I hardly think less terrestrial coverage is good news.

This was a lot of people's only viewing of rl and watering it down is bad news I feel.

To be fair to the BBC, I don't know many punters who are that interested in your standard horse race. There's far too much racing and that's down, purely and simply, to the bookies. The standard is often poor and seen by many as a day out rather than a spectacle (draw your own comparisons with a certain code of football).

But in the grand scheme of BBC cuts we've lost out on very, very little. 1 game less for the 2 earlier rounds and thats it, 2 quarter finals, 2 semis and the final are all still on BBC.

Serious question, but in the digital era of television and given the choice of viewing via multimedia platforms, does terrestrial tv really provide the same exposure as in the past? I can understand in the era of 4/5 channels only that casual viewers could be picked up by RL through showing the Challenge Cup on the BBC. However nowadays there is so much choice and things like Sky+ / TiVo have changed viewing habits - people browse channels like the BBC a lot less.

Viewing figures for major RL games [CC Final & Internationals] are far superior to those on Sky TV. SKy get them in the 100,000s whereas BBC get them in their 1,000,000s.

It is essential RL remains on terrestrial TV IMO.

The game has to stay on terrestrial TV, but it has to be well respected by said TV.

Showing the Super League Show in the Northern regions only unless it's 3am, and having little to no advertising is not good enough imo. The Challenge Cup is one of the beebs biggest showpieces apparently yet I rarely see it promoted the way other sports are.