Wellsy4HullFC

You really need to get out of your own bubble because you're enjoying the smell of your own farts. If you don't think finishing bottom and joint bottom were failures, you've got some interesting mental gymnastics. It's all part of the journey, nothing wrong with just saying "yeah, we had a rough few years rebuilding." I know plenty of Hull KR fans that hold their hand up to those shoddy years and did so at the time also. I won't tar them all with the same brush like you try to ours because I'm not that bitter. Enjoy your progression. You should. But remember, you haven't won anything yet so maybe get down from that pedestal.

Yorkshire & The East vs Lancashire & The West. There, everyone's included. Like when they added "Ireland" to GB&I. As long as they avoid calling them the Red Rose Wests, I'm sure we'll be fine!

Well, not really. After bouncing back, you finished 3rd bottom (then 18pd away from being in another MPG), joint bottom and then bottom again. Relegation knocked you back years. Let's not rewrite history into some kind of "rising phoenix" underdog story. Had it but been for Widnes' compete collapse that year, you may have stayed down there.

Something has to change. Smith had a full season and an off-season. I get he might have not been able to recruit all the players he wanted, but he got so little out of the ones he's got that it was just unacceptable. There was no confidence he could turn anything around. Since he's gone, there's some visible changes happening. Whether they're good or bad, who knows, but the support was being lost through such inept performances that you've got to be shown to be doing something. They're the customers after all. You can't have one win in 14 games (that one win being a last minute try at home against a newly promoted team with zero wins and guaranteed relegation), with 3 out of the last 4 by more than 50+, and expect to keep your job.

Agreed. You only need to look at Wigan's demise in the mid-00s. Nearly relegated in 06. They got a new coach and signed one player (on the face of it). Seemed to make a huge difference! *I'll ignore the fact they also broke the salary cap...* And again, a few years later they changed owner, head coach and suddenly became the blue print! With the right people and investment, the change can be pretty quick. By the looks of it, we're willing to fork out some money (which we weren't sure about before) to get the right people. That's a relief at least because the feeling was we were skint and doing it all on the cheap. Turns out, we're just doing it really really really badly!

And you'd no doubt get another great coach that gets 150% out of 75% budget. The real person we should be after is the person who's finding the coaches...

Could this not just be the first round of negotiations? Offer 1 rejected...

The Robins?

Looks like they'll just have to be called North West RL and include Cumbria... (I'm being facetious obviously)

Catalans- B Saints- B Wigan- A Warrington- A Hull KR- C Huddersfield- C Salford- C Leeds- D Leigh- E Castleford- F Hull FC- F London- E

Like I say, for me it just doesn't feel like an England game if it's not the best available players. It never will be unless it's played Down Under. Can we compromise with an annual mid-season England international Down Under on the same weekend as Yorkshire v Lancashire, France v Wales and Ireland v Scotland? (Throw in England Knights v Jamaica for those not eligible for Yorks/Lancs).

Each to their own. I enjoyed the Roses series in the 00s, and the reason for a somewhat lower than normal quality would be more down to backing up after a SL game IMO.

One England team at close to reserve international standard playing a team that is below reserve international standard is a lower standard than 2 teams at close to reserve international standard, yes. The mistake you made was not remembering that France are lightyears away, even from our reserves. It's a poor matchup.

I would far rather England play in a competitive, meaningful match. If they can't do that, I don't want them to play as it cheapens the brand. That's my biggest issue. England in tinpot matches missing half of their available players in front of a crowd not befitting an international event serves no purpose for the players (of both teams), the sport or the fans. If this is all we can get mid-season, I'd rather we didn't use the England monicker and saved it for proper internationals at the end of the season. I want England to be a big deal and it's matches like this that make it less so. If we can't do it right, do something else. I'd rather an All Stars game than a match that damages the viewing of international rugby league.

There's never been "loads of marketing" for anything in rugby league except for finals and end of season internationals. It was marketed as County of Origin, but other than a name and a logo, what else did they do? Even with the England brand advantage, you can't get anyone to go to a mid-season drubbing with half the team playing at the other side of the world. It's very close to reserve international standard. The fact that you think there's not much of a difference between playing on a Wednesday night and playing on a Saturday evening is laughable by the way. You surely don't mean that.