Dave T

Tonight is a perfect example of what I refer to when I say we can maybe benefit from multiple Friday games. Wire v Hull has often been televised and poor. If that's the case tonight, you can easily stay engaged for the 2hrs with the other matches as well. So on that basis I think fans are more likely to stay engaged and commit to the night's viewing instead of drifting to other things. Friday night is SL night. But anyway, Wire v Hull on tv for me this week.

You could be right in that I am being overly generous, because some of the things that are either not explained well, or don't make sense are challenging. Having an A grade means little really. It doesn't guarantee you a slot at all, as one of the amendments is to score everyone annually. It offers zero protection, which was one of the points of an A grade. And as you point out, we have 12 clubs, whilst they have said when they get 12 grade A clubs they will look to expand, that won't happen overnight - if we get 15 grade A's this year we won't expand to 15 clubs for 2025. In reality, the gradings of A, B and C mean nowt. It's basically a ranking system where you need to be in the top 12 for Super League. I also don't accept the argument from people that 'if we ever get to tge stage of 15 grade A club's then we are doing great' - whilst that may be true, I think we have set the bar relatively low, and you do actually have to have the mechanics of what you'd do with those clubs. It is negligent to be relaxed about it and say we'll think about it when it happens. When I say broadly fine, I'm more referring to the areas of focus - facilities, engagement, performance, finances - they are OK.

I have some sympathy with your view. Not that I agree with you fully, but I share the view that this system hasn't been implemented very well, I think it's broadly fine, but as long as you have weird metrics, you do rather undermine your system and people will buy in less. I like the fact it has forced some clubs to take action, but it hasn't addressed the most basic criticism of P&R, which was the volatility of P&R.

I often make this point. People don't always explicitly say exactly what you say above, but it is rather ignored that we have had 24 clubs over the years. I think being unhappy about individual events is fair, but that can't be the whole narrative here. And when people talk about favourites etc. we have to include Oldham and Workington as they were original members as you say. Sure, be peed off that you felt your club was shafted in 1994, but the game didn't pull up the drawstrings and exclude these clubs.

On para 3 - IIRC the protests were dampened somewhat as an announcement came that day that the merger was off and there was an assumption that we would both be in SL. I think as the details emerged and the approach of the top 10 being in it became clear that Widnes were out, but the protest had been quashed. Had that detail emerged in advance, I think things could have been quite nasty.

I don't suppose this is a particularly complex discussion. People have different circumstances and tastes and will ultimately put different value on the same thing. I think Sky Sports is brilliant, the OP doesn't - that's fine, and not really much to discuss tbh.

It is perfectly reasonable for people to believe that clubs being placed into SL outside of the standard process that was in place at that time benefited from 'favouritism'. It may not be the best word to use, but it makes the point. Let's remember that this is in the context of P&R being the mechanism for the vast majority of the last few decades. PSG, London, Gateshead, Catalans, Leigh all benefitted from being hand-picked outside of normal process. I think that is understandable that some people don't like that when we have many clubs who have been fighting for promotion to SL and have never made it. But, that is a very narrow way of looking at this, because when you look at the whole picture and the context, it is more complex than just favouritism. Let's be honest, many clubs given a place in SL were also treated poorly and that is an outcome of poor leadership and strategies imo.

Well, yeah to be honest. The ones at the top of the IMG table are the ones with more fans, viewers, sponsors etc. I think there are plenty of nuances to this debate, and I really don't like this weird hybrid system they've gone with, but people really do overstate the benefits of relegation battles.

Is the excitement actually appreciated by people on a tangible level? Are people really that interested. Because the biggest crowds, the biggest viewing figures etc are for the games at the top of the table.

None of this is perfect, and i do think there needs to be an element of accepting that the holistic approach will tease out the better teams, and broadly speaking, I don't think there were too many anomalies in that first round - although time will tell on that. I do think people are guilty of looking at the minute detail too much, but that is always going to happen under a system like this, which is a flaw for me. On your point about digital engagement - one thing I did see was London recently pleading for people to engage with their social media so they could get IMG points. We also hear the likes of Cas talk about putting seats in to get IMG points. I think this speaks volumes about those clubs, and explains why they are ranked where they are. Instead of just saying "click here to give us points" maybe London could actually focus on the spirit of this and actually create content that people want to engage with. And maybe instead of Cas talking about improving facilities to get points, they should change their mindset that they are improving facilities for the comfort of their fans to improve their viewing experience, allowing them to drive more money and retain more fans. I think it speaks volumes about the mindsets of people in the sport. And that includes fans - people are talking about Castleford finally making improvements to their ground after decades of criticising the ground as a negative. It's a really strange mindset.

I think there are plenty of issues with how the Grading has been introduced, but I don't have an issue with this one (apart from maybe the actual numbers and %). Turnover is really important here - it's all well and good giving points for a club making a profit - but that isn't necessarily going to grow the game. A tiny club making £1k profit shouldn't be rewarded more than a club turning over £10m and posting a loss of £100k for example. It feels sensible that the three things they look for here is (1) pure turnover number - they want bigger clubs that are driving loads of income. (2) % of non-centralised - no over-reliance on central funding - clubs need to drive their own income (3) profit - this addresses your concerns that clubs aren't just recklessly driving hollow turnover. Broadly it feels like it can work. I also don't have too much of an issue with the on-field performance tbh, having one giant ladder feels ok, and in the circumstance you describe, Wakey have the opportunity to be ranked 9th on performance if they won the GF and the 1895 cup. That doesn't feel too odd.

This has been debunked though hasn't it? People said that this was an issue when Sky had Hull spending £1.8m on their "guess the wage bill" table. Pearson has dismissed that and confirmed they are spending half a million more than that. People said this was an issue when they were losing and Smith hadn't ben sacked. They said they could just coast and not have to sack their manager. Then they sacked their manager. This whole coasting point isn't really playing out. Some teams are just rubbish and it's usually bad decisions.

Crowd fluctuation is down to many factors, including team performance, scheduling, marketing, prices, morale etc - I'd argue that Hull beibg a basket case and sacking their coach is a far bigger factor than any structure element. London's crowds have so far been better than 5 years ago when they were in a relaxation battle and had 10 wins. If we point to any other element being the factor, then I rest my case.

Poor team without a head coach gets poor crowd? Well, knock me down with a feather!

This is a weird take on a weekend when Leigh (joint 2nd from bottom on 2pts) wipe the floor with top of the table Catalans. I also suggest your memory isn't that good when suggesting that 10-12 could feasibly make the playoffs. No surprise, the teams 10-12 each year have been generally rubbish. I'm not really sure what your '8 team SL' really means tbh.