So they are going to relegate 6 teams next year ? , excellent





Some clubs eh , and pray tell us what is the main criteria those clubs will have ?



And as 80 % of the Championship dont have that criterion , tell us what you expect of those clubs , their fans and owners ?

If we accept that opinion , And to a large degree I do , what in your opinion is the solution ?



Something I also agree with , so who in your opinion will/should be the club to suffer this devastation ?

That's not true. Now a license can be refused to a club that is doing well on and off the field and financially stable if a preferred bid comes in from another club.

Bradford, Hull, Hull KR all came up and withn a ferw years had won the Championship and Cup. SL is a Closed Shop soley for the benefit of its members.

Bloody hell, if we're going back that far then you can add Leigh to the list - the last club to do it without any imports too.

great post, spot on



even in soccer with its better funded clubs, relegation can still kill off a club

Not true. The rfl already said a championship side will be promoted at the expense of a current SL side. How can what you say be the case if they can say that before the licence applications have been submitted?

No, there are more than 8 teams who can and do contribute to SL and are sustainable





they wont have any criteria, nobody is talking about any criteria, for a change you are being completely irrelevant.



whatever they want,

If we ever get to the stage where we are refusing financially stable clubs doing well on and off the field because we have clubs which are better then we are in a wonderful position that we should be celebrating and giving Richard Lewis the freedom of Yorkshire.



But considering we havent yet got the 14 clubs in the league that position we dont really need to be worrying about having lots of clubs outside the league who are in that position not being able to get in

If there is no club in a position to be relegated then we would expand. Considering we have at least 3 or 4 clubs clearly in danger Its not something we really need to worry about is it?

So you do agree that we have 3/4 clubs unable to run themselves well enough to operate successfully in a competitoin with a financial glass ceiling already too low and with not enough quality plays to go round , as I posted earlier , I'd suggest 6 clubs are unsustainable , so tell us , who should/will be removed and the consequences of that removal will be ?

Would we? If it was that easy, there'd be 15 clubs now with Widnes being one of them.







But my point is, how do the RFL already know that there is a championship club that is better than those 3 or 4 before licence applications have even been submitted?

Its not my decision to make, i dont have all the information because i havent seen the bids.



But i would think it clear Cas, Wakefield and Salford are in trouble. Crusaders have a year to prove themselves but i think this year has been as encouraging as we could really have realistically hoped for, the back end of the season will tell us a lot more about them.



Quins need to be careful, whilst i believe they will always be in there as long as they function to a decent level, the crowds simply arent good enough, the participation levels in the capital show there is latent support for the game there, Quins attempts at turning that in to bums on seats has been atrocious.



Personally i think Wakefield and Castleford will merge. and remove the issue. If Salford dont have real real progress to their new stadium then they would be in deep trouble as well

The fact we arent is simply evidence that we dont have enough clubs at that level. The fact is there are some clubs in the SL who are struggling so adding another struggling one isnt going to really help anything is it





they dont, they pandered to the flatcappers and made a promise they really shouldnt have to keep them quiet. There is no guarantee that the club which comes up will be any better than the one which goes down, but thats what we are left with when people shout and thcweam and stamp their feet like those at Leigh etc did.



but the same issue is even more likely under P+R

So in your opinion the answer is , we stick with what we have until either



1 We get enough TV/Sponsorship to get all the current clubs solvent and then expand



2 A Championship club becomes so big and rich that they totally outgrow the Comp they are in and are miles bigger than a non important SL club



As for the rest of the clubs outside SL , then who cares anyway

I dont think we should be expanding to accommodate a heartland club unless there was a incredibly strong case for doing so. There isnt the playing strength to keep adding heartland clubs.



well yes, heartland clubs not in SL will either replace a failling SL one or we had a huge upsurge in participation levels in the heartlands, which i dont see as very likely



the question of what we do with SL is completely different to that of what we do with the Championships



thats not to say we stick with what we have got, there are clubs in SL who may need replacing

Which one day in the next millenia you might actually answer

Its fine as it is for now.

I don't think lower league chairmen invest solely with the intention of getting their club to SL, because at every club other than Widnes it's completely unrealistic. If the backers of clubs such as Featherstone pulled out because they were told that they would have to have a sustainable business to get into SL rather than taking a boom or bust approach, then quite honestly they would be complete morons. Once we get to the stage where there are enough clubs in SL, then the league could potentially split, that's what I was suggesting. That would be a long time away, but doesn't stop the ambition of clubs now as long as it is realistic.



Hull KR got into masses of debt which they are still in, and isn't it the case that if they had not won the Grand Final they would have also gone bust (I might be wrong on this). Either way, the board took a massive risk which seems to have paid off but it could easily have gone sour, and they shouldn't have been forced to do this as there is clearly a sustainable SL club there. As I have already said twice on this thread, Huddersfield were only in such a state as a result of automatic P&R.



Football is not in any way a like-for-like comparison with RL. I've not seen any people claiming that 'this is our money', that's a stupid argument if so. But RL doesn't have enough money in the game to do what you are suggesting, as you have said clubs are already in debt so why are you suggesting taking money away from them further? Football is rich enough to distribute money to lower clubs and use massive parachute payments, RL simply cannot afford this and it's just extremely short sighted to suggest otherwise.

That has absolutely nothing to do with this, if you can't have a debate without being childish and spiteful then don't bother at all.

drove past salfords new ground lol.....at least they have moved the cows off the field so I suppose thats enough to allow them to stay in



The franchise thing is a total sham,and not one team will be dropped from super league,can't wait for tricky dicky to be on sky with his school projector naming the same teams over and over again

I thought we [iwere[/i having a sensible debate but can quickly see this is how things work with you.



Your fine displaying your own ignorance towards people who dare aspire of SL, the Chairmen, the fans, the sponsors (calling folk morons and clowns isn't exactly intelectual debate is it?) but can't hack it when a bit is thrown back?



You think P&R is 'utterly absurd', I think plonking an unprepared team into SL was 'utterly absurd'. Neither are unreasonable opinions and both have been proven to be correct at some point in recent history.



If you can't accept that without turning into a great big girls blouse then you perhaps need to give your head a wobble.

one team at least will be dropped in 2012, which makes everything else you have put nonsense

Perhaps having a pointless unrelated dig at Crusaders highlighted the reasons for your beliefs and showed they were pretty childish.

It was not pointless whatsover.



I needed an example to prove that franchises have the potential to be 'utterly absurd'.



Given Celtic are to date the only current example of franchising failure, it would be quite difficult to use any other example.



If you can give me any other examples then feel free and I will amend my post.

It would be 'utterly absurd' to judge any long term changes after only one year

It would be even more 'utterly absurd' to think one example is proof of anything