I agree that the top 6 was best. Under the top 8 a team can win every game of the season and week 1 of the playoff and then get knocked out thanks to an inconsistent penalty call 90 seconds from the end of the semi-final (not sour grapes....honest ).

Under the top 6, one of the top two teams is only 1 more game from the final BUT IMHO a more interesting point is that the other team has to lose two games in a row to go out. It would seem fairer to be able to say "well you had two goes at it as your reward for doing well all season" if they didnt make it. Dont think its going to happen any time seen though as for 2013 the championship have moved form the top 6 to follow SLs top 8.

Leeds' route from fifth for the last two years has still been extremely difficult, but the same level of advantage isn't quite there for the top two teams as it used to be. You now need to win two games from first or second to make the final rather than just one, and that has made the week one games between the top four teams are bit more mundane than they really should be. It has also created an idea that top four is just as good as top two, because the only difference is home advantage in week one.

Finishing second used to have a big advantage over finishing third, whereas now fourth and fifth is the cut off point which lowers standards. Leeds have done it the hard way twice and fair enough - there's no point having them in it if they're not allowed to win it - but the advantages for top two need to be restored.

Restructure to 2 leagues of 10 with P&R

League 1
Top 4 playoffs, something you actually have to work hard at and earn.

Bottom 4 playoffs, this keeps the bottoms clubs from tailing off and keeping the intensity up.
Loser of this goes into a P&R playoff game.

That is still 8 clubs with meaningful (even if 4 is for the wrong reason) games to play
-------------------------

League 2
top 6 playoff, winner goes into P&R playoff game with League 1, Winner plays in league 1 loser in league two following season.

It's quite difficult to compare what happened in '72 with today. Forty years is a long time and attitudes to the game were different. For a start there were lots of competitions. I can not remember when they all started or were closed, but there was the Regal trophy, Captain Morgan, BBC Floodlight, Lancashire cup etc. Today we only have two, so there is much more focus / scrutiny of these and I suppose there is a bigger disappointment if you don't get to the final.
The Challenge Cup was (I think), the major cup that everyone wanted to win. Because I am an old fart, I still view the CC as equally important to SL - quite different to most supporters probably.
We were much more 'tribal' in those days. It was essential to beat Saints and Wigan and Widnes, they really were the enemy. Nothing to do with 2 points at all, that was just a by-product of winning.
League games were not just another step towards winning / qualifying for the trophy at the end of the season, they were the heart of the sport, and you wanted to beat the opposition each week.

So if you look at all those points, you will see that most are about peoples attitude to games, rather than the structure. If you find this hard to believe, then think about the challenge cup. Its one of the oldest competitions, it has always existed and has a fantastic heritage. But it is now considered by many to be second class to SL. Why ? I would maintain the overriding publicity to SL has changed peoples attitudes, just as advertising shapes peoples attitudes to brands. So for me, its very difficult to make meaningful comparisons with the past because of peoples attitude. It was a different era.

It isn't the play offs that are the problem, whatever the format - top 4, 6 or 8 - or who wins and from what position in the table. If you've qualified to play in them then you have every right to win.

The problem is with the preceeding 27 rounds and how to make them more competitively contested and therefore of greater interest.

A radical, but easily implimented solution would be to simply change the points awarded for each game played in the weekly rounds.

For example; 1 point for a draw, 2 points for a home win, but 4 points for an away win.

Now that would liven things up.

Attendances during the playoffs, comments from certain parts of the media and the fact that these threads keep popping up (and not just on the Wire site) would suggest that there is a problem.


Apathy and boring is hardly going to entice the punter to put their hand in their pocket and buy tickets for regular league games. Many clearly can't be bothered (for whatever reason) for playoff games. The clubs, or SL in general, cannot survive on one 70,000 game a season and allow the rest to go into decline.

Thanks, very interesting. Difficult for me to imagine as I have grown up with the SL era and all the marketing etc that came with it as a child. I got the history of RL DVD a few months ago and wondered why so much of the focus was on the cup, that would explain it.

I agree with both points.

To be fair , most of the posts on this thread have merit , the one I agree with most is about the 1st week non elimination games , they really do appear to be pretty pointless .

Speaking as a Leeds fan , whilst it was great fun winning the thing from 5th , there was a worry even amongst plenty of us that the league season was devalued , to do it again just really compounded it . Of course we will revel in being called " champions " who honestly wouldn't ?

The real damage to the league structure is probably only just starting to be realised .

Why does winning the play-offs from 5th induce all this hand-wringing? Is it so much worse than winning from 2nd or 3rd?? In 2005 (the Andrew Johns year, remember, Wire fans), Bradford won from 3rd, having finished 10 points behind the league leaders (from 28 games). Leeds finished 10 points behind Wigan last year (from 27 games)...

Charlie Winslade is blob on IMO with his recollections of yesteryear but what you must also consider apart from Dewsbury winning from 8th is that they were 8th in a league of 30 teams yet only played 34 league games to reach that 'lofty' perch. They didn't play everyone twice /home and away and it clearly favoured teams based on County lines.

Following this nonsense, 8th beating 3rd and we got nowt, the division was split into two so that everyone could play teams home and away obviously a fairer season and the Champions were first place in the regular rounds on merit, League Champions if you like.

The next 'moan' was one particular team sweeping up because they were the only professional team, (not their fault or a crime) but we now have an era where we are all professional and operate a financial constraint to even up the field

How hard can it be?

The fact that people have realised you can now quite cheerfully lose weekly games and it doesn't really matter is at the root of this.

--- your right,i mean, a team that has has been beaten wembley finalists for three years running ,then go on to finish 5th in the regular season for the last two seasons,( like you stated-10 ten points behind the true winners of superleague - wigan) then go on to win a few *knockout games and be crowned the * worthy*champions of sl? then play in the wcc as champions of a knock out comp ,opps,,sorry i mean sl champs-, ( not sour grapes-just facts) so basically,whats the point of even having a hub cap award