Dave T
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Posts
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Posts posted by Dave T
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20 minutes ago, sweaty craiq said:
As long as folk don’t expect distractions to appease personal desires for detail at this stage. A bland say nothing the review is underway and this is whose involved would be more than plenty. I am sure the folk that really matter know the detail of what’s going on and at this stage that mustn’t be the “fans”
That is the justification of somebody who doesn't give a s*** for transparency with respect.
It's always the justification "you dont need to know".
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22 minutes ago, Just Browny said:
And full membership of the RFL should be available to clubs who have participated in RFL competitions for 5+ years. With full voting rights.
The principle of that may seem sound, however I think this is where a distinction between the RFL and SLE is probably needed, and RFL voting being limited to what it can do with regards to SLE. RFL are responsible for grassroots development in the UK, the England team etc. and there is a conflict with overseas teams being a member of that organisation - but this is where SLE needs a strong governance model.
But any of the above issues are possible to overcome, with right governance, which is the overarching point.
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Just now, Harry Stottle said:
Quite right in that we do not know the content of the items under review, but if they were published there would be speculative answers coming from all sides, and on these pages probably exceeding the IMG thread - yes I know I was a main contributor - and I do not believe it is not good to drop information in the public domain bit by bit.
I am quite happy awaiting till the i's are dotted and the t's are crossed untill July as we are informed we will find out what is the intention of those who seemingly are going to have a big input into how the game moves forward releases the findings of the Strategic Review which hopefully will be by a majority decision by the clubs as was done for the Re-Imagining project.
Again, I'm a fan of people doing what they said they would.
It was Nigel Wood who stated they would share the details of the workstream. And that isn't a wild commitment, it is exactly the kind of transparency you'd expect from a governing body and the kind of approach that Sport England are looking for.
Keeping things secret because we don't like people discussing it on a forum isn't a good approach.
And I look forward to the outcomes too. Although if I don't like them, I can sleep easy, knowing that there will be another within 3 years when crowds and sponsors haven't doubled.
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Good stuff, don't always agree with him, but do on this.
However, I do think the bigger piece here is around the central funding etc. The sooner we get watertight agreements on central funding, allocations, costs etc. that aren't up for discussion every year the better.
IMO the simple starting point is that all SLE clubs should get an equal share of central funding (media, sponsorship etc) irrespective of which territory it comes from. But irrespective of whether my approach is the one they go with, they just need a long term commitment and we just then stop talking about it.
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Just now, sweaty craiq said:
There’s a few should be’s and look to’s in that statement - so I agree with something is needed and personally be happy with it’s underway and the team are in place headed by Wood. Although I thought that had been done.
I'm just a fan of people being credible and doing what they say they will.
There is zero reason not to release details of the workstreams of the review. It's a really easy win for transparency.
And there has been zero improvement in communications. Remember this wasn't a long term aspiration, this was his commitment, knowing he is there for a short period.
There is zero reason for silence.
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18 hours ago, HornyHornyHorneeet said:
Pretty sure I read that the review would only be completed in July this year.
I'm not talking about the outcomes of the review.
"The work streams of the Strategic Review will be finalised over the next week or so. We will look to publish these, together with details of the other contributors who have agreed to assist with the process.
Our sport is blessed with talented professionals, in clubs, at the RFL and Rugby League Commercial and indeed everyone, who will happily offer their skills, expertise and energy to move us forward.
We also need to communicate much better – with clubs and other key stakeholders, and most of all with fans."
https://www.totalrl.com/nigel-wood-sets-out-his-priorities-on-rfl-return/
2 months ago those claims of communicating details of the review and communicating with fans better.
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11 minutes ago, Eddie said:
Blocks 137 and 139 are good examples.
They are selling some rows on Wire's allocation and some on the RFL's.
This is often what they are doing when people claim they only put 50% of blocks on sale.
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6 minutes ago, HornyHornyHorneeet said:
If its a transitional board and interim appointments with a review process being undertaken, then the way I would read it is any new vision or significant change would likely become effective when the review process has been concluded (July I think was stated)???
Did they ever announce the details of the review as Wood promised?
Even as an interim gang they seem very slack on keeping promises.
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Irrespective of injuries or tiredness or whatever, we shouldn't be losing by 30 points against a team level in the league with us. Particularly when that completes the double against us.
There was enough talent in that team to either get a result or at least stay in the match.
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20 minutes ago, HornyHornyHorneeet said:
You would expect so, which would therefore mean that Andy's statement that there are no issues with Sport England is correct.
As per the rest of my line, why would they announce Wood as Chair if they'd done the right things?
They've just gone silent, seemingly hoping everyone will forget.
If everything's cool, why not announce the situation?
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32 minutes ago, HornyHornyHorneeet said:
Re the Sport England think I think what Andy is saying and reading through the full exchange, is that there aren't any issues with Sport England but that doesn't fit the toxic social media agenda very well does it.
Clearly the reason Nigel cant be named Chair (officially) is a technicality in the RFL's own article of association.
It would also appear that their is a compliant transitional RFL board in place and the strategic review process is ongoing.
On the bit in bold. These are requirements from Sport England's Code of Sports Governance:
1.9 Each Board must have a duly appointed Chair who shall be responsible for the leadership of the Board.
2.6 The appointment of the Chair and Independent Non-Executive Directors must be via an open, publicly advertised recruitment process.
So we appear to be breaching 2.6 with the plan for Wood (plus our internal article on the 12m piece) meaning that we aren't meeting 1.9 of having a Chair.
Now, I expect the relevant people have had the appropriate conversations on this with SE and agreed the transition to the new board - however based on the signed off press releases that are factually incorrect, where they announced Wood as the Interim Chair, it suggests they didn't do their homework.
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I often think we just fall into lazy analysis with things like 'lazy players' or 'poor culture'. Yet it was only a short while ago that people were celebrating the likes of Leeds and Saints culture, telling us that you can't just buy a team and you have to follow their model.
I think nearer to the truth is that squad makeup is complex and being a little out of balance, or a couple of key injuries or the odd bad signing can affect the team quite a lot.
When I look at the Wire team, I'm not seeing slackers, I'm seeing a team all at sea at times, and I think coaching is playing a part in that. Whether that is the head coach, or assistants, or conditioners, obviously we don't know, but I'm certainly not thinking anyone highlighting Currie as a problem is on the right track.
There are more strong teams now, the likes of Leigh, Wakey, Hull KR are coming in and making their challenges, and there's no place to hide right now. It's how it should be too.
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4 minutes ago, graveyard johnny said:
WHAT QUALIFIES BURGESS AS A SL COACH?- have been wondering for a while
Well he has some credit in the bank as he improved us last year taking us to a 3rd place finish and a Wembley final, but this is proving a difficult second season.
Question marks definitely, but we'll have to judge at the end of the season I think.
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1 hour ago, ELBOWSEYE said:
I look at the signings, apart from sneyd. Russell, Leyland and the Leeds winger all poor quality (Leyland might develop) and Musgrove and Russell rarely play, and as two overseas players you expect better, but it's not beyond us winning the CC final if Williams, walker, king, Fitzgibbon and Thewlis all play.
I was travelling so only saw a few minutes of today's game (thankfully), but I must admit to thinking that Burgess is a little out of his depth at the moment. I find his selections all over the place and I don't think it's always easy to see what he's doing with the team. Admittedly there are a lot of enforced changes each week at the moment, but I think he's struggling right now.
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The main thing for me over the years has been the poor governance, and they haven't learnt anything from it.
There is little wrong with having the RFL as the leaders in this country - people can then get into their own arguments about who should be in the hot seats, but in reality that's less important than good governance.
When the RFL were in charge things broadly worked (under-performed yes) but decisions were made and whilst there would be some challenge with clubs, I'm OK with that as they hold the board accountable and voting rights can keep that in check. The weakness with that model was under-investment in right people and strategy imo.
Where things have always gone belly up has been when the clubs have believed they can do better than the RFL. The couple of SLE and NFP breakaways have never done anything well and they've always come crawling back to bed with the RFL. All it has done is weaken the RFL and confuse the lines of accountability and ownership to leave things falling through the gaps.
As part of the last restructure they seem to have done their best to confuse it even more. I dont think anyone knows anymore who is the leader of the game, is it RL Com and Rhodri Jones or RFL and Tony Sutton. At the moment it seems to be neither. And then we have the farce over the Chair which tbh in its current form isn't the most important role.
The clubs keep wrestling control amd power, but don't really know what they want to do with it. Let's be honest, nothing bold has ever come from these breakaways, it's always just been broadly more of the same.
Simplify things, pull together, invest in the commercial arm of the RFL (still call it RLcom if you like) and stop fannying about.
A good example of the lack of leadership.and ownership is around grading. On the RFL site it's called IMG Grading Handbook, yet the document is branded with RFL and RLCom. I don't know whether it's intentional passing the buck or what, but it's weird when we don't know who is doing what, who leads what. Nobody has a voice of authority at the moment.
And now the noisy idiots have shut up shop too.
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21 minutes ago, Gooleboy said:
I can't fault your optimism, but that would be some achievement to get 20k+ Londoners to a RL game.
We've easily done that before. Major London internationals always get a good local following, it really is noticeable how many different faces and voices we get at these events. When we got 67k in for that WC semi final, we easily had 20-30k Southerners I'd suggest conservatively. Probably more.
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2 hours ago, Rugbyleaguesupporter said:
I'm presuming we haven't thought of doing an Ashes/ cup final bundle?
Bundles are nice and all that, but in reality, the thing they offer are discounts, and I just don't think that pricing is a challenge here.
The bigger piece is that you have a comms strategy that speaks to customers about both of these events (and others) appropriately.
And the even bigger piece is that you go big, make the Challenge Cup Final such a great event that people want to rush back to Wembley - and for once they have the opportunity to do that for RL just a few months later. A challenge I find is that the actual RL events often underwhelm (apart from the sport usually) and the actual events should be one of the biggest marketing tools we have.
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6 minutes ago, Eddie said:
That’s understandable but still a shame, I was hoping for a 65k crowd but it seems unlikely now.
I'd like to think that's still achievable. There will still be some who haven't been paid yet for example and there should still be efforts to sell tickets, but it obviously slows down a lot.
I think there are 70k on sale so it doesn't have to be 'sold out' to get 65k, so fingers crossed.
I'd go for 61k
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22 minutes ago, gingerjon said:
Really odd video. I half expected James Child to hold up a copy of today's English language paper and confirm that he was being treated well.
But, in terms of what it says, a very small group of people have complete control but are somewhat lost as to what to do with that control.
And, in terms of what it reveals, an abject failure by every aspect of the rugby league media and social media sphere in this country.
It's quite shocking how this publication was a mouthpiece for DB and any kind of anti-RFL/IMG article you could find, and now there is just nothing.
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1 hour ago, Eddie said:
On that note I am doing that (probably every half an hour rather than 5 minutes) and Wire’s tickets don’t seem to be shifting at all.
Yeah, very slow now. The upper tier around halfway for example have plenty left.
I suppose 7 finals in 17 years means Wembley just isn't the must attend event for Wire fans. I've made this point before, in those first couple of years from 2009 I went and had a group of 15 to 20 or so going. This year not a single one will attend.
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6 hours ago, Treizistance said:
Sport England need to take RFL to the cleaners. Sooner the top professional clubs leave this show, the better.
You're not really following it are you?
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8 hours ago, RigbyLuger said:
Some communication, but not from anyone on the board anymore
I found Child really interesting on this, however had to turn it off halfway through as I found Caplan and Shaw-Wright unbearable.
Shaw-Wright's insistence with fannying about on his phone and chirping in with random comments was irritating, and Caplan kept stopping Child when he was in full flow and making weird points.
It was really interesting when Child was talking about the board makeup and the virtual meeting etc. and Caplan just stopped it going anywhere by looking on his phone for the board members on the website (which had already been discussed). His point about announcements for next year (Vegas etc) being worthless was nonsense. We do still have RLCom and co keeping the show on the road.
Child was excellent, informative and balanced i thought.
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When we get a release like that on the website, who exactly is it? Who is SRD?
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Just now, Worzel said:
Fair point, yes probably have some community initiatives too etc.
It is frustrating though. I do wish they'd think of us geeks who like to watch the ticketing site pressing refresh every five minutes
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Some sense spoken on French clubs
in The General Rugby League Forum
Posted
Joking aside, these things need to be discussed sensibly whenever we do something different.
There aren't many sports who would embark on a new venture where ultimately the existing clubs just pay the incremental cost.
New PNG team? Here's a few million dollars each as a sweetener. Same with Perth.
SA teams in the Union Euro comp? Here's huge sponsorship and media deal alongside it.
We also see costs covered by additional investment when things are launched, otherwise those sports just dont bother doing them. We do embark on many things where the business case would be dismissed outright by other sports.
I'm not advocating doing that, I'd rather we distribute central funds better so that the 'league's pots of money to invest in initiatives, but it isn't a surprise to me that clubs challenge the governing body who aren't great at bringing in investment to fund these things and just leave the costs to clubs.