Joined: Feb 12 2003 Posts: 5487 Location: At The New Stadium
The RFL has confirmed that, subject to fulfilling their minimum criteria, at least one Championship club will be awarded a Super League spot next March.
The RFL has also confirmed Super League will stay at 14 clubs - leaving the current teams facing an anxious wait.
The next set of licences will run from 2012 to 2014.
The current licensing system saw the abolition of promotion and relegation two seasons ago, with clubs instead applying for one of 14 licences for a three-year stay in Super League.
These licences have one more season to run after this year and the new batch will be awarded next summer.
However, the lucky Championship side will discover their fate before that in March, with a December deadline for application, subject to meeting five criteria laid down by the RFL.
The criteria are:
1 Commercial, marketing, media and community.
2 Facilities.
3 Finance.
4 Governance and business management.
5 Playing strength and player performance strategy.
Before that any Championship side wishing to apply for a place in Super League has to meet the following minimum criteria before being allowed to try to win a place.
This news will do little to allay current concerns of fans of Castleford, Wakefield and Salford
They are:
1 Club has reached a Championship final or won the Northern Rail Cup in 2009 or 2010.
2 Club has a stadium with an operational capacity of 10,000.
3 No insolvency event has occurred during the 2008, 2009 and 2010 seasons.
4 Club has turnover of at least £1,000,000 in financial year ending 2009 or 2010 (turnover of charitable foundation can be included in this figure).
5 Club has an average attendance of at least 2,500 in 2009 or 2010.
At present, only Widnes meet the criteria.
Current Super League sides Castleford and Wakefield were awarded licences in 2008 after agreeing to plans to move to new stadia, plans that have since stalled.
St Helens and Salford have also had to make plans to move to a bigger ground, to fulfil the licensing criteria for 2012.
The RFL has confirmed that, subject to fulfilling their minimum criteria, at least one Championship club will be awarded a Super League spot next March.
The RFL has also confirmed Super League will stay at 14 clubs - leaving the current teams facing an anxious wait.
The next set of licences will run from 2012 to 2014.
The current licensing system saw the abolition of promotion and relegation two seasons ago, with clubs instead applying for one of 14 licences for a three-year stay in Super League.
These licences have one more season to run after this year and the new batch will be awarded next summer.
However, the lucky Championship side will discover their fate before that in March, with a December deadline for application, subject to meeting five criteria laid down by the RFL.
The criteria are:
1 Commercial, marketing, media and community.
2 Facilities.
3 Finance.
4 Governance and business management.
5 Playing strength and player performance strategy.
Before that any Championship side wishing to apply for a place in Super League has to meet the following minimum criteria before being allowed to try to win a place.
This news will do little to allay current concerns of fans of Castleford, Wakefield and Salford
They are:
1 Club has reached a Championship final or won the Northern Rail Cup in 2009 or 2010.
2 Club has a stadium with an operational capacity of 10,000.
3 No insolvency event has occurred during the 2008, 2009 and 2010 seasons.
4 Club has turnover of at least £1,000,000 in financial year ending 2009 or 2010 (turnover of charitable foundation can be included in this figure).
5 Club has an average attendance of at least 2,500 in 2009 or 2010.
At present, only Widnes meet the criteria.
Current Super League sides Castleford and Wakefield were awarded licences in 2008 after agreeing to plans to move to new stadia, plans that have since stalled.
St Helens and Salford have also had to make plans to move to a bigger ground, to fulfil the licensing criteria for 2012.
Joined: Aug 17 2009 Posts: 1116 Location: Isle of Axholme
SL will end up as a circus full of manufactured, plastic clubs in areas where the game has no interest. The future of RL is for well managed clubs living within their means and not trying to live an impossible dream. As long as we have a decent competitive team to watch that stays out of debt then that's fine by me. Let's be as good as we can be, but not at any price. SL will burn itself out as it would appear football is doing.
Joined: Apr 01 2007 Posts: 285 Location: In kitchen with head in gas oven
Mate and I talked about this a few weeks ago, and Widnes was the pick irrespective of league position, + one other foreign club (mate favoured a French side but I think it will be Dublin, Edinburgh or Glasgow based). But we agreed-they wont stick at 14, they will backtrack in a few weeks and say something like:
'After lengthy consultations and talks............blah blah blah ..........Wakefield and Castleford new stadia.....blah blah and more blah we have decided to make Superleague a 16 club league. The two new clubs will be .......(drum roll)................WIDNES and A.N.OTHER foreign club.'
You read it here first
"Rugby League is a simple game played by simple people. Rugby union is a complex game played by w*nkers" - Laurie Daley
Gargoyle wrote:Mate and I talked about this a few weeks ago, and Widnes was the pick irrespective of league position, + one other foreign club (mate favoured a French side but I think it will be Dublin, Edinburgh or Glasgow based). But we agreed-they wont stick at 14, they will backtrack in a few weeks and say something like:
'After lengthy consultations and talks............blah blah blah ..........Wakefield and Castleford new stadia.....blah blah and more blah we have decided to make Superleague a 16 club league. The two new clubs will be .......(drum roll)................WIDNES and A.N.OTHER foreign club.'
You read it here first
But will the existing Clubs be in favour of taking 1/16th of the available money (SKY etc) rather than 1/14th.
Joined: Apr 01 2007 Posts: 285 Location: In kitchen with head in gas oven
Wanderer wrote:But will the existing Clubs be in favour of taking 1/16th of the available money (SKY etc) rather than 1/14th.
I think at least one of them will be! And as it could be any one from say Cas, Wakey, Salford and maybe (but its only a minute possibility) Hull KR, Harlequins, Catalans or even Bradford any vote might be closer than people think.
"Rugby League is a simple game played by simple people. Rugby union is a complex game played by w*nkers" - Laurie Daley
The attendance at Friday nights super league game between Crusaders & Harlequins was just 1.122. We are constantly been told that the game of rugby league is booming yet at yesterdays challenge cup semi final between Leeds & St Helens they only opened three sides of the ground the attendance was 15267 that is a very poor crowd for a challenge cup semi final between two of the sports top teams
Gargoyle wrote:I think at least one of them will be! And as it could be any one from say Cas, Wakey, Salford and maybe (but its only a minute possibility) Hull KR, Harlequins, Catalans or even Bradford any vote might be closer than people think.
I see your thinking although I would suggest that only three (Castleford, Salford and Wakefield) are really in danger as poor as Harlequins are.
Joined: May 12 2003 Posts: 1651 Location: Barnsley
Does anyone think they will go down the old road of mergers? Like merging Crusaders and Widnes and calling them .... Widnes for example!! Its happened before and it frees up another space.
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