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The never-ending League Restructure debate (Many merged threads)


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I was being slightly facetious but the point remains. You don't think this is the end of the retreating do you? How long till 12 teams is too expensive? ? It's not really the fact it is 12 teams, so much as the fact it's admitting defeat (because that's what it is)

I'm sure there will be many good games played in the future, I just don't expect anyone outside the RL zones will care. Its not next week or next season that the damage done by this will be aparrent, but it will be in the near future.

 

So do you think the NSWRL admitted defeat when it merged or demoted all but two of its founding clubs? Or do you think it had the vision to turn a competition confined to the suburbs of Sydney into a nationwide league?

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So do you think the NSWRL admitted defeat when it merged or demoted all but two of its founding clubs? Or do you think it had the vision to turn a competition confined to the suburbs of Sydney into a nationwide league?

Now I know this might be hard to understand, but hear me out..

This isn't the NRL.

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Yeah, cos Wigan and Huddersfield are huge box office. Or is it St Helens snd Warrington that are going to be so attractive to big sponsors?

This is where Duff Duffs argument falls flat. Inlike the NRL, we dont have 15 big cities or big city suburbs playing RL. The towns or clubs in SL are no bigger than some of their counterparts in the NLs. There is no chance of one medium sized towns fans migrating to anothers.

The NRL or its predecessor has never had 30 odd pro teams.

I do think that even the NRL might benefit from P&R to make the game even stronger around Oz (like football here). Anyway there are far less people in Oz than the UK so we can better cope with P&R

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Yeah, cos Wigan and Huddersfield are huge box office. Or is it St Helens snd Warrington that are going to be so attractive to big sponsors?

 

Well Wigan is probably the best brand club rugby league has. Ask a southerner or an Australian to name a British Rugby League club and the chances are they will say Wigan.  If you think the likes of Wigan and St Helens aren't viable then rugby league might as well give up.

 

The problem is that since the early 1990s British rugby league has been appalling at expanding into areas of feasible growth such as Wales, the south of France and Manchester proper.

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You think this is about the clubs showing vision?

 

Yes. If they had had their heads screwed in the mid 1990s the Calder Tiger-Cats, Hull United or Manchester Reds could have won Super League titles by now and be powerhouses in the game. Instead they are scrapping about for their places in the top division. 

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The NRL is a million dollar league because RL is the number one sport in NSW and Queensland. In the UK it isn't the number one sport ... anywhere, really. Doesn't matter whether we have 12, 10 or 2 teams in SL, or whether we have P&R or not; we'll never have their kind of money, or their player depth.

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Don't everyone get so excited, It will only be another couple of years before the Knee jerks again. Sooner or later it will dawn that League has neither the player strength for anything more that a elite comp, Nor the quality of people at the RFL to take the game forward, whatever changes come in, they will be deemed to have failed long before they have had a chance to succeed, Just a opinion of course.

Dont expect anything from a pig but a grunt

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Well Wigan is probably the best brand club rugby league has. Ask a southerner or an Australian to name a British Rugby League club and the chances are they will say Wigan.  If you think the likes of Wigan and St Helens aren't viable then rugby league might as well give up.

 

The problem is that since the early 1990s British rugby league has been appalling at expanding into areas of feasible growth such as Wales, the south of France and Manchester proper.

since when was the south of france in britan ?

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The NRL is a million dollar league because RL is the number one sport in NSW and Queensland. In the UK it isn't the number one sport ... anywhere, really. Doesn't matter whether we have 12, 10 or 2 teams in SL, or whether we have P&R or not; we'll never have their kind of money, or their player depth.

Yet despite this, the NRL cannot expand into the rest of Australia or NZ, due to its closed shop.

The NRL is a bad example!

We need to find our own optimal growth mechanism. I would have preferred a 14 club SL (inc Toulouse) with 2 up 2 down (and the French exempt), and some rules on finance, budgeting for youth and marketing when promoted.

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I think it is important now that a real push is made by all concerned to really grow attendances outside SL and grow the game, ultimately so we can both argue for an expanded SL, and provide more pro clubs generating good players for England.

I've argued on here for throughout theicensing years, that we could see growth in NL1 and NL2 if we returned to P&R. Now that we've got this, its up to my club and the other big frontrunners to step up a gear. We've got the stadium and a big (lapsed) fanbase, and the town is still RL through and through. I hope the licensing years havent done too much damage, but I am confident our gates can grow substantially when the games count again.

I'm also hoping that some of the new teams can be up there challenging for SL in 2015. It would be great if Cru and Hemel could be getting gates of a few k

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This is where Duff Duffs argument falls flat. Inlike the NRL, we dont have 15 big cities or big city suburbs playing RL. The towns or clubs in SL are no bigger than some of their counterparts in the NLs. There is no chance of one medium sized towns fans migrating to anothers.

The NRL or its predecessor has never had 30 odd pro teams.

I do think that even the NRL might benefit from P&R to make the game even stronger around Oz (like football here). Anyway there are far less people in Oz than the UK so we can better cope with P&R

 

 

Everything you have said there is completely wrong. The NSWRL team in Sydney were piled on top of each other. Wests, Balmain, St George, Newtown, Souths, Easts and Canterbury were all within spitting distance of each other. In the fully professional era they were completely unsustainable and of that lot only Souths, Easts and Canterbury survive as stand alone clubs. It is exactly the same as Castleford, Featherstone and Wakefield.

 

Also the figures show that supporters do migrate to the bigger and more successful clubs. The crowd figures show that since the 1980s the big clubs like Wigan and Leeds have increased their crowds significantly and the support for second tier clubs has declined both proportionally and absolutely. If you put a high quality product on the field supporters will forget their petty parochialism and go and watch the nearest Super League club. Wests Tigers and St George Illawarra have thrived since their mergers. 

 

Also before the expansion of the NSWRL there were loads of first grade rugby league clubs in Australia. In 1987 there were 23 first grade rugby league clubs in Sydney and Brisbane alone. To create a national competition sacrifices had to be made. The BRL had to be sacrificed and 6 of the NSWRL's founding clubs had to merge or go semi pro. Clubs that had a much greater history of success and importance to the game than the small town clubs in the UK. 

 

The thing the NSWRL realised is that to grow it had to change and not bow down to the vested self interests of its smaller and economically unviable clubs. 

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Everything you have said there is completely wrong. The NSWRL team in Sydney were piled on top of each other. Wests, Balmain, St George, Newtown, Souths, Easts and Canterbury were all within spitting distance of each other. In the fully professional era they were completely unsustainable and of that lot only Souths, Easts and Canterbury survive as stand alone clubs. It is exactly the same as Castleford, Featherstone and Wakefield.

Also the figures show that supporters do migrate to the bigger and more successful clubs. The crowd figures show that since the 1980s the big clubs like Wigan and Leeds have increased their crowds significantly and the support for second tier clubs has declined both proportionally and absolutely. If you put a high quality product on the field supporters will forget their petty parochialism and go and watch the nearest Super League club. Wests Tigers and St George Illawarra have thrived since their mergers.

Also before the expansion of the NSWRL there were loads of first grade rugby league clubs in Australia. In 1987 there were 23 first grade rugby league clubs in Sydney and Brisbane alone. To create a national competition sacrifices had to be made. The BRL had to be sacrificed and 6 of the NSWRL's founding clubs had to merge or go semi pro. Clubs that had a much greater history of success and importance to the game than the small town clubs in the UK.

The thing the NSWRL realised is that to grow it had to change and not bow down to the vested self interests of its smaller and economically unviable clubs.

RL seems to have contracted in Sydney since the mergers and it certainly damaged the game, from which RU has definitley benefited and perhaps picked up fans. How do you know a P&R or conference system wouldnt be even better in Oz?

Can you name the 23 teams you mention? Brisbane never had a strong league like Sydney

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You are missing the point completely. How did the NRL become the billion dollar competition that it is today? Did the NSWRL decide that preserving the first grade status of the North Sydney, Western Suburbs, Balmain, Newtown, Illawarra and St George was the best way of growing the game? Or did they look to expand the League into Newcastle, Queensland, New Zealand, Canberra and Victoria?

I think will all know the answer to that question. Teams from small, insignificant places that don't register with the general population is not box office, it never has been.

Because it is and was the number one winter sport, commanding huge tv and sponsorship when sport was courted in the new media world

Soccer is that beneficiary here with other sports leaving us well down the food chain

The dominant soccer clubs play in our major city's we have no real presence In London Manchester Birmingham Liverpool Newcastle or Glasgow

I am having second thoughts on nominating you now

Edited by sweaty craiq
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I think it is important now that a real push is made by all concerned to really grow attendances outside SL and grow the game, ultimately so we can both argue for an expanded SL, and provide more pro clubs generating good players for England.

I've argued on here for throughout theicensing years, that we could see growth in NL1 and NL2 if we returned to P&R. Now that we've got this, its up to my club and the other big frontrunners to step up a gear. We've got the stadium and a big (lapsed) fanbase, and the town is still RL through and through. I hope the licensing years havent done too much damage, but I am confident our gates can grow substantially when the games count again.

I'm also hoping that some of the new teams can be up there challenging for SL in 2015. It would be great if Cru and Hemel could be getting gates of a few k

 

Some of the stuff regarding promotion and relegation you say is correct, but your opinion is just so bias because you want what is best for your own club which is summed up perfectly by the majority of this post. You aren't wanting what is best for the game but just for Leigh which is quite frustrating really, because if everyone wanted what was best for their own club then the game would be a total mess.

 

For the record I was in favour of a change in the system. I just couldn't see the French clubs and getting into SL if the system stood. The only way I could of seen it is chucking Toulouse Avignon and maybe Carcasonne into the league suddenly and the RFL would of had to try and sell the four French clubs in the competition and look for a TV deal, too much of a risk IMO. I think in the 12 system we are able to manage our resources better. I hope Toulouse come in with protection for 3 years. At least with 12 clubs they will have more players to choose from in the top division. Hopefully Toulouse have already been informed they are going to be in and they can start building towards it now, telling them in late 2014 is just foolish. Then if Toulouse is a success move onto Avignon and build the French up slowly.

 

If the RFL don't have a plan to get the French clubs in though and have made the change for the sake of it then I really don't see the point in the move. The move isn't going to kill the game like some people are suggesting. It just won't progress the game swapping the bottom SL clubs with the top Championship clubs. The move just isn't going to affect Wigan Leeds Saints Wire Hull ect, why should it? They will carry on pretty much the same, producing the bulk of the talent which plays in SL and will compete exactly the same. It's not going to make a difference if Wigan play Castleford or Featherstone at the end of the day.

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Yet despite this, the NRL cannot expand into the rest of Australia or NZ, due to its closed shop.

The NRL is a bad example!

We need to find our own optimal growth mechanism. I would have preferred a 14 club SL (inc Toulouse) with 2 up 2 down (and the French exempt), and some rules on finance, budgeting for youth and marketing when promoted.

 

Err. The NRL has expanded. North Queensland, Gold Coast, Canberra, Melbourne, Newcastle, Auckland. Even Penrith.

 

In 100 years the RFL has successfully expanded professional rugby league to one place, Perpignan. That is a shocking record record. Wales, Paris, South Yorkshire, the North East and soon London will have been and gone.  A catalogue of incompetence. 

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Err. The NRL has expanded. North Queensland, Gold Coast, Canberra, Melbourne, Newcastle, Auckland. Even Penrith.

In 100 years the RFL has successfully expanded professional rugby league to one place, Perpignan. That is a shocking record record. Wales, Paris, South Yorkshire, the North East and soon London will have been and gone. A catalogue of incompetence.

Err - Rugby League was always played in North Queensland, Gold Coast, Canberra, Newcastle, Auckland and Penrith. The only expansion place is Melbourne and they havent really captured the imagination of the Victorian public.

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Err - Rugby League was always played in North Queensland, Gold Coast, Canberra, Newcastle, Auckland and Penrith. The only expansion place is Melbourne and they havent really captured the imagination of the Victorian public.

 

It's taken a while but the Storm seem to get nearly 20,000 to their home games now.  Not bad in my opinion!

"Rugby League is rugby in the simplest form in the sense that it's about great defence, great tackling technique, good handling, good passing, catching and great kicking."

 

 Stuart Lancaster - England Rugby Union Head Coach - October 2013

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Next year, we have to finish outside the bottonm two with a £600k lower grant than the others. Come on Bradford industry and commerce give something back to the city by raising the £600k so we can pay players up to the salary cap!!

Under Scrutiny by the Right-On Thought Police

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RL seems to have contracted in Sydney since the mergers and it certainly damaged the game, from which RU has definitley benefited and perhaps picked up fans. How do you know a P&R or conference system wouldnt be even better in Oz?

Can you name the 23 teams you mention? Brisbane never had a strong league like Sydney

 

Are you joking? The merged clubs are thriving, both Tigers and Dragons have won the Premiership post merger, and Souths have gone from being a basket case to being the best supported team in the City. Canterbury are motoring on and Easts are still Easts. The only club's who neck is on the chopper is Cronulla.

 

The golden period of Australian rugby union came to a shuddering halt with the 2003 World Cup. It is a niche sport that doesn't pose a strategic threat to either the NRL or the AFL. 

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Err - Rugby League was always played in North Queensland, Gold Coast, Canberra, Newcastle, Auckland and Penrith. The only expansion place is Melbourne and they havent really captured the imagination of the Victorian public.

 

Rugby league has always been played in the south of France, Liverpool, Manchester and Wales and the RFL haven't had much luck getting pro teams going. 

 

The key issue is the heartland clubs have never wanted to sacrifice their own self interests for the greater good of expanding the sport. 

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Rugby league has always been played in the south of France, Liverpool, Manchester and Wales and the RFL haven't had much luck getting pro teams going.

The key issue is the heartland clubs have never wanted to sacrifice their own self interests for the greater good of expanding the sport.

They shouldnt need to! We should find a solution that achieves heartland development and expansion - like football. I'm sick of hearing about the NRL. Btw how come RU could expand into Perth but the NRL failed (as it did in Adelaide and various other places)

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The key issue is the heartland clubs have never wanted to sacrifice their own self interests for the greater good of expanding the sport. 

 

Agreed.

 

Again, I'd like to reiterate I am happy with the 12-team format in SL. I won't however, be happy with the announcements yet to be made about the structure. They are barking mad.

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