The playoffs have made a massive difference there then!

all i can say is,even tho we have had a brilliant season,i cant get over the fact that a team who finshes 5th in regular season,win a few knock out games and are classed as champions of sl,yes i know,its the same for all the teams,we all know the rules,etc etc,but still,it just does not seem right and imo never will

Nice one again but I don’t need a dictionary translation thank you I know what it means, I’m not thick and you’re not as bright as you obviously think you are. Your ego seems to always need you to have the last word, fine respond, have it, but it won’t change my last post. TIME WILL SHOW WHO IS RIGHT, and if it’s you I’ll go so far as eat your dictionary and my season ticket!

Lose 11 out of 27 league games and win the things it does have a slight negative effect on the point of the weekly rounds.

I have no complaints about having play-offs, I just think the current system is wrong and too complicated. Give the team finishing top decent prize money and make the play offs top 5 or 6, instead of 8, and you'll improver the quality of the early games. The top two or three sides will want to keep putting their top sides out whilst they have a chance of finishing top and winning the normal league season will really mean something.
Bring back promotion and relegation and you might even have a real competition, plus some real incentive for Championship clubs.

There needs to be a better incentive to win the league, such as direct passage to the Grand Final. However, this would have the downside of giving that team too many free weeks prior to the Final in the current top 8 system.

Hence a top 3 play off, with 2v3 with winner playing 1st place team in Final would make much more sense in a 14 team league.

In many of the various proposed solutions the downside is the winning team having a week off competition, which from past experience generally doesn't seem to be an advantage. I wonder if part of the solution could involve not giving the winning team(s) a whole fortnight betwen games, but arranging the dates of the games so that the teams coming up through the play-offs would need to double up and play 2 games in four or five days. That might be a good way of making sure the top one or two teams (however it's arranged) get a genuine reward while making it a bit tougher for a team to come through the play-offs, and I think most teams would genuinely want to avoid the need to double up. But I acknowledge it might mean games at an awkward time for fans such as Mondays and Thursdays, and perhaps Sky wouldn't like it because it might involve games on a Monday or Thursday at a time of year when it doesn't suit them.

Maybe the solution is that there isn't really a problem and that the subject wouldn't have come up for heavy discussion had Wigan been able to beat Leeds 2 weeks ago or even if Wire had beaten Leeds on Saturday?

I can definitely understand that a fan could find it more palatable to decry the system when their team proves unable to beat one who finished many points behind them in the regular season.

The challenge is for other clubs to learn how to manage the physical and mental preparation of their sides through the year so they can peak when it matters - like Leeds have proved able to. It isn't to radically change the system.

The 'problem' is not who is getting to or winning the GF ; the 'problem' is the thousands of empty seats not just at league games but during the PO games - The semi-finals, supposedly the two biggest games outside of the GF itself, featuring arguably the 4 biggest (best!) teams playing in SL at the moment, were attended by crowds lower than the average for league games at those grounds ....... Fans are voting with their feet (and more importantly to the RFL, their wallets), and turning their back on a format that is making a mockery of the importance of league position to being 'champions'.

Those who chose to think their isn't a problem can discuss it with Stevo/Clarkey et al amongst the tumble weed strewn empty stadiums in a few years time.

-if there isnt a problem with the present format-why are there so many threads on most of the rl forums saying there is

For me the problem is not Leeds winning from 5th, but the effect on the 27 rounds and the lack of interest among potential supporters if the play-off system is seen as being weighted in such a way which does not give the top one or two teams a suitable advantage for their league placing. And the issues with the play-off system have been discussed intermittently here through the season. For me at least this really isn't sour grapes against Leeds - I rather like a lot of their players and what they have done in the play-offs is very impressive indeed and they beat us fair and square last year and this. But what I want is to feel that it is four months rather than eleven before I watch some intense and meaningful fixtures where there is something at stake.

Like I said I can understand fans thinking that way so will ignore the foot stamping.

Seems to me your main purported criticism is that the attendences in the play offs were low as fans apparently vote with their feet in protest at the concept.

After 14 years.

The attendance at the final, or the attendances for the final since it's inception, each seem to disprove that notion though. It's clearly seen as a marquee event.

The reality is simply that the play off games are televised and don't benefit from season ticket attendance. Likewise the Challenge Cup rounds (which aren't all televised) don't get season ticket attendance and they provide, by your rationale, far more dissapointing attendances and as a result a far more urgent challenge. Wire have done incredibly well in the cup in recent years though, which, I'm sure, is totally unconnected to your concentrating solely on the play off system. Two days after Wire were defeated in it.

I'm also struggling to see how not having play off games or reducing their number will somehow raise more revenue.

Even leaving the flawed and rather disingenuous attendance argument aside you can't ignore the wants of the RFL, Sky, the clubs, the international management and wider media. They all completely buy into the play off concept.

That really leaves us with the true nub of the matter: whether the Grand final winner is a more worthy champion than the side who can accumulate the most points in the weekly rounds. There's clear arguments for both approaches. Personally I find it more appealing with play offs - they make for a much tougher challenge, allow for higher intensity, give a dramatic season finale rather than the damp squibs first past the post can provide and it lends itself to player management that recognises players can' be mentally or physically at their peak for 9 months solid.

For good or ill the game reverted to a championship in 1998 and for the last few years one club has proved better able to succeed in that environment. That's arguably not good for the game but it isn't a fault of the system only in how effectively different clubs prove able to apply themselves to it.

thats the whole point,leeds have done well in play offs,but in the regular season bugger all,cept get to wembley and lose -again-how can they be classed as sl champions.im really having to think about renewing my s/t , i prolly will, but the fact im having to think about it is causing me some concern as i love rl!but a team being crowned champions after finishing 5th ,again,really does leave a nasty taste !

You don't honestly believe that half a dozen clubs jockeying for position for 27 games and then stringing 3 or 4 top performances back to back is a tougher challenge than going all out to finish top after 27 games?

Wigan v Catalan: 7,232
Wire v Saints: 10,190
Leeds v Wakefield: 9,044
Hull v Huddersfield: 8,662
Catalan v Leeds: 11,523
Wire v Hull: 7,323
Wigan v Leeds: 8,235
Saints v Wire: 12,715

These figures are a negative for the sport. Every attendance is probably below each club's average attendance.

Something is wrong with the current set-up of the Play-offs.