Time for a rethink ?

[SSoutherner]

25 minutes ago, Marauder said:

How many thriving winter sides who went summer are struggling or even gone and how many who went summer but went back to winter are back on a even keel, I think a better question would be around the thriving clubs how many other clubs folded, this applies to both seasons and you'll find that winning teams will not suffer from the yo yo player who is jumping from season to season before any one of them are finished.

I was chatting to the Queensbury secretary last night and since moving to summer they've gone from 3 open-age teams to 1 in a very short time and that's with the aid of the local union team from where they are playing from now, Doncaster Toll Bar was in the same situation but decided to go back to winter were they've pulled themselves around.

But as i said before it depends where in the country you are - in leagues Heartlands fine but anywhere where Union is the mainstay the only way you will/can grow the game is via the Summer season where you can get players who are already playing union who will play league for the other part of the year. You will not (at least initially) persuade enough players to jump ship from Union to sustain a league team and other than at Uni's there aren't enough league refugees to form expat "London M62ers" teams as it were

[Defender1]

2 hours ago, SSoutherner said:

But as i said before it depends where in the country you are - in leagues Heartlands fine but anywhere where Union is the mainstay the only way you will/can grow the game is via the Summer season where you can get players who are already playing union who will play league for the other part of the year. You will not (at least initially) persuade enough players to jump ship from Union to sustain a league team and other than at Uni's there aren't enough league refugees to form expat "London M62ers" teams as it were

Funny thing in Hull where there are still 7-8 union teams in the area 6 with juniors when we competed in the winter with Union we always had players. In Hull 8s played Tues night 6.30 ko, 9s Wed, 10s Thurs all during the summer and it was great, 11s played a short summer season on a Sunday morning  and then went to winter in September that short season was a nightmare for training and match days, hence I knew summer would not work. 

The clubhouse is empty after match days once the other team has left, and the commitment has simply fallen away, nobody seems interested any more. Thatto came to us a few weeks ago saying they had 14 missing due to some function, unfortunately for us they still won

[Jacko45]

On 7/17/2018 at 12:30 PM, DoubleD said:

 

You keep that chip on your shoulder and carry on hankering back to the good old days then. In the meantime, the world moves on

The world does move on but amateur r.l isn't , 1 or 2 might be doing ok but most are struggling.

[thepimp007]

Well it certainly is an issue that needs discussing, and discussing properly without agendas. I do think the Division 3 was a step too far and was going to allow clubs too much leeway in terms of facilities and clubhouse location. I remember when I played when younger before getting involved at Dudley Hill if you got drawn against a Conference side in the national cup it was a huge chance to turn a good side over. If them fixtures were to happen now there wouldnt be the fear factor or respect factor that used to be there.

The summer idea for me was the right idea, the practice around it though has left a lot to be desired. Participation levels in all sports is down we aren't the only ones suffering. But we can least afford it more than other sports too. When we (Dudley Hill) moved to the National league 3 with its promise of what it was going to be and potential promotion to the semi pro league after 3 seasons it was supposed to be the start of something. At that point only ourselves, Bramley, Hemel, Coventry and St Albans stuck it out. Teams come and went just like is happening now. We came back to the conference and had a strong side and ended up eventually getting to the premier during winter seasons.

Since the move to summer we have at times struggled with players. Signing pennine players hoping they will stay with the club. Suffered a relegation due to not being able to make a trip to Mayfield. Its a far cry from the position we were in during the winter seasons. We have finally got back to a core of settled players, but availability (plus a couple of discipline issues) has been hit and miss and that is after a promotion season. The answer is probably not a whole scale move back to winter but maybe the question needs to be changed from summer winter to what on earth can we do to improve it!

[johnmatrix]

The regional leagues have undoubtedly suffered due to the expansion of the NCL but why is that a bad thing? If your team wanted to play against better opposition etc with better facilities who or why would you stop them. Admittedly I think the NCL over the last couple of seasons have 'bent' the rules slightly to admit teams who in the past would not have been admitted. 

There is no one size fits all. 

What are the rfl going to do about the lack of 16/18yrs old players ? Probably not alot, thats the sad part.

We need some proactive thinking on many issues affecting the amateur game.we 

[TheDuke]

I think the move to summer has been good for some and bad for others, the main issue being it wasn’t a en mass decision for the game to move, in typical RL fashion it’s led to infighting amongst administrators and people losing interest. I believe if all levels and leagues had gone over it would have been much in a better state than it is now

[Spidey]

12 hours ago, TheDuke said:

I think the move to summer has been good for some and bad for others, the main issue being it wasn’t a en mass decision for the game to move, in typical RL fashion it’s led to infighting amongst administrators and people losing interest. I believe if all levels and leagues had gone over it would have been much in a better state than it is now

I think that’s why it’s worked a bit better in the NW. It wasn’t all the clubs at first but probably 80-90% of them with the remaining one following pretty quickly. What we’ve seen in Yorkshire was practically a 50:50 split, also with teams swapping between the two or trying to do both and failing

[redbeckroad]

Ask the people who really matter ie the players. Some of the lads in open age rugby now have never been involved in a winter season in their lives, including youth rugby. I've asked lads what they think of going back to winter and their comments leave no doubt. I think a move back would result in grassroots rugby league losing more players than it would gain/regain.

For me youth rugby is where the problem lies and that has nothing to do with the winter/ summer debate. If we can't attract more kids into the game the it's going to wither from the roots up and that's not just a problem for the amateur game.

[Defender1]

9 minutes ago, redbeckroad said:

Ask the people who really matter ie the players. Some of the lads in open age rugby now have never been involved in a winter season in their lives, including youth rugby. I've asked lads what they think of going back to winter and their comments leave no doubt. I think a move back would result in grassroots rugby league losing more players than it would gain/regain.

For me youth rugby is where the problem lies and that has nothing to do with the winter/ summer debate. If we can't attract more kids into the game the it's going to wither from the roots up and that's not just a problem for the amateur game.

Well they ain’t committed to the Winter or Summer, players will play when there is a game, when we start training in December and playing friendlys in January the lads just cannot wait to get on the park

[Marauder]

On ‎7‎/‎18‎/‎2018 at 9:01 AM, SSoutherner said:

But as i said before it depends where in the country you are - in leagues Heartlands fine but anywhere where Union is the mainstay the only way you will/can grow the game is via the Summer season where you can get players who are already playing union who will play league for the other part of the year. You will not (at least initially) persuade enough players to jump ship from Union to sustain a league team and other than at Uni's there aren't enough league refugees to form expat "London M62ers" teams as it were

I understand that each area will have a different issues and because of the Southern issues IMO the old RLC system was the best way forward for promoting rugby league everywhere, we definitely had more players and teams playing over a 12 month period than what we have now (Before anyone jumps in with RFL playing numbers, most clubs have signed the ships cat on along with the pit canary, neither have pulled a shirt on along with 40% who are in the squad lists)

[johnmatrix]

How many non heartland's teams are are there? Should we bothered about them? What if nobody plays rugby league in Devon Or wherever? are we really expanding the game when the game is shrinking in Yorkshire/Lancashire/Cumbria?

Has the rfl spent the money in the right places?

[Defender1]

On 7/20/2018 at 11:55 AM, Spidey said:

I think that’s why it’s worked a bit better in the NW. It wasn’t all the clubs at first but probably 80-90% of them with the remaining one following pretty quickly. What we’ve seen in Yorkshire was practically a 50:50 split, also with teams swapping between the two or trying to do both and failing

Yes really embraced it with only 9 results from yesterday and a raft of 24-0 and PP. Out of 28 fixtures in YML 16 results not a game went ahead in Aliance League 1 with all these being NCL A Teams.

Difficult this week as I think finals for the 16-18 teams this week but see how many of these are taking place on a weekend I suspect a lot of the U18s are doubling up

[Spidey]

On the whole there is more OA rugby played in summer in the NW than Yorkshire. That’s the point I was making. 

Our A team game was abandoned on 20mibs yesterday due to constant abuse to the ref from our opponents (they’d already had two sin binned and one sent off) I’ve not checked how it was listed on the website

[DoubleD]

18 minutes ago, Spidey said:

On the whole there is more OA rugby played in summer in the NW than Yorkshire. That’s the point I was making. 

Our A team game was abandoned on 20mibs yesterday due to constant abuse to the ref from our opponents (they’d already had two sin binned and one sent off) I’ve not checked how it was listed on the website

What team was that?

[Spidey]

16 minutes ago, DoubleD said:

What team was that?

It was Eccleston Lions (against Crosfields)

I didn’t see the game as was watching the NCL match on the other pitch 

They had a bit of a bad time yesterday as one of their players had a seizure before the game which delayed the kick off - not sure if that effected them. I’m told the player in question is now okay after going to hospital. 

The game was a double header counting for the cup & league. Bit of work for the league to work out what to do as the next round is next week, then there is a mandatory 9s competition following that (I can see plenty of teams not turning up to that and getting fined)

The coach highlighted to me this sort of thing impacts players making commitments, as highlighted there are a few teams that struggle for numbers. Players don’t like disjointed seasons, it amplifies the usual summer issues of holidays etc. 

[DoubleD]

25 minutes ago, Spidey said:

It was Eccleston Lions (against Crosfields)

I didn’t see the game as was watching the NCL match on the other pitch 

They had a bit of a bad time yesterday as one of their players had a seizure before the game which delayed the kick off - not sure if that effected them. I’m told the player in question is now okay after going to hospital. 

The game was a double header counting for the cup & league. Bit of work for the league to work out what to do as the next round is next week, then there is a mandatory 9s competition following that (I can see plenty of teams not turning up to that and getting fined)

The coach highlighted to me this sort of thing impacts players making commitments, as highlighted there are a few teams that struggle for numbers. Players don’t like disjointed seasons, it amplifies the usual summer issues of holidays etc. 

The result should be awarded to your team, there’s no place for that in our game. I would fine them as well 

[Spidey]

29 minutes ago, DoubleD said:

The result should be awarded to your team, there’s no place for that in our game. I would fine them as well 

Having not witnessed it, I’m not going to guess what the outcome would be. I agree there’s no place in the game for it. Having seen Eccleston quite a few times before I was a bit surprised at the report on the team sheet from the ref, there are other teams around that I wouldn’t be surprised with. Just not them. Hopefully a one off

[Wilber]

On ‎7‎/‎22‎/‎2018 at 11:32 AM, Spidey said:

 then there is a mandatory 9s competition following that (I can see plenty of teams not turning up to that and getting fined)

. 

Well everyone in the room voted for it plus its a £100 fine if they don't attend.

pointless voting for things then not engaging in it, they have three games of 7.5min each way and can turn up with 9/10 players so if they cant do that then we all may as well pack up now and go play tiddlewinks

[Spidey]

4 minutes ago, Wilber said:

Well everyone in the room voted for it plus its a £100 fine if they don't attend.

pointless voting for things then not engaging in it, they have three games of 7.5min each way and can turn up with 9/10 players so if they cant do that then we all may as well pack up now and go play tiddlewinks

I’m only going off what I’ve heard from clubs. 

Was it a unanimous vote?

[BARRETT]

If Stewart Prior voted yes, I guess it was a unanimous vote 

[Wilber]

4 hours ago, BARRETT said:

If Stewart Prior voted yes, I guess it was a unanimous vote 

Spell my name right and i may tell you

[shawy13]

£100 fine for missing some pointless 9s comp  It’ll cost us £300 for a mini bus to get us there to play 45 mins of rugby. 

Wigan St Pats for example have cried off on us 5 times in past few years yet they only get fined £30 a time. Often they cancel on morning of the game or late Friday once foods been bought, pitch marked out, programmes printed etc. Add those costs to our loss of bar takings and match sponsorship and we are out of pocket to the tune of hundreds of pounds and you wanna fine us £100 if we don’t make a 4 hour round trip to some pointless mid season jolly that’s only gonna benefit the clubs hosting it. How can that be right? 

[D34n0]

Personally I think the 16-18’s sides should play on a Saturday. Allows for curtain raisers to open age side also allows for  unity between youth and open age teams at an important age. I think they’re more likely to conitinue at senior level. The drop out ratio at this age is huge. Just my thoughts.

[Defender1]

8 hours ago, D34n0 said:

Personally I think the 16-18’s sides should play on a Saturday. Allows for curtain raisers to open age side also allows for  unity between youth and open age teams at an important age. I think they’re more likely to conitinue at senior level. The drop out ratio at this age is huge. Just my thoughts.

I agree they also like to go out and getting lads up on a Sunday morning is a nightmare, can remember going round in the mini bus knocking lads up most weeks

[Spidey]

53 minutes ago, Defender1 said:

I agree they also like to go out and getting lads up on a Sunday morning is a nightmare, can remember going round in the mini bus knocking lads up most weeks

I think it’s good in theory. When I was involved with our U18s team there were plenty where worked on saturdays, as long as they can get work on a Sunday instead. 

More rugby being played on a saturday would be a good thing. One thing I notice going to Yorkshire is full clubhouses when we arrive due to junior games taking place on Saturday mornings. Wish the NW would do this also