparts. One way to reduce the number of games is to reduce the number of clubs in the elite competition.

That would mean the clubs losing out on home games however, and the idea of chairmen voting to reduce their income streams brings to mind turkeys and Christmas.

The best compromise re club, player and country is to put a limit on the number of games any individual player can play in.

Or have an elite squad of 42 players chosen by the England Coach at the beginning of the season who are signed to central contracts and restricted to 20 games a season.

Then have a draft of those players with 3 players going to each club and their salary is taken off the club's salary cap.

Would distribute the better players around the league more fairly equalling a more competitive league.

You've got to be kidding!! Can you really see see any club giving up their rights to a player? E.g. club X invests in its youth policy and develops, lets say, 5 home-grown stars (behaviour which the RL are trying to foster), it puts them of long contracts (as you would). They are selected for England at the start of one season, so how's that work then? The club potentially lose them all in the draft!!!! And, if they get to keep any, they lose their services for 7 games.

but the idea is to progress the game as a whole,not to think about the well being of the clubs that have held the sport back for a hundred years.

The issue isnt the amount of clubs, its the amount each club contributes to the league. It again comes down to the effort clubs put in to youth development and also the need for expansion.

There is a limit to the amount of players we can take from the heartlands, if we are to have more clubs, then we need more players. We have a very strong heartland where there isnt a great deal of potential for growth in the amateur game. If you look at the amateur game in west yorkshire, cumbria, the areas around Hull and Wigan, you will see a very very strong amateur scene, as strong as any amateur sport in the country.

A huge amount of our players come from these areas, and there isnt a huge amount more than can be squeezed out of there. We need a more national amateur game, and more pro and semi-pro clubs throughout the country to provide pathways to the top for them.

we need to look at the make up of the league rather than the number, in the future there is no reason not to believe this country cant sustain 14 even 20 teams, but we need to get more clubs, in more areas at EVERY level of the game.

If we could replace 2 or 3 heartland teams, with 2 or 3 clubs like quins (from a solely youth development point of view) who have invested and worked with the amateur game to build a whole new pool of players then we can grow the size of the league

as for limiting the amount of players playing, fine, limit it across the board, every player can play a maximum of 22 games across all competitions per season.

why is the LEAGUE more important than the sport to you?

id like to know where you thought thats what i had said?

It's easy to say, but what exactly do you mean by 'progress the game as a whole'?

I like that, similar to NFL, you get more teams playing against top sides, the localness will improve crowds for teams like Leigh and Widnes. Everyone's a winner. Can't see any flaws to that.