In the South, the issue is a lack of development officers. I imagine if you checked the figures you'd find the London numbers are down as well e.g. very many players came through Greenwich Admirals but the Admirals are defunct. Now that's not down to the Broncos.

No longer. The Scorpions cut the dual-registration link.

The dual reg agreement has indeed ended but I believe Wigan still have strong links with the South Wales academy set up. This was separate to their deal with the Scorpions.

Been away for a week so just read this thread, some good posts but I'm more positive than most.

Hull FC for example appear to be garbage at the moment, I don't think it's out the realm of possibility for a team that has has a good season to not beat them.

We'll see though!

The reason "London" Welsh are playing their games 50 miles away is that they aren't allowed to do any development at Old Deer Park. So the poor 1000 seater stand is all there will ever be.

What we need to do to come back up.

We will go into a league which will be something like:

Bradford
London
Leigh
Featherstone
Halifax
Doncaster
Dewsbury
Sheffield
Batley
Workington
Whitehaven
York

At the end of the season I'd expect to see Leigh Centurions and Bradford in the top two with the other two from London, Featherstone, Halifax and Sheffield

This will make up the top 4 in the new 8 system

Now if you look at the bottom 4 in the new 8 system I'd expect to see Wakefield and Catalans plus two from Hull KR, Hull FC, Salford and Castleford in there.

So assuming we make it the league would probably be then:

Leigh Centurions
Bradford
London
One of Halifax, Sheffield or Featherstone
Wakefield
Catalans
Hull FC
Hull KR

Now the top 4 would probably be the Super League clubs and assuming the games go to level of quality and we can beat the other Championship clubs the table would be:

Catalans - return to Super League
Hull FC - return to Super League
Hull KR - return to Super League
------------
Wakefield - play off for a place in Super League
London - play off for a place in Super League
------------
Bradford
Leigh
Halifax

This would give us a one-off game v Wakefield to come back up.

If we can beat Wakefield in the 8 league we'd probably still get them in the one-off game.

The only way I would see a Championship club coming up is to win probably twice from four games against SL clubs, unless of course there are other underdog winners and it isn't just the SL clubs beating the Championship clubs pretty much every time

I'm not suggesting we will do that in season one with yet another new squad, but I believe it is improbable for any Championship club to beat two SL clubs in four games, but maybe win the one off game

Cheers
Mark

Do we know if the old Superleague contracts are ripped up on relegation rule will apply? If so the SL team, especially imports, have a huge incentive.

Must admit I loath the idea of promotion coming down to a one off game post season in any sport. Doubly so in such a physical sport where a few injuries the week before could destroy a club.

It's not impossible London could bounce back, though I don't see it next season. This system does however seem to have an inbuilt bias towards the SL teams and to lessen the chance.

This is the system the teams voted for so we are where we are...... Hopefully it'll either work or be abandoned quickly.

It's actually quite a good system, as it will require a backer who is "serious" about committing to a club and investing appropriately. Not sure on rammo's prediction as Fev' have an investor who appears to be hungry.

Top 4 likely to be.

Northern,
Leigh,
Fev'
and one from Donnie', Fax' or London.

To be honest looking at our squad, us competing for fourth with Fax' n Donnie' might be a little overly optomistic in truth, BUT, the oportunity IS there.

A smaller, more westerly base may or may not be better, I still believe it's more a matter of MARKETING & Promotion and PERMANANCEY rather than what end of London we are based. We need a long leasehold somewhere, preferably near a tube or decently connected station BUT a permanent base beyond all else.

The answer to the original question of 'does anyone believe we can come back? is "only the clinically insane and David Hughes's fan boys.

...regardless of if we spend to the Cap and have the full allocation of overseas players (when the RFL deem us worthy, these allowances will be released) we will struggle against even the worst SL has to offer.

Our squad will be WEAKER than this years.......we've had 21 opportunities and since May these have all been "must win" as the players (I assume dread going the year winless)......we've not really trouble anyone in regards of the last 20 minutes of a game other than maybe Catalans at Magic whilst shipping 486 points in the 11 games since May and scoring 174.....or losing 44-16 on average. This is opposed to the 49-15 average beating we took in the first 10 games.

For us to even reach the 4v5 game, we first have to finish in the top 4 of the Championship, then defeat or fellow championship teams again whilst preventing any "hammerings" v the team that so far this year (If you take 8-12 as is) have stuck 44 points a game on us as an average over 6 games with Salford and HKR to come.
If you want an idea of how we would compete against these teams in a play-off.....they are both in the hunt for 8th.....I suspect we will ship the 88 between them.

The club is destined for life in the 2nd tier (or worse) until the idiot chairmen of the clubs in the championship realise what Knock down Nigel has sold them and whine some more to get straight forward 1 up 1 down back (or licencing but with a 20 year time frame)

Rammo in cloud cuckoo land shock!

Whilst Fev don't seem to be in any danger the main 'money man' has walked and the club may have to revise some of their more fighting talk. The much publicised bids for internationals certainly seem to have ceased.

Personally I think it will turn out to be a dogs dinner with too many mismatches and some poor gates in the middle eight. Quite how teams sell season tickets when they don't know who some of the games are against is beyond me. It looks designed to protect the elite against relegation and potential financial implosion if they have a bad season. I fear it will be worse than franchising for level two. I sincerely hope to be proven spectacularly wrong.

. Drone

Dogs dinner, mmmm, maybe, but franchising was just sending RL's smaller clubs to the wall, here we have promotion/relegation albeit weighted towards SL's consistancy, lets face it, only clubs that implode are likely to be replaced by a championship outfit, but actually having the opportunity to go for it IS important.

London will find it hard, we did before and we will again, but we got so tantalisingly close that I'm looking forward to it. It could be worse, we could just be kicked out full stop.

C'mon tell me honestly, won't you wear the shirt with a little MORE pride when we finally EARN the right to play against the big guns rather than being HANDED the ersatz SL franchise??? It may take 10 years, we may need to disolve and reform a few times, we may have several different owners etc etc et-al (and not to mention how many more bloody venues).

But I say this "C'MON LURNDUN!"

Franchising wasn't good but I fear this is worse. Four, or so, full time teams with eight or so semi pro teams and for all bar Bradford / someone with a very wealthy backer, no real chance of promotion.Sounds suspiciously like the very unloved two tier, too many predictable results Championship One this season.

TBH whilst the new system isn't great at level two the biggest losers are the five relegated from the Championship this season. From a potential 800k or so central funding down to 80k or so. Ouch.

Re your sentiment if London do thrive, spot on. That would be a real achievement

We have always found a way in the past and we will in the future, count on it!