..and that's the problem. It's why clubs get in trouble, and why the RFL has to bail them out.

Jack Gibson was one of the first to say, 'get it right off the pitch, and on the pitch will follow'. Look at soccer.

Wigan Athletic. I rememeber their promotion into the football league. Wigan isn't a football town, doesn't have a great history and tradition. It's a place to set up a 'new' team... a massive RL town, sandwiched between City & United, Liverpool & Everton, Bolton, Blackburn, Burnley and Preston.

And yet. A good stadium. A good matchday experience. A great professional environment for the players. And, hey presto, a Premiership team.

There are other examples across the divisions in football. Reading. Yeovil. Or kick'n'clap, on my doorstep at Exeter Chiefs.

It doesn't, though. Sport England provides £29.4m lottery funding and around £6m exchequer funding. The current Sky deal was £50m over 4 years. Carnegie puts in £8m. BBC puts in several million. The other sponsorship deals are worth a few million. Ticket sales and merchandising rights are worth over £10m annually. Sky's tv rights deal is less than half of the total income to the RFL.




Bang on. Totally agree.

But that's the clubs cocking things up, not the RFL. The very same club chairmen that you initially said should see sense and get rid of Nigel Wood & Richard Lewis.

You list quite a lot of money there. The Championship clubs get what exactly, and I mean money that doesn't have ridiculous conditions attached

Sorry W71, bad example there mate. It was all provided by Dave Whelan and Dave Whelan alone, not through any kind of organic growth.

Their attendances this year and cheap as chips season tickets confirms that the club is built on sand. If Whelan had been a Southport fan then it could easily have been them in the Prem now whilst Wigan compete with Athy Colls for the Bedford League Sunday Cup (or sommat).

The better example was Reading but then again Jon Madjeski is almost as much to them as Whelan is to Wigan. In fairness they had a half decent following at Elm Park (they'd knocked on the Premier League door for a good while and sold 38000 tickets for their 95 play off game with Bolton in just 3 days) whilst Latics struggled to get 2000 at Springfield for years.

Well fair enough but I still think the second paragraph of my post is relevant even though you did not quote that.

By the way do you think Wigan Athletic are making money ?

Sport is most definatley not a commercial enterprise at pro level. It is a passion for its' backers isn't it ?

football is and i suspect RU is as well.

Yea right some of our top football clubs are definately in the black.

He was agreeing with me Bart.

Yea jc I got the wrong end of the stick ....

That is a joke when the RFL are splitting us completely in two by making clubs outside SL have to BEG to get into it through the stupid franchising ssytem and alienating heartland clubs by making us like lepers.
I like many other fans support my club (Fax) and not RL anymore, I don't care a jot about England RL its a SL team not ours as we are excluded so why should I care?
Sad as I have been RL through and through for 40 years now and used to support anything with RL on it and go to GB games and even CC semi finals, not any more I will never go to any internationals or any games as a neutral in SL anymore like I would do years ago. I just to to the Challenge Cup Final out of tradition and a trip with the lads and thats it they have lost my support.
I know a lot of people who feel like this now.

W71 has some great points, he will be much closer to grassroots expansion support then most on here. JC has hit the nail on the head though, heartlands non SL clubs have no part to play in RL's future. This is clearly the strategy of the RFL, its a very dangerous one and supports my belief that unless things change quickly its time for a breakaway as the clubs in this area are simply there to groom future SL clubs from non heartlands.
The opportunities from central funding have only recently been available, our expanding national presence certainly helps in securing a bigger slice of that and the work of W71 and the others in taking the sport to new areas is fantastic, having Welsh and French clubs in SL is fantastic, having them in the Championships is fantastic but what is happening to the Fev,s, Haven's, Leyth's, Fax's etc is not, our failure to develop at International level certainly is not.
Does anyone think Whelan would have done what he did knowing should he win promotion he may not get into the Premiership?

Agreed, but the point is Wigan didn't sign a brilliant team with their billionaire's money, they build a great environment. The same is true at Reading, and, come to that, at Exeter Chiefs and Worcester RFC. This is directly applicable to us at LSV, and even though I don't feel we've grasped that opportunity yet, it is one of the strongest assets in our favour (despite the ownership and revenue issues).

Totally agree with you, as a business plan it's as sustainable and forward thinking as you could ever hope to get.

But at 4.45 on a Sunday aftenoon when Batley have handed us our backsides, not many folk wandering back up Schofield Stret care about the community work, stadium, youth structure, etc etc etc, its another couple of hundred off the next gate, and the plan goes to pot because there isnt enough cash coming in to pay for it.

Dont get me wrong, I'd sooner spend Robbie Pauls wage on the youth structure, (for example), but it really is a difficult balancing act because you need players like him to help develop the kids and bring the best out of the rest.