The Hive it is then

The Hive it is then

The countdown is on......

I just wish i knew who was negotiating with who about what? What have the RFL/SL clubs agreed with us if anything. Is it just the ground that needs sorting?

You need to get rid of that chip on your shoulder. No one, as far as I know, wants London to fail. As I see it, people just want a level playing field instead of competing against clubs with special dispensations. It is looking like your club will get dispensations regarding the overseas quota. I've no real problem with that, but some might, and it's a fair point to make.

Why should the owner of a northern club turn round to its fans and say that they will sacrifice their chance of success so that we can all have another go at making London successful, particularly when its fans appear to regard those northern fans as just followers of "pit town clubs"? And it has to be noted that 4,000 people watching a semi-professional HKR take on Wigan would be a record crowd for you in recent years.

I hope it works in London or the south, I really do, but continual expectation of special favours or slagging of the paying northern customers does not do greatly for your cause. It isn't the fault of the RFL that not enough people turned up to the Stoop, and that's the bottom line.

We don't all slag off northerners and northern clubs. Some of us appreciate that the north is the life blood of our game and has a lot of heritage to be proud of.

Gutterfax doesn't even live in this hemisphere so ignore him.

Woods etc is hardly responsible for Australia being very, very good at RL nor the Irish not playing much RL.

I don't think it fair to compare with Australia 2008 as a benchmark. Australia has RL as first or second sport and their team were favourites to win.

Fair play to the RFL. They be crap at many things but this worked very, very well. I know the argument that Woods isn't really responible for this but he picked the right person. If he had picked the wrong one then we'd blame him for that so credit to him. (But more to Sally Bolton).



It was ever thus. The thing is that RL is not considered to be a national sport by many and Broncos (or Crusaders) didn't change that. Is the Super League Show shown in London or Wales at peak times? No, it never was. Oddly enough it was and is shown in the North East.

Engage are an insurance company from Harrogate less than 20 miles drive from Red Hall. Few people have heard of them in any context other than sponsoring SL.

To be any different, we need more than just a token outpost club.

Absolutely effing ridiculous. Another 10 days as if the past 10 months hasn't been long enough. www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/rugby-league/25207002

Absolutely effing ridiculous. Another 10 days as if the past 10 months hasn't been long enough. www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/rugby-league/25207002

Ah....a differing point of view is rubbish now is it?

0.0027% increase in average attendances.
167,000 more fans or 57% delivering only 10% more profit
BBC viewing figures beaten by friendly Union Internationals?


2 Italians and 7 Samoans out of 34 players.......window dressing is exactly that, window dressing


The only thing that will break this dominance is a team of ex-pat Aussies playing under a flag of convenience! Short-medium term????
Ireland were 5th in 2008.......REMIND ME HOW THEY KICKED ON?? How's the international calendar looking for 2014? Will those NRL players be flying to Italy for the games v Serbia/Russia?


Yet they are still ranked #4 in the world.......

You call it rubbish, I call it factual analysis. I know which one is backed up by facts and which one is fanciful bollox

Great RLWC 2013 BTW, just not the game changer that some are claiming it to be!

Hey at least we are predictable another 10 days ok 10 working days sooo we WILL know in 2 weeks

Unless that becomes yet another 2 weeks.

Sorry for the few young players still contracted (5 or 6 of them). They know no more than we do about what's going on.

Gutterfax. What constitutes being Irish. Are you Irish cos you're born there? And finally are you Irish born?

The Irish Diaspora is estimated to include close to 100,000,000 people, which is not bad considering the Island of Ireland has about 6.5 million people. Any one of these people could answer a question on a census questionnaire regarding "heritage?" with the response IRISH.
Irishness (sic) in a sporting sense is usually along grandparent rules, which Sir Jack Charlton, AKA God Almighty, used and abused to great effect getting "us" to Euro 88, Italia 90 and USA 94. Rumours of mothers only having to have drank Guinness were wide of the mark, but of the 22 players in those tournaments, there was at least 9 Irish born players involved. Other sports have also used the grand-parenting rule, including Union, but none of them have managed to compile an "International" team of 24 players not born in Ireland, to represent Ireland. Given the 5th place finish in 2008, the performance at RLWC 2013 shows the level of "legacy" in the last 5 years in Irish RL

Back on topic. Ian Ramsdale has a clearer picture of what's going on than most of us, and he still finds plenty to be confused about.

Here's his latest assessment, posted this morning: