An invitational national competition is not the same as a club league, though some people seem unable to realise that. Maybe the closed shop Ashes tests should have more countries involved?
They could also kick out one of the teams, as you say it's an invite by the organisers tournament. There is nowhere to get relegated to and nowhere to get promoted from. The rugby league has a league system and for years teams went up and down between them. Now the top league whatever it's called has 12 teams, if you finish bottom you will not be relegated to the second tier. The team finishing top of the second tier will not be promoted to the top tier. I didn't think it was so hard to understand, but some will argue black is white. Or red depending which side of the river you are.
Pearson was one of the ring leaders. He also suggested cutting funding to all clubs outside of Super League and sharing it with the other 11 clubs. Luckily that day Gary Hetherington and his Wessie mafia turned on him. Made for an amusing watch. He is getting what he deserves now for years of mis-management and doing the dirty on coaches and players.
The ambition isn't removed. If smaller teams sort their economies out, invest in their grounds and academies, they will be invited to join the super league. It's not a perfect solution, but it's an attempt to shore up what the league has and to prevent clubs, like Bradford did, spending all their income on salaries in an attempt to win and then going out of business, which is bad for the sport and league structure. For the sport as a whole, its better to have a well-run Hull FC surviving and bringing academy players through, than a one season wonder with a team full of Australians and then going bust, being replaced by a tiny club that have no hope of competing long term. It's done to survive and not to follow the path seen in English RU clubs (is it four or five established clubs that have gone bust in the last few years?). It may or may not work, but not doing anything wasn't helping the league.
You're over-focusing on what was an example to show that a competition where a set number of specific teams compete against each other, isn't necessarily less competitive or less interesting just because there's no relegation or promotion.
'Part of problem' Simon Grix explains Hull FC's lack of relegation threat and delivers message to fans - Hull Live (hulldailymail.co.uk)
I enjoy both codes. International Rugby Union & the NRL. Would love to go see a state of origin game.
The concept, as you have explained fairly well, was good and this is what teams voted for. They voted for more transparency on finance via gradings. They voted for clubs to be forced to set up an academy if they have ambitions of the top flight, they voted to improve stadia etc. Or certainly the ones I know did as I have not been in an RFL meeting for 2 years or so since IMG came on board. What has happened though is IMG and the RFL's worst nightmare in that Pearson has diliberately saved as much money as he can and put out the worst ever Hull FC side on record, so bad a Championship squad in the Broncos has beaten them 3 times. This has made a mockery of the competition and other owners are rightly furious with Derek Beaumont commenting publically recently. The owner of London Broncos is worth somewhere in the region of £300,000,000. He has sunk £24m into the club and has no intention of stopping. He has relocated to Jersey and the tax he saves covers the Broncos investment on its own so he is not pulling away any time soon. However this year he has spent nothing because there was nothing to play for. They were told they were down regardless. Had they been on an even playing field he would have spent a million quid on players and potentially seen capacity crowds at Plough Lane, that was always the long term plan back in 2020 when we started the journey. The licence grading is based on the last 3 seasons. 2 of which I was there and we went through a deliberate transition to blood more academy kids, save money on the squad and move into Plough Lane for a push at Super League. Those academy kids are now in Super League beating Hull 3 times a year but at the time we had no idea that we would be punished for this 2 years later. We were actually doing the right thing in the sence of being financially sensible and trying to get the most out of one of the best academies in the game. Yet because the club was outside of SL with low crowds they lost too many grading points. They have actually been in Super League since its inception more than about 5 current clubs from the top of my head and as of a few years ago the viewing figures for Super League on a Friday night within the M25 was the highest in the Country far higher than the north so to just rule out London is ridiculous. I've plenty I could say about the Broncos, people that are there now and things that are fundamentally wrong with the club, but the grading system was not executed properly and was done at the benefit of clubs like Hull and people like Pearson. A lot within the game are starting to realise this now and there is unrest amongst club owners, and rightly so.
Ye, me too. But I've noticed RU games are getting more tedious to watch (not all games obviously), especially live. The scrum penalties and the stops and starts for safety and refereeing debates are there for a reason, but kill the atmosphere. Most of the decent technical action in the scrum you can't see anyway. My prediction is that the RFU will do what they've been doing for 25 years and subtly change RU rules to make it more like league and thus, more watchable. If the legal actions are won by former players over the next decade, there's a high chance that union scrums will have to become none/less contested anyway and there's already been so many rule changes to get the ball quicker out of rucks and mauls (just called different names from League rules). This will most likely be the final nail for league in England over the next few decades.
I have always agreed with the old adage that a good game of union is better than a good game of league but a bad game of league is better than a bad game of union. Union internationals on the whole are very enjoyable to watch.
That is true and the recent later stages of the RWC were testament to that. But it is getting more technical and strategic and with fewer playing and so fewer having less understanding of the rules ( I played up to mid-twenties and have no idea of some of the rules now), it's getting less enjoyable to watch, especially at club level. I enjoy watching it more on TV where get better viewing angles of the scrum etc. I went to Harlequins two seasons ago and the atmosphere was abysmal.
You can’t compare club sports and international sport. A club can sign anyone they like and can afford from anywhere in the world. See Chelsea as an example. If they then **** that up and finish bottom of the league they’re in they deserve to be relegated not told that it’s all ok because they’re so great and popular. International football is not professional as such but representational. England cannot play anyone they want, only those who qualify for us. If the country happen to be **** (or Scotland) then it’s not a case that they deserve to be relegated. It’s dependent entirely on the quality of the pre-defined group of players. Add to that the fact that internationally there’s nowhere to be relegated to, seeing as we lack a second string planet full of teams not quite as good as the Earthly ones. Oh and don’t mention the Nations league or the Cricket test championship gubbins. They’re both ****e, roundly ignored and prove the point that a league system doesn’t work in international sport.
You know far more than me on the politics and the technical aspect of the deal. I just see it as something had to be done to protect the sport and do something radical to save a failing business model. In that regard, i accept that something was done to try and change it and its worth seeing if it works. As to whether the clubs are treating the new rules/structure in the manner that they were meant, I defer to you on this matter.
Union seems to have a completion with league to see who can introduce the most rule changes each year. My grandson spent 3 seasons playing junior rugby before he moved away and there were numerous changes. A bloke I know who played for the first team and has coached at both union and league says every season when he gos to watch a game has to ask why something was pulled up or allowed to happen when previously they weren’t.
As was said at the time by many owners there was no need to scrap promotion and relegation. The chances of a Batley or Swinton getting promoted was out of the question. Of the contenders (Bradford, Toulouse, York, Featherstone, London etc) all had decent grounds except Fev. Conditions could be placed that if you didn't mean the stadium criteria you need to share elsewhere. All of those clubs have decent crowds, ladies teams, scholarship teams etc. Wakefield have known since last year they are in super League next season and have signed a squad for next year accordingly. They could have saved money this year and just coasted to mid table but thankfully they had more pride than certain other clubs who decided to embarrass themselves and their fans by simply having a year off. Hull KR are an example of how to run a club properly right now. Unfortunately the black and whites are polar opposites and worlds apart from their nearest and dearest.
