After the shock of Wakefield receiving another 3 years and the clear moving of the goal posts, is it time for clubs outside of super league to come together and unite against the franchise system?

yes! .......

however it will get them no where

yes, but it requires imagination and bravery beyond the shallow pockets of most of us in championship rugby league.

We'd be joining BARLA in no time...

...unfortunately.

it would be utopia if the Championship could find a backer the rival of Sky, but alas................

I spoke with Phil Coffey about this when we missed out last time and he said the board then had spoken with other clubs and hardly any of them were interested in taking a stand against it all. This is mainly because very few of them have the clout both financially or via fan base to ever get in SL anyway the way the rules work currently.

To be quite frank the majority of clubs in the Championship have little or no aspirations for Superleague and talking about breakaways and banding together against franchising is futile.

What we somehow have to do is double our fanbase. Only then imo will we ever be considered for a franchise.

Unite away, it'll get you nowhere.

Until RL fans start to appreciate that if you go to watch semi professional clubs then you'd better get used to being in the Championshop the better.

There seems to be some embarrassment about being in the Championship - why? We're not a fully pro outfit, even if we were in SL we'd not have deep enough pockets to fund a competative club. Much as we take the pish out of Wakey, that's our fate should we enter SL again.

I like it in our league. Competative matches and no SL poncing about.

I'm comfortable at the moment - but if some Steve o'Conner wants to come along as give us that financial boost, then I'd be more than happy to take the big step up.

We all want the best success for our team, but at the end of the day, I'd rather that we didn't head into the financial doldrums again if it was going to spell the end of the club.

That's a good point - "no SL poncing about".

I like the honesty and rawness of Championship rugby and I wish people in all the clubs' towns would embrace it more.
The skill level is getting better every year and I feel it is more grounded in the communities it serves.

I have to say I prefer listening to a championship crowds banter when their team is going badly than some of the atrocious statements I have heard from some SL fans towards their own team. It is a lot friendlier in our leagues.

Nik where have you been for the last month or two?
The 'financial doldrums' are right here right now, it's time some of our fans awoke to that.

I think we're all well ware Fred. Unfortunately those "doldrums" don't just apply to RL or our club specifically. The country as a whole is struggling, so the knock on effect is being felt in every walk of life.

Obviously from SN's post not all ARE aware.

How were we faring at HP compared to the LSV?

I'll bet most of our problems are caused by the fact we aren't making enough money through the ground via the bar etc, plus I'd imagine we're paying a horrendous amount of rent to play there and have our offices there.

Talk about white elephant

trouble being is that we were not able to stay at HP (reasons discussed on here many times)so what you write is right about the lack of income streams but unfortunately irrelevant because of our enforced move