The current system does NOT reward mediocrity. When we were mediocre and ot into the play offs in lower end positions we got no rewards other than an unexpectedly enjoyable night at Headingley in 2006. The teams that finished in positions 6-8 this year were all fairly mediocre and got little reward.

This Leeds team are made of champion stuff, not mediocrity.

I'm still heartbroken that Warrington are not champions, and the fear that we never will be refuses to leave me, but to deny this Leeds team their rightful position is laughable. They got exactly what they deserved led by Super League's outstanding captain.

This is assuming that the Challenge Cup 'mattered' as much to the Leeds coaching and management team as it did to Wire's.

Leeds learned a lot from 2005, when they spent the first half of the year sweeping away all before them before gradually burning out in the second half of the season - when it really mattered. Meanwhile Bradford, who'd been ordinary in the first half peaked at the right time and were worthy winners.

There was 12 months of turmoil at Leeds off the back of that but afterwards a model was in place that has seen the club win at Old Trafford in 5 of the last 6 years.

Aside from any world club championship commitments Leeds management's very clear focus is getting the side to peak physically and mentally when it matters - in September and October. That's even reflected in the timing and structure of pre-season training compared to what's in play at other clubs.

The Challenge Cup is definitely a nice to have and publicly they'll make all the right noises and give it their best to win in every game they play in but they're not quite at their peak in late August. Everything is focussed on the big prize at Old Trafford.

The cost of that is they won't be 100% in the challenge cup but the payback is that come the business end of the season they will be while some opponents who have tried to maintain a high intensity all year will inevitably be on the wane.

So if you had won last night you would have been equally dismayed that Wigan were not representing SL in the WCC?

We did it from 5th.................... AGAIN

You are deluded ! If the champions were decieded by the team finishing top of the regular rounds do you think Warrington would have rested and rotated players over the season or put out a reserve team again London the week before the challenge cup ?

At the time, what happened at the end of 2005 was tremendously dissapointing. But looking back it actually put leeds on the road to the success they've had in the last 6 years. Leeds are right to focus mainly on the grand final because championships are what makes great teams.

Last season knocked me sick. We were head and shoulders the best team in the league, but we were not crowned champs. However, we knew what was about to come (the play-offs).

This season, Wigan were the best (sicks up a tiny bit of Shiraz), and again, They weren't crowned champs.

Leeds know how to "beat the system". Fair play to 'em. They beat us.

I'll say it again. Let's "toughen up" this end of season jamboree. Winners go straight to the GF. 2 plays 3 for the right to meet the league winners in the GF. No half baked teams "saving" themselves until Sept, and no dross getting a whooping in the elite play-offs.
Everyone's a winner

If you're going to have a 3 team (and 2 game) play-offs, then there's very little point having a play-off system at all. The play-offs are a big revenue generator and that's a large part of why they were brought in. Aside from the fact that having 3 teams battling it out over the course of 2 games is largely a meaningless exercise (if it's going to be contested by such a small pool you might as well just have first past the post), it's also not going to generate much revenue or even interest in my eyes.

So the question really is do we reduce it to 5 or 6 teams, leave it as 8, or scrap it altogether. Scrapping it is clearly not going to happen, and nor should it, but I do think it needs to be reduced to 6 teams at most.

A BIG REVENUE GENERATOR??????????????????????????????????

Have you SEEN he attendances, for this season's big revenue generator.?

I have heard the following playoff format suggested which if we have to have a playoff format to me at least sounds reasonable.

A 7 team playoff.

Week 1, the 1st place team has a week off and goes direct into the semifinals, 2nd plays 7th, 3rd plays 6th, 4th plays 5th.

Week 2, the three winners join the 1st placed team in the semifinals with 1st playing the lowest ranked team, second highest playing the remaining team.

No second chances, and the reward for finishing top is a week off and only 80 minutes from the final rather than 160 minutes.

Alternatively, we could simply have first place go direct to the final where they'll play Leeds

Come off it, we won the league by 1 point, and thats because we beat Wigan (as usual) home and away so taking aside the head to heads they were better against the rest of the teams in the league. Head and shoulders the best would be winning the league by 6 points clear or something.

The reason it felt such a shock was because we were in such good form at that stage of the season, we hadn't lost in SL since Salford in June (the first half of the season we had been quite erratic) and we had just smashed Huddersfield 40-0 in the playoffs.

This year we 'beat the system' in the playoffs to an extent. We played Saints twice in the playoffs, they won one, we won one. We got a 'second chance', they didn't. How is that fair?

First post on here. I'm a Wire fan and congratulate Leeds on becoming champions last night - I've got absolutely nothing against them and have a lot of time for their coach and many of their players and they played better than us last night and deserved the win. I also accept that if you're going to have a play-off system you need to accept that the champions may not be the team that finishes first or second in the league.

But I think the game does have a problem if the balance in favour of the play-off finale has been tipped to such an extent that the 27 weekly rounds lack intensity and importance. On one hand I can't wait for the return of SL in February, but on the other hand I know that when it comes there will too many weeks when we put out a rotated side and you feel no more than relieved to win at home to a middling side, embarrassing losses which can easily be brushed off and big nights against the big teams which even then still lack something because the stakes are not quite as high as they should be. On SuperLeague BackChat last week there was general agreement that the season hadn't produced many great moments without any linking of that to the reality that teams aren't particularly encouraged to play great rugby during the regular season. The question isn't so much "Why can Leeds finish fifth in the league and become champions?" but "Why are Leeds finishing fifth in the League?"