give us a chance to see if any of their youngsters that wigan offer to loan us will be suitable for our needs

True

Like the Toulouse thing the RFLput out the sweetner of paying for a micky up in France to the clubs and they thought hey that,ll be good and didnt think that the RFL had ulterior motives and Toulouse would go in front of them in terms of Franchising.

Don't forget that when the Toulouse inclusion was announced, it was stated that they still had to tick the boxes to be able to apply. As yet they have not ticked any boxes, and if they are not entering the NRC then they only have the 2010 GF left to be able to 'tick the box'. Gateshead v Toulouse GF 2010 anyone. The RFL will be working out the strategy as we speak

championship clubs need more TV money. if superleague and sky wont allow more funds to filter down then these club shoud be allowed to search for ther own TV right. ther must be a market for it remember the grand final a few years ago on ITV.sky and superleague have never allowed it since

I agree completely with TV Boy. But why can't we fight back to break away or change the system?

1. SL clubs have all the power. 2 votes in every RFL decision compared to 1 for each NL club. So even though there are more NL clubs they'd never get a decision through unless they were all 100% united and had the backing of a couple of SL clubs to boot.

2. SL clubs won't support NL - turkeys voting for Christmas etc. And any club that even thought of supporting a NL-led initiative would be put under massive pressure by the SkyFL. The top SL clubs won't want to change the system thats built to suit them and the lower SL clubs won't want to rock the boat knowing there's another round of franchises round the corner and few (if any) can boast that they ticked all the boxes last time. All the RFL would have to do would be threaten to look at attendances (for example) in the next application process, or stadia facilities, or some such, and certain SL clubs would go very quiet.

3. Similarly, ambitious NL clubs won't be quite so cocky with franchise applications coming up. "Listen, Arthur (or insert name of any other chairman of an "ambitious" club) this isn't going to look very good on a franchise application, is it? Pity really as we thought you were making such good progress..." That'll be silence from those clubs then. Look how quick the clubs were to sign on the dotted line not to challenge the franchise decisions when they were told they couldn't apply without doing so.

4. And the rest of the NL? Well they won't want to upset any applecarts either. They've been starved of cash for so long most of them are living hand-to-mouth anyway - just a simple threat to cut funding to the lower divisions, or to scrutinise a club's finances in the name of salary cap compliance, or to introduce some mandatory but costly procedures or improvements in the lower divisions, and it'd put the futures of some clubs at risk. Most of them wouldn't take that chance.

So why can't we fight back? Because the SkyFL have a stranglehold on the game. As much as I'd love to see us return to an honest game by breaking away from the whole bent lot of 'em, I don't see how it will happen. Personally I think the best chance we've got is for somebody to prove that what sky or the governing body is doing is illegal and challenge the system that way (or at least force an investigation that would uncover some of the corruption and bring about some changes), but who's going to stand up to them?