My main thought it that I don't disagree with any of this.

My main worry is that the British game overall is in a period of stagnation, but that no one at Red Hall seems to realise this.

Man for man, our top sides are very poor at present.

The question is, will this series highlight that ... or will it be swept under the carpet again because, as you say, it's more important to keep Wakefield in Super League?

I'm not sure who mentioned it, might've been on another thread but I would also be fully behind an 8 club league. 2 games a week on Sky to fulfil their quota and at the end of the season the top team goes to the GF and 2nd and 3rd play each other for the other place. No shield or any of that crap. Less fixtures, a bit more emphasis on the Challenge Cup and a more competitive league with the talent spread across less clubs until we can actually develop some decent players.

I had my rant after the Catalan game so I was quite calm after last night.
As usual NK a very pragmatic and sensible post.
The problem that I have is that I'm not sure how the game or the club can turn it around at the moment. Cash is obviously a fundamental issue but don't see anything that is going to change that in the foreseeable future as the Sky deal has I think still got several years to go.

Imo the world series is a total joke. I'm pro world club challenge but this awful world series wants scrapping.

It's hindrance of a game to start with and so far LMS, Walmsley, MM, Willie Isa and matty Smith all injured in a game that means not nothing. The confidence of both teams will also be knocked after big losses.

Half the teams that have competed in the comp haven't even qualified for it and only in it due to teams opting out of it which is again laughable when they say "best v best".

They are so far ahead of us it's unreal. They haven't played a single game and we've played few friendlies and two rounds of super league and smash us. They flew 12,000 miles to play us and still smash us. They are playing in weather conditions they ain't used to and smash us.

It's a joke of a comp and should be scrapped.

I don't see it being scrapped, but look ahead to next year: if you were the coach of a top NRL side, what would you do? I can see them starting to send over teams of kids, instead of risking their best players, secure in the knowledge that they'll probably be good enough to get a win anyway.

That's part of the reason we don't need these games - you don't need to give the Australians much to rub our noses in it.

It's why the 2005 Ashes (and subsequent trouncings) were so sweet.

There's certainly a real problem with strength in depth. If Leeds or Wigan were at full strength they'd do better. Sts I'm not sure, they really do look average across the park this year.

The gap in class overall is real, but what really annoys me is how much of it is down to the way SL teams play as opposed to simply being up against better players. Look how many really soft tries the SL sides have let in. How many are down to not reacting fast enough, or complete failure to read plays? Far too many. By contrast the SL sides look virtually clueless (and perhaps most importantly completely lacking composure) when they do have the ball in attack. To me the lack of composure largely comes from simply not having a plan to a set of 6, which is ridiculous.

I think the salary cap is a fig leaf. If you raised it tomorrow all you'd do is see wage inflation for existing SL players. I don't mind increasing it if clubs can afford it, but lets not pretend just raising the cap would see SL sides full of Aussie internationals or RU stars.

Sadly I think the gap has widened in part because SL clubs have reverted to British coaches. Robinson and Maguire were tremendous in SL and had spent time learning their trade from the best in Aus. I like McDermott at Leeds, but does anyone seriously think he, Wane or Cunningham would get a gig in the NRL? It feels a bit like the early 80s to me when the likes of Bamford, Fox and Murphy were coaching in England whilst Gibson, Stanton, Fulton etc were coaching in Aus.

Coaching is the key to it all, we have chubby Wane and Saints have tracky Cunny...and they have Slick Wayne and Cool Trent..different league..just look at the british players that left SL and prospered in AUS....coaching....coaching...coaching..coaching....coaching...etc

The problem is that we need international competitions to create interest for players.

One of the reasons given for player defections to RU is the bigger international dimension.

I've long thought that the WCC could be something truly different and exciting, which RU could never offer. But 2016 might have seen that ship sunk too.

It's a strange time for RL in this country. All 3 teams in the World Club Series had big injury problems, so it's hard to come to concrete conclusions (although i still think we'd probably have lost all 3 games). I'd say Leeds and Saints and us to an extent are going through a period of transition too. You've got a salary cap that's too low, but raising it doesn't automatically create great players. You've got a reserve 'league' (if you can call it that) which is an absolute joke.

But on the other hand it's one of the most exciting times to be an England supporter. We've got arguably the best coach in the world and a pack that can compete with the very best. Question marks still hang over our half-backs, but things are looking promising for the 4 nations and World Cup (fingers crossed).

It was interesting to listen to Wayne Bennetts interview with Eddie Hemmings and how he spoke about being able to tell which superleague coaches are good coaches by the habits their players bring with them in to the England camp. He spoke about him wanting to select players ideally who are being well coached on a weekly basis as a month isn't really long enough to get bad habits out of players systems.

His choice of assistant and other coaches will be interesting but there's one things that's for sure-He knows what he's talking about.

Sorry, but you're misguided if you think RU could never offer anything like WCC.

There's ample strength in Union competitions in UK, France, Oz, NZ, South Africa, even Italy and Argentina to host something like WCC, but they simply don't need to as they already have successful and competitive international and pan-continental cup competitions in place.

RL should concentrate on a champions v champions one-off game. Less of the attempts to generate money with this sort of thing - which only results in scorn from the Aussies and any casual viewer tuning in thinking 'What's the point?' and promptly switching off again.

I doubt RU could put out any club sides who are as tough and skilled as the top boys from the NRL, but ultimatley I agree that it doesn't make much difference as a) we don't sell it properly - I'm sure that no-one outside the RL corridor knew that Brisbane were in town - and b) the NRL only seem to be getting interested at a time when our domestic sport has regressed in standards back to the pre-1980 era. So yes, though they've spent a couple of decades getting spanked by us in the WCC, now they are indeed turning scornful again.