Unfortunately most southern teams are based around one or two key individuals and rarely survive their departure. There are some very impressive exceptions but it's a legitimate question to ask what legacy, say, Crawley Jets left.

Sadly I'm hearing both Oxford and Hemel have dropped out of the U18 league this season. The former is particularly worrying as the whole ethos of the club is to build local participation and the first team this season have often included 14 southern based lads and I think it was 15 at least once. (Admittedly injuries have forced their hand a little here.)

Clearly the more juniors playing the more good players will be uncovered to play at the highest level available down south, currently Broncos.

As an aside, if the York press is, to be believed a RU player who made his debut for Oxford in Sunday had a rugby league background that amounted to four training sessions. Not exactly evidence of a sport thriving down south. (I should add a conversation I had with someone who is likely to know suggests he had been around the club long enough that he would have attended more than four training sessions.)

On general survival think next year may be OK. I don't think the Hive will turn down the money until they can get rid of Underhill. The team my well be supported by the increased Sky money and parachute payments (both worryingly vague at the moment). So with 'free' ground and 'free' team don't see the urgent need to fold. ( I'm sure free can be defined by others)

Future years more worrying.

On a venue, London Welsh have signed up for a 3 year deal for the Kassam stadium in Oxford. This leaves them paying the Council for the Old Deer Park in Richmond. Advantages, Zone 4 underground/overground/fast trains, great club house and facilities. Disadvantage one poor 1,000 seater stand, but you can stand another 1,000 people round the outside of a rugby field do we need more?

So many negative viewpoints on here and most of them sadly true. Re-entry into SL anytime soon looks no more than about a 5% or 10% chance.

And, even if we do, does the "club" have any prospect of being able to manage its affairs any more successfully than it has in recent years? Can't see how unless somebody new with commitment, bottomless pockets, and lots of savvy appears over the horizon. Chances of that? Almost nil.

I agree with you GF their is no pathway for players into the top flight, thats why Tony Clubb is playing at Wigan, LMS at Saints, K Dixon probably soon to go to a SL team MCB just been picked up, where did they come from?

Louis is an example of how fragile the system is. From memory a cover teacher, who is an RL fan, suggested he tried it out. Had that teacher not gone to that school it is unlikely Louis would ever have played rugby. Tony meanwhile started RL a club who no longer exist.

It would be daft to say there is no pathway but the state of it is worryingly fragile. Throw in the fact the Broncos academy could be a target for the cut backs that will be necessary post relegation and it's difficult to feel optimistic unless the RFL get involved. We don't want to return to the days we had to loan Tony,Louis and Ade to Hull FC as we didn't have anything to offer down south at that stage in their development.

Yes we could, but the system is loaded against any team outside of Super League. We potentially have a one year advantage however it all depends on the recruitment and whether there is a balance there. It also depends on the coaching set up. I get the impression Grima is pretty much on his own at present and that won't really change until Henderson joins. It may be worth leaving judgement until we know what sort of squad we actually have. With a proper pre-season we should be in the middle 8.

The danger is as someone has said its a fresh group of our youth being bullied in the Championship rather than the current youth being bullied in the Super League.

And the amateur team that I played for in York is no longer playing!!! park teams come park teams go in all sports everywhere in the country.

Love the optimism on here though, maybe we should all pack up and go home.

English RL continually re invents itself, it has done through its history. The play off system next year could!!! I say could BTW turn out to be quite entertaining.
As I said before the 4 from the top coming down will be the teams that have been losing, the 4 from the bottom tier will have been winning, so one lot will be going in to the back end of the season with confidence and presumably playing well, where as the other lot will be lacking in confidence.

Look at it this year! if you went to the 8 team league as it stands now what would it be?
Us, Bradford, Salford, Wakey
Leigh, fev, Halifax, Doncaster.
On current form how would that end up? probably the way teams are playing Salford (only coz of recent buys) Wakey Leigh fighting for 2/3 place Bradford, Us Fev Halifax, Donny, although I might put Fev ahead of us.
But thats down to current form and going in to games with confidence and a winning or losing mentality
so on that Leigh would get promoted and we would be in the mix with Bradford and fev for the 4/5 play off.

That would be entertaining!

But surely to God were going to sign a few players either with SL experience who are out of contract or a few Championship level players? We are surely going to need a few old tough heads to help the kids along no?

Alternatively you identify the weaknesses in the structure and work to improve the situation. To his credit it is clear that Joe is well aware of the issues and doing what is on his power to resolve the problems in player pathway. Fingers crossed the money men, be it at Broncos and/or the RFL are so far sighted.

I've said on here before that my favourite level of RL is Championship. I watched a lot of it on lot of it on long weekends up north and have thoroughly enjoyed my two seasons watching Championship One. Next season could be enjoyable but I'd rather it goes down in southern RL history as the season we finally began to got to grips with the challenges in player pathway down south. Something that goes beyond the Broncos but in which they are hugely important.

LW used to have problems when playoffs for RU season came around as cricket season had started. Not sure the venue can be used for rugby during summer months.

Agree that's what we need as a minimum. But as yet we've yet to sign or announce them. Got to hope thise signed have the right mentality.