Liverpool Rover

IMO Hawaii would be the best US State to take a game to.

I watch the NFL and when teams are losing games after being knocked out of playoff contention it's because they are not very good, not because they have eased up.

I see this a lot but how do we know? These are professional sportsmen so going out to win every game should be natural to them. If there was no relegation anymore teams should be wary of getting a reputation for coasting and having a lack of ambition as no one would want to join them, crowds would drop, broadcasters wouldn't want to choose their games so visibility drops and sponsorship will suffer. Being honest if there are teams who need relegation for something to play for rather than because they want to try to be the best should have questions about whether they should be in Super League at all.

Afterwards I was thinking about people flicking through the channels and coming across a new game show hosted by Lee Mack and watching it until the end.

Red Rum and the National Hunt horses of that era would probably be able to just plough straight through the modern Grand National fences. I would raise the fences a little to force the horses to be slowed down before jumping as well as moving the start further forward so the field can't build up as much speed to the first fence.

I've seen that Castleford apparently are expected to vote against and Wakefield have changed their minds and will now vote in favour.

The more I hear Keighleys whinging the more I think that professional sport really isn't for them.

The irony of animal rights protestors using glue while protesting for animal welfare.

Klaus Teuber, designer of the Settlers Of Catan board game, which is now seen as a classic gateway to modern board games and making people aware that there is more to board games than Monopoly and Cluedo.

Bruno, Lewis, Benn, Eubank and Hamed are still probably bigger names with the general than the majority of current British boxers. It's probably the same with snooker as well. When I was a kid the biggest household sporting names seemed to be those from individual sports, even the top WWF stars of the day were famous names over here, everyone had heard of Hulk Hogan, Ultimate Warrior, Andre The Giant etc. The top RL stars such as Schofield, Hanley & Offiah may have had a lot of name recognition within the RL heartlands amongst people who had no interest in the sport but outside of the heartlands if you weren't into RL you probably would have never heard of them. RL had always had a following outside of it's heartlands but not in anywhere enough numbers to make the top players star household names. Back in the 80s more people in the UK would probably have been more aware of William "the refrigerator" Perry and Dan Marino than the big name RL players. The lack of national attention and interest from the national media has meant that the majority of the public has never got to hear about our players.

Ivo Grahams top level poophousery, Jenny Eclairs barge sailing and Frankie Boyle in a wedding dress. I would have rather heard the music in the dance task but I guess that there would have been all sorts of licensing issues. Mae Martin is just adorable and I think they will run away with this series.

Out of curiosity I looked at the league tables from the 70s onwards and I would say at least 80-85% of the promoted teams went straight back down again so the rate of promoted teams surviving the first season hasn't been very good, which doesn't really suggest that P&R has worked that well. People point to football and say it works but I would say that football as a sport is more suited to P&R than Rugby League is, as promoted teams when they feel it is needed can grind out enough points by playing more defensively or by sitting deep and hitting teams on the counter and there is more of a chance of shock results. In RL promoted teams don't have that choice and as such are more exposed when playing the stronger teams, which is a big disadvantage in a sport where more often than not the better team usually wins. This is why IMO promoted teams ideally need more than one off season to really be able to put together a decent team but they don't get that as one bad season and they go down and all the money that was spent on trying to stay in Super League, on top of all the money spent on getting there in the first place, has been wasted.

I would trust that IMG would take being in the Championship into account when coming up with grading scores more than I would if the RFL were in charge of this.

I would say that a lot of teams in the RU Premiership aren't based in towns you associate with major pro sport either but With IMG on board to help build a fanbase one of the best ways is to create events that people want to go to and taking games to a bigger stadium and creating an event feel to it with bands etc is one way of doing that. This way you can market the game to RL & general sports fans who may fancy going to a game and at the same time market that other things will be going on to try to attract families who want a day out so you are targeting as wide a range of people as you can. I'm not sure I agree with teams not being big enough draws, I think most people won't really care where they are from if they produce a good game.

It sounded to me like the Keighley owners were saying they wanted 2 up 2 down with traditional P&R and not having it within the IMG system. We need as many clubs in Super League to be looking up and raise their standards to get to the level of Saints, Wigan etc and I feel adding an extra relegation place would just spook clubs into just focusing on trying to make sure that they get to still be in Super League from one season to the next which would entrench the big clubs at the top even more. Two promotion places will just encourage a mad scramble for promotion and IMO it's the short term thinking that the game needs to move away from.

There was a time when Hull KR didn't have the money until Hudgell took over. I don't see why someone wouldn't be interested in investing in a championship club if they know that a high enough grading would make them a lot less likely to be relegated with the stability that could bring.

Something like the NRL model where championship clubs can apply for Super League when they are ready or what IMG are proposing, so championship clubs aren't throwing all their money and gambling on short term success because they have to be promoted right now.

They don't have an alternative plan, so far it has been "we want promotion and relegation waaah!"

My team went down and then up again the following year in the middle eights. It never changed my mind about it being a ridiculous system that was rightfully scrapped.

On YouTube I came across one from a Grand Final from the old Brisbane RL competition went on for some time.

He was probably doomed when the Leeds fans started referring to him as Yank Lampard.

I’m about halfway through Bad Sisters on Apple TV. I’ve been enjoying it so far.

Boxing referee Mills Lane, although the first thing that came to mind when I saw this was that he was the referee in Celebrity Deathmatch.

Last night I saw a trailer for an Inside No. 9 Christmas special.

The drama queen who had a go for someone for leaving the room in tears the previous night before doing the same thing himself. I think Amanda might end up winning.