If we want a better International Team

[cpwigan]

http://www.rleague.com/db/article.php?id=37955

A chink of light in Hull

[warrior1973]

When Superleague formed, i know its sounds harsh but certain teams should have merged. Before people start to bang on about tradition...tradition would still be there. Imagine a team in East Manchester consisting of Oldham Rochdale and Salford. These teams wouldnt fold as they'd act as a be a feeder club still playing in a comp one below Superleague. Between these 3 clubs they have at maximum 5 thousand supporters between them. Those supporters wouldnt walk away from the sport and hate rugby league, they'd still watch their respected team but just maybe they'll watch their new Superleague club aswell. As is Superleague now, there would be no promotion or relagation, just teams that could market the game correctly and get bigger crowds which would bring the intensity and anticipation on match days greater.

[wiganwarriordave]

i think it all boils down to SL's many caps and rules.... Youngsters want to play football and RU because it's so much highly paid. The SL salary cap should be raised, the cap on the amount of overseas players should be lowered, and homegrown talent should be exempt from the cap... Otherwise, good british talent, either a) won't come trhough to SL/international standard or b) they come through, but then sell out to RU.......... And i can't say i blame em, i'd take a 200% payrise for less work!

As long as SL is full of aussies, as long as good talent either doesnt choose to play RL or sells out to RU, it's the international team and the standard of british RL that suffers on the whole.

[cpwigan]

I think you are right Dave I.E we do not get enough youngsters and talented athletic youngsters playing the game BUT I think the get rid of foreign players call that many will make is too simplistic. We actually got in this miss because we had an international transfer ban and we ended up with lots of sub standard British players who until the 1982 Kangaroos arrived thought they were actually very good and many fans agreed they were.

The problem is self interest has over rode a call that has gone up for the last 30 years to make changes, to do something. Some change has crept through but much has been stifled by self interest from individual clubs and their chairmen/owners. Ask yourself this if Aus can only manage a competition of virtually the same size what makes British RL think it can justify such a big competition? It cannot When a club is created because we must expand geographically what do they do, pour in more and more money to sign sub standard overseas players and those clubs even get exemption rules to sign more and more and let more money leak from the sport. When SL began it never addressed player supply, it never set aside a real % of the money the sport got to develop players. Why not, because EVERY club scrapped for their bitter lives for a bigger slice of the financial cake. The bigger picture never got a look in.

[gpartin]

i think it all boils down to SL's many caps and rules.... Youngsters want to play football and RU because it's so much highly paid.

I agree with a lot of your post but this bit is rubbish imo. For a start very few kids get into playing sport thinking they're going to be professional, they'll play what their mates are playing, a sport that's already popular in the area they live in or taught in the schools. Football is popular all over because anyone who can walk can kick a ball long before they can catch, the object of the game is easy for anyone to understand and the coverage of the game down to conference level is disproportionate to the number of people who actually go and watch the matches, more people have heard of Dagenham and Redbridge than Castleford Tigers for example.

Now rugby Union has certain similarities to football in that there are certain players like Jonny Wilkinson and Gavin Henson who's names are recognisable to people who don't even follow the sport and that it gets coverage on the national news. Kids who already follow the sport will see these players as heroes and some kids might even start playing after being inspired to do so by these types of players but the money these players earn won't even come into it since to make it as a professional in any sport you need to start young and enjoy it, the slight chance of a big paycheque 10 years down the line won't motivate kids to do anything they don't enjoy.

Adults are far more motivated by money than kids are and the threat of rugby union stealing all our stars has always been talked about but has never materialised, there's just been the odd one or two every now and then. Since union is played in a lot of schools the chances are there are more Rugby League pro's who have played union at some stage than the other way round (at my school alone Matty Blaymire, Jodie Broughton and Michael Wainwright all played union and were bloody good at it too.)

[Panchitta Marra]

http://www.nrl.com/news/news/newsarticl ... fault.aspx
Kangaroos greats Laurie Daley and Greg Alexander say England needs to go back to the drawing board if it is going to compete with Australia and New Zealand in the Four Nations.
Daley suggested more England stars may need to follow in the footsteps of Sam Burgess and Gareth Ellis and make a move to the NRL in order to match the standard of the Australians and the Kiwis.

[platt-warrior]

What you're saying Mick is bring over more quality Aussie
coaches this is the answer imo.

[cpwigan]

There is an argument that you need coaches who will give youngsters the opportunity. The counter argument (wrongly IMO) that a Noble would give is duty of care etc etc.

The raison de'tre behind franchising in the main was remove the pressure of relegation and clubs / coaches can and WILL give youngsters opportunities. You can google the advent of franchising and to a man, every club / owner said the same. THE REALITY is you bullshitted us boys just to get rid of promotion / relegation (SELF INTEREST)

Self Interest kills RL in this country

There is actually an argument that reducing the overseas quota has weakened SL. Even journeymen from Aus / NZ are better than what we have. The reason they are better is because most of British RL never bothered with developing young players. The be all and end all was what % of the SKY money will I / My club get.

Players improve their playing standards the higher the intensity of the playing competition they play in week in week out. At the moment SL / British RL is more interested in how they can fritter away the SKY money than the big picture.

RADICALLY; We can only have an 8 team SL competition. Financially that may result in less income BUT the alternatives such as less games, better marketing, higher prices, better playing standards, those 8 clubs taking slightly more money might offset that. An Origin Style Series could be introduced. Clubs would gain a % increase on the salary cap for every quota space they did not fill.

You then have two lower divisions of 12 each or possibly 14 each. The second tier would have clubs with reasonable finances and the opportunity to attract reasonable crowds. Clubs like Halifax, Leigh and Barrow would benefit enormously financially from playing clubs like Wakefield and Castleford, Salford and Widnes etc. The bottom 3rd tier would be clubs operating just above professional standard with little or no money who could be run sensibly rather than suicidally. Tiers 2 and 3 would have no overseas players.

[BriH]

There is something me and my wife commented on during this 4 Nations comp.
NZ and Auss are mainly NRL. England (oh how I wish it was Great Britain) have three?

[Kittwazzer]

Chris Irvine tweeted earlier that the Salary Cap is now detrimental to our game. He said we now have a more level playing field but the overall standard in SL has dropped.

I think he makes a valid point. Every year now, we get the comment 'On the day, any team can beat any other'.

That might make for a more exciting domestic season but let's be honest, the top team should not lose to the bottom one. League placings should mean more than that!