IMO it matters that the best two teams as determined over the course of a credible Regular Round season get to contest the Grand Final in the game to decide the Champions.

Under the present system a team from outside the top two (just as occurred last season also) have gained home advantage in a Elimination Semi-Final that their regular season did not warrant.

A situation that couldn't occur during the play-off formats used from 1998 to 2008.

Under this format there is an increased possibility that the best two teams as decided over the course of the season may not meet in the final to decide the Champions and IMO that prospect diminishes the importance and integrity of the Regular Rounds and the season as a whole.

People often refer to the Challenge Cup as Mickey Mouse and this play-off format is in danger of doing the same to the SL.

What about clubcall happening every round. First place gets first pick, 2nd gets 2nd pick unless they were picked etc.

To throw a spanner in too, whoever wins each game takes over the higher seeding, so if 1st chose 8th and lose 8th become top seeds and get first pick next time. You are only as good as your last game and all that!

Top two dont get knocked out after the first round. They get to be the "little snotty kid with the glasses who gets picked last" in the next round.

For everyone else its win or bust.

You could even have a 14 team playoff!

It's all opinion, not fact. Your 1st point is subjective. The quality of the teams in each position will vary year on year.

The fact is, finishing 4th you have to win 2 games to get to old trafford finishing 5th you have to win 3. Therefore finishing 4th is better than 5th.

Then just have 1st vs 2nd grand final and scrap the playoffs.

Top 5 was my favourite format for the quality of teams we had in the competition.

Extending the playoffs only works if you have [iat least [/i6 teams who are realistically capable of (and deserving of) winning the GF. I'd love to see a situation where we had several quality teams jostling for the advantage of home playoff games and second bites etc. This would be more credible if there was little between top teams and [iany[/i advantage in the playoffs could be crucial, even a home game. This is not the case and the top 8 system we have seems to be more about levelling the playing field and keeping crap teams in the frame for longer. An attempt to artificially project our competition as something it isn't.

In a more even competition I don't see why the system should be overly biased towards 1 and 2 getting to the final, but we haven't got a more even competition.

Having said all that I'll laugh my "cock off if (as small a chance as it is) the Goons get eliminated next round. A veritable tsunami of trolls would overwhelm even the uber-moderators of Cherry&White. They'd have to switch the board off completely.

Yeah, they'd have gone from apocolyptic inducing worldwide dominance, to errr, just the 1 title on the trot.

Warrington fans will be the same when they win it this year - 'decade of domination' etc etc.

That was supposed to be the general idea as laid down by the RFL 1998 to 2008, in creating formats that favoured higher League placings and ensured a home semi-final for the clubs finishing 1 and 2 and why not as those placings were earned over the preceeding 23 to 30 rounds depending on the League format at the time.

Sure, pretend it's something more, sell a few tickets and fill a few evenings on Sky Sports but ultimately it was all geared to deliver 1 V 2 at Old Trafford for the final showdown.

Move away from that basic concept and IMO run the risk of invalidating the worth of the bread and butter weekly rounds.

Why do you want to reward a team for losing. I repeat. Because Wigan could not beat Warrington they finished 2nd. Because they could not beat Saints at home they lose home advantage in the semis. If they do not beat your "dross" Catalans they will be out of the competition. How much more advantage do you want them to have for losing?




The reward is a home game semi final. You could say what is the reward for coming 3rd? An away game against a very dangerous opponent who only finished one place higher! You either have a playoff or not.



There has to be some advantage for winning, for the teams below 2nd place otherwise the competition would have no excitment. To date the various play off rules have not produced a Champion from your "dross" And if one of them does overcome the handicap then they will have deserved it.



It doen't make it dysfunctional and the 6th place will still have to play away to the 2nd place. What it means is form is the key. Any play off competition becomes a knock out cup event and so is about form on the day and not previous performances. For this to work there has to be the chance of a lower team winning despite the inbuilt handicaps - otherwise its pointless.

As I have previously stated IMO the "Hub Cap" should have the most status and be for the team that finishes top of the table as a true Super League Champions Trophy.

To allow a team that didn't finish top to become champions is in itself a flawed idea, or indeed for a team to lose at home and still have the chance to be called Champions is a bit flaky.

The playoffs should not be for the Championship Trophy but be for what it is - an exciting revenue producing Cup competition for the Top 8 (or 6 or 5 or 4 etc) with a handicap in favour of the top finishing teams.

Fans who have been around since before 1998 need to try and let go of the importance of league placings. The league campaign is a qualifying campaign. Is it unfair if a formula 1 driver doesn't win a race having qualified from pole position?

Before season start everyone knows that to acheive the goal of a championship they will need to defeat the other teams who qualify for the playoffs in a pre-determined format.

Goal 1 is to qualify as high as possible to garner the rewards that come from that. Goal 2 and, perhaps, more important, is to hit your straps at the right time of the season.

Wigan and Huddersfield are sufficiently rewarded with a 2nd bite of the cherry and a home tie against a lower placed team. That is sufficient reward. If they want to earn the right to be champions they should be able to overcome the teams around them. If they can't find form when it matters why find alternate playoff formulae to accomadate them?

If a team ever does win it from outside the top 3 or from within the lower half of the top 8 they will be fully deserved champions having timed their run perfectly and overcome the odds that finishing in the bottom half throws up against them.

In the NFL wild card teams (lowest placed playoff qualifiers) have won the Superbowl and it's not even a topic for discussion. They appreciate the season is merely to qualify for the playoffs.

............but I would lose the silly club call

The same as was afforded all teams finishing the regular season in positions 1 and 2 from 1998 to 2008. If you can find a reference of mine to Les Catalans as dross perhaps you'll be kind enough to post a link to it.




In what way was Sunday's game at the DW Stadium a semi-final? It wasn't so I'm sure you'll now have to agree that rightfully earned reward has been denied them.

You don't need three teams for a Grand Final just the two and preferably they should be the ones that have shown themselves over the season to be most deserving. The RFL shouldn't care about teams finishing 3rd to 5th, 6th or 8th depending on the format as they haven't earnt the right. Getting the teams finishing 1st and 2nd is what they require for the integrity of the Regular season to be maintained.



If ever a dross team (7th or 8th) become Champions they will have little credibility and nor will the format that allowed a team that lost more games in the Regular Season than they won to become Champions.

At that point there should be little interest in 27 Regular Rounds as it appears they will have counted for practically nothing other than avoiding finishing in the bottom 6 of 14.



Agreed on the form part but the answer is not to deprive the higher placed team in the regular season with the loss of home advantage when facing a team that finished lower on the ladder. That's simply not equitable to me and it's only appeared since 2009. It's the biggest difference from the formats that have gone before and served the game well IMO in giving the best opportunity for the season to finish with a flourish and not some hopelessly mis-matched, tired out, damp squib.




Not with an inbalance in fixture lists. The current Leeds V Bradford Millenium Magic fixture in 2011, in theory handed Leeds a distinct advantage over both Wigan and St Helens where the Champions could be decided on less than the two points on offer.

I'm comfortable under either system (first past the post or Play-Offs) for deciding the Champions as long as it's agreed before the season starts. The fact the vast majority of RL Champions have been decided by the latter convinces me that it's the correct method to use once the format is sorted. Unfortunately only RL can come up with a progessively worse format as the years go by.

__________



You appear to be describing the position of a pre-match favourite in RL. In sport (even F1) it's all on the duration of the event.

In F1 the driver (Vettel - obviously) who collects the most points over the course of 20 individual events is declared the Champion. F1 is first past the post as determined by a League table at the end of the 'Regular Rounds' (with no Play-Offs) but carry on using the analogy if you think it's useful to the debate on which play-off format best suits RL.

Sorry you did state your dross teams were 7th & 8th and not 6th.

Not to give an incentive to the 3rd and 4th teams if they win away in the first round made it far too easy for the top 2. It now gives has the first round more edge.



I said "Because they (Wigan) could not beat Saints at home (in round1) they lose home advantage in the semis" A home semi was the reward for the winner of the first round at the DW. Wigan knew that and lost. Wigan rightfully earned a home tie in round 1 only but a home loss meant they then didn't deserve a home semi



The playoffs are a handicap knock out and should be won by the most deserving in this competition and not prior competitions otherwise why have it?

The top 4 get a handicap advantage to start with but must make the most of it otherwise they are no longer the most deserving. For the competition to have credibility every team in it has the right to win it. The odds are heavily in favour of the top 2 winning it as history shows. If a team that is awarded a 2nd bite, after losing at home, and cannot win away they do not deserve to be champions.



I think if this were to happen they will have great credibility as they would have knocked out all above them.



The "Hub Cap" is a separate competition. The top 2 & top 4 start with great advantages and opportunities.



The higher placed team only loses home advantage if they are beaten at home by a lower team which is fair. If they don't risk losing something in the first round why are they in the first round?



I agree this has never been fair and should revert to just one home and away game.




I thought the majority of RL Champions were decided by first past the post!

But I agree the system could be better and even include home and away ties,

The incentive to win for 3rd and 4th should be the week off. No need to add further gain/pain by reversing the positions earned over 27 Regular Rounds.



Yes you did, sorry I miss-read that initially. I agree everyone knows the rules beforehand (and previously I have said Wigan will just have to suck it up) but that isn't what the debate has been about. It's whether the current format is the best way of going about deciding the SL Champions.



If I understand your point, the Play-Offs aren't a seperate competition, they are the means by which we find the Champion team as an extension of the Regular Rounds having first eliminated the utter dross from this element of the same competition.



Surely the best way to find the 'most deserving' is 1 V 8, 2 V 7 etc not by pitting the top 4 head to head with enormous consequences for the loser who could find their season irreparably damaged allowing a weaker team to come through and take their place. You are manufacturing an entirely false proposition that simply wouldn't happen in the wild. First the weak are picked off before finally the two top dogs go head to head to decide the Champions.

The history of this format is relatively young and as long as the season's best become Champions it's still OK and so far P1 have done just that by seeing off P2 in the two finals so far.



Sounds more akin to a worthy Challenge Cup winner than becoming the Champions. If a team ever do so (from 8th) by having a steller final month after a mediocre opening seven, where they almost certainly lost more games than they won, I'd personally find it difficult deep down to think of them as the sports' Champion team.



Is it fair though? Wigan have lost what could be crucial home advantage in a potential future semi-final by losing to a team who finished only one place lower in 3rd and by definition still a very capable team. Had they been playing at home to Hull KR in an obviously fairer alternative format (2 V 7) would this have happened?

It's a crazy format. Lose by 8 points (could just have easily been 1 point) in Week 1 to highly competitive opponents (while others lower ranked teams are enjoying a comparative stroll in the park) and your immediately demoted to the chasing pack and no longer favourite to even make the final.




Method for deciding RL Champions:

1895/96 to 1905/06 - League - 6 Titles
1962/63 to 1963/64 - League - 2 Titles
1973/74 to 1997 - League - 25 Titles

Total - League - 33 Titles

1906/07 to 1961/62 - Play-Off - 51 Titles
1964/65 to 1972/73 - Play-Off - 9 Titles
1998 to 2010 - Play-Off - 13 Titles (and continuing)


Total - Play-Off - 73 Titles

Well, at least you two aren't arguing about sodding planes.

As long as you are all happy, thats all that matters.

when these two get going it like those old kicking duels the fullbacks used to have many years ago first one to drop the ball etc.Lewis jones and Johnny Wilson used have a kicking duel every game .its good reading wth tvoc and Juan ,and good duel

PS whats wrong with sodding planes then?

My thoughts exactly. Guys either get a room or agree to disagree. Please don't turn this into another 'who can type the most' contest There's a game a game on Friday.

I allowed Juan to have the final word on the 'Wilf Rosenberg thread' by not reading his final reply. (Still haven't) I decided to be the bigger man and walk away before someone ended up getting hurt.

Sssh though, remember it's our secret.

Whow! Thats one way of putting spin on a retreat. Your're not French by any chance are you?..... and modest too!

They are a necessary evil to get me quickly & (relatively) cheaply to far flung places.
That's all.

Hardly a retreat by allowing someone to have the (un-read) final say when the circles by that stage were ever decreasing in nature.

If I'd have read your reply I'd have probably felt the need to reply (as I'm doing here), I chose not to.

Perhaps you should try it sometime?

Yes I believe you didn't read my reply because you keep repeating that you didn't .......which means it must be so.

Your point being?

You (and everyone else) can believe whatever you like (such as 'first past the post' being the predominant way British RL has determined it's top flight Champions) but the truth of the matter is I did not read your reply to save me feeling the need to reply.

That's the honest truth - it matters not one jot to me who believes it.

Ok I will concede to you that it would be better if the 1st and 2nd finishers retain home advantage if they get to the semis and lose the week off if they lose the 1st round matches.



By the way I have taken your advice and haven't replied to your last post but I did take the courtesy to read it. Hope this didn't infringe on your self appointed bigger man status!