League Restructure Thread (Merged Threads)

[The Rocket]

4 minutes ago, Toby Chopra said:

It's just that we can't continue to shower cash right down to the bottom of the league when our income's been cut by a third. Or give part time championship clubs half a million a year for that matter. 

Over here we have NRL, the State Cups and then the regional or `Group` competitions, usually made of about 6,8 to 12 teams, the Group Leagues are completely self-funded, they do not receive one cent from the NSWRL or NRL. There is a prize for winning the comp from the NSWRL, but that`s it and it ain`t much and sometimes a team mightn`t win the comp for twenty years so you couldn`t rely on it.

Some of the teams in our competition are based out of small towns of about 6000 residents, some even less, but through sponsorship and ticket sales field competitive sides every year. One thing that is obvious though a lot of ex-players who now are either tradesman or business men in the area are sponsors of the club, I think my Local Team Taree Bulls have about 20 such sponsors who chip in and keep the club going year after year.

I would be interested to know why your League 1 competition couldn`t be the same.

BTW I spoke to our local group president a while back and told him that roughly the same level competition in England got the equivalent of about $150k (AUS) a year central funding and he was dumbfounded.

 

[Big Picture]

1 hour ago, The Rocket said:

Over here we have NRL, the State Cups and then the regional or `Group` competitions, usually made of about 6,8 to 12 teams, the Group Leagues are completely self-funded, they do not receive one cent from the NSWRL or NRL. There is a prize for winning the comp from the NSWRL, but that`s it and it ain`t much and sometimes a team mightn`t win the comp for twenty years so you couldn`t rely on it.

Some of the teams in our competition are based out of small towns of about 6000 residents, some even less, but through sponsorship and ticket sales field competitive sides every year. One thing that is obvious though a lot of ex-players who now are either tradesman or business men in the area are sponsors of the club, I think my Local Team Taree Bulls have about 20 such sponsors who chip in and keep the club going year after year.

I would be interested to know why your League 1 competition couldn`t be the same.

BTW I spoke to our local group president a while back and told him that roughly the same level competition in England got the equivalent of about $150k (AUS) a year central funding and he was dumbfounded.

 

What sort of budgets do the clubs in those regional leagues have by comparison to that figure?

[Dallas Mead]

5 hours ago, Scubby said:

I just don't agree. The game should be pretty ruthless at the moment. If the sport thinks there is potential in Newcastle, Coventry, Wales, Bradford and London then it should give them time and resources to be fast tracked to the elite competition within 3-5 years. It shouldn't create a convoluted system to try and get them fighting through the brambles because it will be fun and inclusive.

If you want to look at how expansion and wealth is created then look more towards the AFL model than the League Express opinion columns.

The equivalent AFL model in RL would be saying Coventry, Newcastle, London, Toulouse (or whoever) will be coming into the competition (and staying in) in 3 years time. Here is £5m each from central funding to build your infrastructure and you will have salary cap exemptions/weightings for the next 10 years (plus marketing help) to assist you to be competitive and recruit the best players you can.

The AFL would have paid Toulouse and Toronto to be part of the competition - not kneecapped them to appease some corner shop traditionalists. That is why the AFL just signed a $2.5b TV deal even in the middle of Covid and the game in the UK has 20 months of the Sky egg timer left.  

The game here would think such a move preposterous and that is why we are skint and declining. 

Totally agree with every single word of this ^^^

[The Future is League]

19 hours ago, Eddie said:

I imagine if TO go up the SL clubs (sorry independent SL board) will think of a reason not to give them any funding, like they did Toronto and (in part) Leigh. It’s pathetic really, sometimes I find it hard to rationalise why I still watch and love super league. 

If Toulouse win the Championship grand final and are denied a place in Super League by some obscure rule that they have made up on the hoof by the Independent SL board (cough cough) or are denied full funding that will drive even more fans away from the game. Crowds are dropping and some people believe they would return this season but they won't. The independent SL board (LOL) seem determined to make Super League a M.62 Corridor game and then watch most of the remaining sponsors drop off or offer a reduced rate to clubs and it will be a case of the clubs being told take it or leave it.

The game is heading into the abyss unless Super League clubs look outside the box at the bigger picture. A game played mainly along the M.62 corridor in this country has little appeal to TV companies and sponsors. Wake up Super League clubs and smell the coffee.

[Blind side johnny]

9 hours ago, Scubby said:

No I don't see anything in it. It is fantasy land. If RL was like football played in huge towns and cities all across the UK for decades then something like this could have basis for discussion.

Sky have given the whole game £50m over 2 years for SL and said you are on notice. The Championship and League has secured £0 in TV money. Zilch, nothing, not a penny. The next offer could be £15m per season take it or leave it or even £10m.

Does anyone really believe the conversation to get that £25m per season to £75m per season in the next 5-10 years involves Batley, Swinton, Whitehaven, Keighley, Rochdale, Dewsbury etc. in any way shape or form?

You seem to be advocating cutting off your feet in order to stand taller.

[Scubby]

16 minutes ago, Blind side johnny said:

You seem to be advocating cutting off your feet in order to stand taller.

Not at all. More like trying to stay afloat while wearing lead boots.

There is no way you can effectively fund the semi professional game without creating as much money as you can from your premier product.

If you can earn £50m you can push 10-15% of that into the semi pro and community game. If you are ####ing about pretending you will get £15m and the top clubs will keep it all in order to survive. League 1 clubs will get 0.

[Liverpool Rover]

If Toulouse are in Super League then there would be double the amount of games in France to sell to French broadcasters and if Ottawa takes off then there is another chance to gain a foothold in North America.

What will probably happen is that the SL Clubs will say that they have no commercial value and make it known that they don’t want them. They are probably praying for the day that Catalans finish in a relegation place so they can get shut of them and then will continue to wonder why TV or sponsors aren’t interested in them.

[The Future is League]

6 minutes ago, Liverpool Rover said:

If Toulouse are in Super League then there would be double the amount of games in France to sell to French broadcasters and if Ottawa takes off then there is another chance to gain a foothold in North America.

What will probably happen is that the SL Clubs will say that they have no commercial value and make it known that they don’t want them. They are probably praying for the day that Catalans finish in a relegation place so they can get shut of them and then will continue to wonder why TV or sponsors aren’t interested in them.

And crowds continue to drop

[GUBRATS]

We're all doomed , doomed I tell you ,DOOMED 

[The Rocket]

7 hours ago, Big Picture said:

What sort of budgets do the clubs in those regional leagues have by comparison to that figure?

Thank you and it`s a bloody good question and I honestly don`t know the answer but will endeavour to find out.

Just quickly the population of the other teams in our Group comp, which I might add has been running for nearly eighty years ; Port Macquarie 40k+ (two teams), Wauchope 6k, Wingham 5k, Old Bar 5k, Forster Tuncurry 18k, Taree 25k, so they`re not all small towns by far, but apart from Port which seems to be a regularly at the top of the table the other teams ebb and flow in their competitiveness, this year Old Bar and Wingham are having really good years and Taree has only won one game.

But I`ll try to find out a little more about that finances question and get back to you, it would be really interesting to know even just for interests sake and definitely just to compare with the English set-up, not for some cheap point-scoring thing but just out of interest. Of course I know that there would be a whole host of other factors in play in any comparisons but we can leave that discussion for another day.

 

[The Rocket]

6 hours ago, Dallas Mead said:

Totally agree with every single word of this ^^^

Yes Scubby sums it up in a nut shell. " the game needs to be ruthless at the moment..".

[Barley Mow]

10 hours ago, The Rocket said:

Over here we have NRL, the State Cups and then the regional or `Group` competitions...

...I spoke to our local group president a while back and told him that roughly the same level competition in England got the equivalent of about $150k (AUS) a year central funding and he was dumbfounded.

 

One key difference though is that although your group comps are the third tier, they each cover a relatively small geographic area (in Australian terms). That means over the whole of NSW and Qld there will be hundreds/thousands of clubs competing in the third tier competitions.

In the UK the third tier covers the whole country (and has included French and Canadian clubs too). There are currently 10 teams at this level to be funded from central funds - this makes it a lot easier to fund.

[DOGFATHER]

12 hours ago, Scubby said:

Exactly, technically Barrow are in 25th position at the moment, flying high and are getting crowds comparable with Salford and Leigh atm never mind Batley, Sheffield and Dewsbury.

Can I take it your view of a successful club is purely based upon attendance figures then? 

To my mind, it is thinking like this, that is truly holding the game back, and has done for years.

Maybe, just maybe, it is thinking like this, why the sport can only get sponsorship in the form of a free pizza at the end of the match, or pictures of players on a few wagons!

What the game has effectively done since SL is:-

"Forget what happens on the field, it doesn't matter whether as a club you have fielded a team that has won more matches than the teams below you. You have 500 less fans turning up most week's, than a team playing 2 divisions below you. Or club X has a money man willing to throw tuppence more a season in than your chairman, so they are more worthy of a place in the top division than you. Despite the fact they have spent several times what you have, and they've not managed to win as many games". 

It is thinking like this, that has made our sport what it is. A urine pot, amateurishly run, laughing stock with absolutely no credibility left.

Many seem to have truly lost sight of what sport is all about, and become completely obsessed with the incidentals, rather than what sport is.

I thought RL was supposed to be a game, a sport, a fun past time, an entertainment, a competition to see which team is best. The best, being the team that wins more times than the others.

It should not be popularity contest, a willy measuring competition showing which chairman can/is willing to put 50 pence more in to buy players than someone else.

Could you imagine the 100m at the Olympics decided in the same way? 

Well done son, you came 7th out of 8 competitors, but we reckon you had more fans in the stadium than the 6 guys that finished before you, and you had £50 more in the bank, so we have awarded you the gold medal!

The game has done this time, and time again since the inception of SL, and then everyone is stood around wondering why national and international sponsors, and indeed overseas markets are not clamouring to get involved. 

Sadly, a balance sheet/crowd comparison competition, has shown it doesn't have the appeal that watching a game does.

Can you imagine trying to sell sponsorship or indeed TV rights for a sport, where success is defined by what happens off the field, more than on it?

If you can, you will realise why the game is, where it is!

[Wellsy4HullFC]

4 hours ago, DOGFATHER said:

Can I take it your view of a successful club is purely based upon attendance figures then? 

To my mind, it is thinking like this, that is truly holding the game back, and has done for years.

Maybe, just maybe, it is thinking like this, why the sport can only get sponsorship in the form of a free pizza at the end of the match, or pictures of players on a few wagons!

What the game has effectively done since SL is:-

"Forget what happens on the field, it doesn't matter whether as a club you have fielded a team that has won more matches than the teams below you. You have 500 less fans turning up most week's, than a team playing 2 divisions below you. Or club X has a money man willing to throw tuppence more a season in than your chairman, so they are more worthy of a place in the top division than you. Despite the fact they have spent several times what you have, and they've not managed to win as many games". 

It is thinking like this, that has made our sport what it is. A urine pot, amateurishly run, laughing stock with absolutely no credibility left.

Many seem to have truly lost sight of what sport is all about, and become completely obsessed with the incidentals, rather than what sport is.

I thought RL was supposed to be a game, a sport, a fun past time, an entertainment, a competition to see which team is best. The best, being the team that wins more times than the others.

It should not be popularity contest, a willy measuring competition showing which chairman can/is willing to put 50 pence more in to buy players than someone else.

Could you imagine the 100m at the Olympics decided in the same way? 

Well done son, you came 7th out of 8 competitors, but we reckon you had more fans in the stadium than the 6 guys that finished before you, and you had £50 more in the bank, so we have awarded you the gold medal!

The game has done this time, and time again since the inception of SL, and then everyone is stood around wondering why national and international sponsors, and indeed overseas markets are not clamouring to get involved. 

Sadly, a balance sheet/crowd comparison competition, has shown it doesn't have the appeal that watching a game does.

Can you imagine trying to sell sponsorship or indeed TV rights for a sport, where success is defined by what happens off the field, more than on it?

If you can, you will realise why the game is, where it is!

This is just a huge rant about how you seemingly don't like professionalism.

[Toby Chopra]

6 hours ago, DOGFATHER said:

Can I take it your view of a successful club is purely based upon attendance figures then? 

To my mind, it is thinking like this, that is truly holding the game back, and has done for years.

Maybe, just maybe, it is thinking like this, why the sport can only get sponsorship in the form of a free pizza at the end of the match, or pictures of players on a few wagons!

What the game has effectively done since SL is:-

"Forget what happens on the field, it doesn't matter whether as a club you have fielded a team that has won more matches than the teams below you. You have 500 less fans turning up most week's, than a team playing 2 divisions below you. Or club X has a money man willing to throw tuppence more a season in than your chairman, so they are more worthy of a place in the top division than you. Despite the fact they have spent several times what you have, and they've not managed to win as many games". 

It is thinking like this, that has made our sport what it is. A urine pot, amateurishly run, laughing stock with absolutely no credibility left.

Many seem to have truly lost sight of what sport is all about, and become completely obsessed with the incidentals, rather than what sport is.

I thought RL was supposed to be a game, a sport, a fun past time, an entertainment, a competition to see which team is best. The best, being the team that wins more times than the others.

It should not be popularity contest, a willy measuring competition showing which chairman can/is willing to put 50 pence more in to buy players than someone else.

Could you imagine the 100m at the Olympics decided in the same way? 

Well done son, you came 7th out of 8 competitors, but we reckon you had more fans in the stadium than the 6 guys that finished before you, and you had £50 more in the bank, so we have awarded you the gold medal!

The game has done this time, and time again since the inception of SL, and then everyone is stood around wondering why national and international sponsors, and indeed overseas markets are not clamouring to get involved. 

Sadly, a balance sheet/crowd comparison competition, has shown it doesn't have the appeal that watching a game does.

Can you imagine trying to sell sponsorship or indeed TV rights for a sport, where success is defined by what happens off the field, more than on it?

If you can, you will realise why the game is, where it is!

The straw-iest of straw men

[gingerjon]

19 minutes ago, Johnoco said:

The Premier League is all about sport I suppose?

It’s the most popular sporting league in the country ergo it must offer the best entertainment.

There is obviously no other reason for its popularity. None.

[Chronicler of Chiswick]

11 hours ago, GUBRATS said:

We're all doomed , doomed I tell you ,DOOMED 

And have been since September 1895.

[Colin James]

There's a balance to be struck between ruthlessness and looking after the whole sport. Three or four years ago a club like York would have been up there with those clubs being named as worth sacrificing because they were a financial basket case close to not completing the season. Now they have turned it around and are doing well and being heralded as a SL club in waiting on the back of a few good years.

We can't not draw lines and make decisions but we do need to be aware that the current status is only a snapshot of the game. You can pick any point in history to swing an axe and there will be clubs lucky/unlucky to be on either side because their peak/trough happens to coincide with the axe swinging. 

Seems quite simple to me that a SL with promotion and relegation in place but also with strict minimum standards is the way to go. Give clubs a timeframe to meet the standards and then accept no excuses if they aren't met. 12 teams playing home and away with no Magic, simple play off series with League Leaders into the final to meet winner of (2v5) v (3v4). Clubs need to sell their tickets. If 11 home games isn't enough they need to find other revenue streams. A shortened format increases the importance of individual games so they should be easier to sell. The space created can be used for internationals.

We don't need to reinvent the wheel. Consistency allows clubs to plan, whatever format is eventually settled on, it has to be long term. We can't keep restructuring like this a few weeks before the end of the season. It's amateurish.

[ATLANTISMAN]

5 minutes ago, Colin James said:

There's a balance to be struck between ruthlessness and looking after the whole sport. Three or four years ago a club like York would have been up there with those clubs being named as worth sacrificing because they were a financial basket case close to not completing the season. Now they have turned it around and are doing well and being heralded as a SL club in waiting on the back of a few good years.

We can't not draw lines and make decisions but we do need to be aware that the current status is only a snapshot of the game. You can pick any point in history to swing an axe and there will be clubs lucky/unlucky to be on either side because their peak/trough happens to coincide with the axe swinging. 

Seems quite simple to me that a SL with promotion and relegation in place but also with strict minimum standards is the way to go. Give clubs a timeframe to meet the standards and then accept no excuses if they aren't met. 12 teams playing home and away with no Magic, simple play off series with League Leaders into the final to meet winner of (2v5) v (3v4). Clubs need to sell their tickets. If 11 home games isn't enough they need to find other revenue streams. A shortened format increases the importance of individual games so they should be easier to sell. The space created can be used for internationals.

We don't need to reinvent the wheel. Consistency allows clubs to plan, whatever format is eventually settled on, it has to be long term. We can't keep restructuring like this a few weeks before the end of the season. It's amateurish.

Totally agree Colin 100% the key though is making sure those MINIMUM STANDARDS RULES are adhered to, right now I can think of 5/6 Championship clubs and 1 League 1 club whose standards far exceed at least 2 SL clubs.

 

Paul

[DOGFATHER]

2 hours ago, Wellsy4HullFC said:

This is just a huge rant about how you seemingly don't like professionalism.

Not in the slightest. I just believe that the best team is the one that wins more games than another, that is all. 

If the Premier League was administered in the same way as Rugby League over the years. Newcastle would not have spent any time outside of the top flight because they are well supported, have a nice big ground, a chairmen willing to spend more than lots of other clubs, and located away from lots of other clubs. Bournemouth, Huddersfield and Stoke for example, would never have been allowed in, and the integrity of the sport would have been diminished because of it. 

[Scubby]

4 minutes ago, DOGFATHER said:

Not in the slightest. I just believe that the best team is the one that wins more games than another, that is all. 

If the Premier League was administered in the same way as Rugby League over the years. Newcastle would not have spent any time outside of the top flight because they are well supported, have a nice big ground, a chairmen willing to spend more than lots of other clubs, and located away from lots of other clubs. Bournemouth, Huddersfield and Stoke for example, would never have been allowed in, and the integrity of the sport would have been diminished because of it. 

Every Premier League club that gets relegated gets full parachute payments for 2 years. At the moment we are so skint we can't even afford to give a full central distribution to the 12th SL member. This distribution is decreasing year on year.

[Liverpool Rover]

1 hour ago, DOGFATHER said:

Not in the slightest. I just believe that the best team is the one that wins more games than another, that is all. 

If the Premier League was administered in the same way as Rugby League over the years. Newcastle would not have spent any time outside of the top flight because they are well supported, have a nice big ground, a chairmen willing to spend more than lots of other clubs, and located away from lots of other clubs. Bournemouth, Huddersfield and Stoke for example, would never have been allowed in, and the integrity of the sport would have been diminished because of it. 

But the best teams belong to the clubs who can generate the most money off field to attract the best players, coaching staff, medical staff etc. When a sport is as big as football with all the resources it has they can get away with having P&R. A sport struggling to attract money like RL isn’t in a position to be able get away with certain clubs being relegated.

[DOGFATHER]

11 hours ago, ShropshireBull said:

But this hasnt happened.  Clubs have been doped with cash and have very little to show for it in many cases. 

Crowds are obviously a sign of stronger and healthier clubs in general and revenue.  Plus bigger clubs are more attractive to sponsors. 

The most successful clubs are the ones who can generate the most revenue so the game may be played on grass but it is won on the spreadsheets.

I dont want it but I suspect a franchise system would be far more attractive to tv and sponsors if we went.

Toulouse Cat Wigan Saints Leeds Bradford London Wire Newcastle York Hull, KR and let the broadcasters pick the last 2.

 

This hasn't happened? It seems you may have selective memory.

Just using one of this week's poster club's as an example, Barrow, who won the Championship in 2009, they were not promoted because we had franchising. There are many others to choose from.

Doped up with cash? Which club's outside of SL have had more money thrown at them, than those in it? 

The fatal floor in your logic is, history has proven that the game has consistently chosen what it has perceived to be the strongest club's in terms of revenue, fan base etc. at the detriment to the most important factor of all, winning on the pitch. The evidence in terms of big sponsorship within the game, fan base and most importantly the TV deal have all decreased massively, because the integrity has been lost.

Your solution to this loss of integrity, is to diminish it even further? By artificially promoting club's to the top tier because you like them this week, or because you believe they have unproven potential. 

Potentially, London and Sheffield should have 20k fans going every week. The reality is very different though.

Looking at the facts, Newcastle, despite spending several times more than the 2 promoted club's, Whitehaven and Oldham, were not good enough where it matters, to earn it by rights, and are hardly ripping the championship up, yet somehow they would in SL?

York has had one good season, two years ago,  but have only won 6 out of the last 20 games, again despite spending much more than most of the club's they are competing against. Yet, somehow they would be great in SL and have investors rushing to part with cash? 

Bradford, really? A club that should have a photo in the OED next to the word mismanagement, and are somehow allowed to play games on a pitch not wide enough to meet minimum regulations. 

 

[Wellsy4HullFC]

1 hour ago, DOGFATHER said:

This hasn't happened? It seems you may have selective memory.

Just using one of this week's poster club's as an example, Barrow, who won the Championship in 2009, they were not promoted because we had franchising. There are many others to choose from.

Your example is flawed because it was already decided there would be no P&R. No one was denied because of a perceived bigger club being relegated. There was no denying of promotion because there was no promotion to be denied.

Had there been guaranteed P&R those years, for all we know other teams would have invested more in their squads and a different result materialised.

Can you give one example of a club being denied promotion or prevented from relegation in the last 20 years in s season that had P&R?

[GUBRATS]

2 hours ago, Liverpool Rover said:

But the best teams belong to the clubs who can generate the most money off field to attract the best players, coaching staff, medical staff etc. When a sport is as big as football with all the resources it has they can get away with having P&R. A sport struggling to attract money like RL isn’t in a position to be able get away with certain clubs being relegated.

Certain clubs like the ones who can generate the most money and attract the best players , coaches , medical staff etc ? , Those clubs ? , The ones with the best teams ?