But it's not sustainable even if they reach Super League, ask Steve O'Connor at Widnes and he's 20X wealthier than Derek. There comes a point where the club must stand on its own and the business must wash its own face.

Leigh have historically never had the marketability to do that!

Erm....

Is there not a danger here that the new level is completely unsustainable? Leigh don't generate massive amounts of income, presumably a lot of the 'relevant income' will be fed in artificially through the owner? Does this not make it even more likely Leigh will suffer another embarrassing financial explosion and even disappear as a professional entity?

As for the bit about the cap not serving any purpose in any league, you sound like a Wigan fan. Crazy.

Hmmmm, 50% of "relevant" income?

What does that mean?

And Bradford

Surely Rimmer has to go after this?

The salary cap rules applying for 2016 were already in the RFL Operational Rules. Every club signs their squads on the basis of it. Then, it's allowed for the rules to be changed! For 2016!! Chief Operating Officer?

The operational rules will go on for pages about what is 'relevant income' It will exclude things like directors' loans to clubs.

But, agreed. This week's announcement begs many more questions than answers. For what period does 'relevant income' apply as regards 50% & of it being the 2016 season cap? eg Year to 31 Dec 2014? Year to 31 Dec 2015? Year to 30 Nov 2015? or what? How do clubs provide evidence? Audited accounts, or not?

The whole thing is an embarrassing joke.

The RFL needs new PROFESSIONAL top management now. Not make it up as you go along nonsense.

Wasn't is precisely those questions that were a major factor in moving to a flat rate cap in SL? Clubs had to be audited after the event to see how much they had earned to check if they had bust the cap or not.

So clubs spent whatever on players and when it was found to be too much the trophies were in the bag already.

Wigan were always where the controversy was re the cap when it was like this but if you look back Saints bust it nearly every year when they were audited.

Another argument against the 50% cap was it let rich clubs outstrip poorer clubs. So Wigan and Leeds cold spend more on players than the rest. If that was a valid argument back then, why does it not apply to Leigh and whichever other club is wealthy enough to exploit this?

Finally depending on what "club relevant income" is, why is it not possible for Championship side to now exceed the salary cap of a SL side? Amass £5m of club relevant income from a rich backer and there you have £2.5m to spend on players.

Good luck to any club that attracts that sort of investment but if it is possible to do this, it takes us back to the era when the salary cap was in fact 50% of income. There must be a limit to stop this surely? Or are the RFL really that stupid as to not foresee that could in fact happen?

None more so than the financial feed that club owners such as Neil Hudghall, Ken Davy supply their respective clubs with..

As for the salary cap, wasnt its fundamentals supposed to stop clubs going bankrupt and to level the playing field?

Two questions how many top flight clubs have gone into administration under a 20 year salary cap vs the preceding 20 years?

How many clubs have won either the GF or Challenge Cup in the last 20 years vs the preceding 20 years?

When you get those answers you will see its failed its clear objectives, time to let the big clubs like Leeds, Saints, Wigan keep their stars and invest in others, which will hopefully entice more owners such as Derek to invest into their towns/cities and the game might actually grow then with a bit of marketing we might attract blue chip sponsors.

Alternatively we can keep in place the lowest salary cap in any sport in the world, pretend it works, let the same 5 teams win everything but continue to provide the NRL and RU with the best talent as we cant afford them...

....because the Championships SC level is now the same as SLs at £1.825M. According to the RL Press this morning Leigh's has been set at £1.31M maximum