How much longer before automatic one-up, one-down promotion and relegation between the leagues is introduced?

The fantastic achievements of both Sheffield and Doncaster should have been rewarded with promotion to Super League and the Championship respectively (with Widnes and York respectively being relegated).

Success in professional sport should be within a structure that rewards it - for supporters, financial backers and players alike.

Every club wants to succeed whilst at least breaking even. But £5m in, £5m out is better than £100k in, £100k out.

By failing to have a system of automatic one-up, one-down promotion and relegation between the leagues, the RFL is failing to reward success, and actually rewarding failure instead - all to the detriment of the development of the game as a whole.

sheffield will do no better than widnes have.....so whats the point?


cut all the deadwood from super league and have 10 teams

Fixed for accuracy

And when there are 10 teams,someone will again become 'deadwood' - no doubt you would then suggest reducing the number of teams to nine?!

Doncaster [iwere[/i promoted prior to the playoffs beginning. They went up along with Barrow, Workington and Whitehaven as the top four in Championship 1 were promoted this year. Its just that no teams were relegated this year. Promotion and relegation will still occur (2 up, 2 down) between Championship and Championship 1 next year too.

Many thanks for this clarification -

but it's exactly this sort of make it up as you go along, chop/change style that the game needs get away from. There needs to be a sensible structure that's left in place - so everybody knows exactly where they stand long term and then let the Club's get on with it.

My recommendation that there be automatic one-up, one-down promotion and relegation between the leagues includes Super League.

Im affraid in sheffields case absolutly not for promotion, it would kill off all the good work they have done, they have a fan base of about 250 people and that is it. How the hell do you expect them to survive let alone compete. They are like the littleist hobo with no home ground and mess fixtures about every single year becuase of the football season. This would make the SL look less silly than it already does which is a hard thing to do.

I dont like licensing but P & R without some caveats is just doomed !!!

nope........its easier to drag 1 deadwood team upto standard than it is dragging 4

london
catalan
wigan
st helens
warrington
huddersfield
bradford
leeds
hull fc
hull kr

that would make for a very competitive league........and yes the championship would become a 16 team comp

Eagles for Super League, I agree

Yep, that will sort out the Super League and create a pathway for Championship clubs to prosper, not.
We have to find a way of making the championship full time and then there could be a return to straight forward promotion/ relegation.
Having said that, would you promote a team that has won a grand final, or a team that has finished top of the comp ?

So long as there is automatic one-up, one-down promotion and relegation between the leagues, that is up for debate.

I wouldn't mind either way - but, if the team finshing top is Champions and gets the promotion place, then there is no need for play-offs in Championship and Championship 1.

Team that finishes top should be promoted in my view.

Firstly because it would build interest and momentum throughout the season and secondly because they have proved themselves to be the strongest and most consistent.

Theoretically, a team could finish top by a large margin then pick up a few injuries in key positions and get knocked out of the playoffs whereas another could finish 6th with no injuries and string a few wins together to win the Grand Final.

I must stress that this is in no way belittling what the Eagles have done. They deserved to win but I'm just saying it does not make them ready for promotion.

it will sort out super league.........and can't championship clubs in a viable,stand alone,competition prosper?


and only when a championship team starts to dominate the championship,iirc we've had different winners every year for the past 5 or 6 years?,should we even look at expanding super league and moving the dominant championship club up.......

Why do London, Bradford and Hull KR get in your little league?
Hull KR won 10 games and London won 7, many against teams you didn't include in your league.
Why would that be more competitive?

Sheffield now have the opportunity to develop their club to the stage where, if promotion is granted, they will have a sustainable business model and actually be able to make a success of it. If they aren't able to do this yet, then they will be given more time. Promoting them this year before they are ready would be massively damaging and probably undo the majority of good work they have done up to this point. I expect that if you asked anyone from Sheffield whether they would want to be promoted into Super League for next season then the answer would be no, because they seem to have their feet on the ground and be realistic about what they want to achieve and how they want to do it rather than buying into the propaganda of a ridiculous system that is totally counter-productive for everyone. As for Doncaster, they were promoted. You are talking complete and utter garbage.