Who are Leeds playing in Newcastle?

Is it Wigan again?

Or have the club petitioned the RFL for whipping boy SL rabble opposition instead, now that regular season results are meaningful?

What I would like to see is the RFL to promote the weekend, starting with a live draw, on TV or radio, for the fixtures. I'm sure even the inept RFL would be able to secure a slot on Rugby AM

What will happen though is Leeds will get Wigan. Saints V Warrington, Cas vs Wakey, Hull vs Hull...and I'm too bored to work out the other fixtures such is my lack of enthusiasm for Super League!

Oh...and I won't be going.

All the top SL teams see your team as that now billy

Probably but would be nice for them to mix it up.
Leeds v Saints and Wigan v Wire are games I don't think have ever taken place at this event. Also the constant Hull Derby should be changed.

I'd go something along the lines of
Day 1 Leeds v Saints, Hull v Hudds, Wakey v Widnes
Day 2 Wigan v Wire, Cas v HKR, Salford v Catalans

I will be going

Perfect time to see some friends up there

We have got Wigan as the last game on day one.

The climax is on Sunday when.... Cas play Wakey!

We could face Wigan six times next season.

2 x regular season
1 x Split
1 x Magic
1 x PO
1 x CC

place will be empty by 4pm sunday. very bad fixtures to keep the crowds in

You've posted this on twitter too, yet your maths is still wrong. That's a maximum of 6, and that would have been the same whoever we played.

I didn't post it, but I copied it from said person.

Fair enough, but the fact remains that this is not a new issue. We could have been 'drawn' against anyone and potentially play them 6 times. Whoever has posted it seems to have gone on a crusade about it on Twitter, as if it wasn't known beforehand. FWIW I don't like it either. If we must have magic weekend i'd rather make it a 9s weekend.

Think we could have played a team 6 times in any of the previous seasons with the magic game plus playoff , CC and GF.

I'm going up to the Magic Weekend just for the mass wedding - hope I get a nice looking one!

I'll never understand how it's fair that Leeds play Wigan while Castleford play Wakefield. I'm sure Wigan, Wire and Saints fans feel the same as well. This format needs to stop. Or at least not have 2 points on the line.

Took me about 5 minutes to come up with a set of fixtures, none of which have been played at MW weekend before

Leeds v Castleford
Catalans v Huddersfield
Wigan v Warrington
Saints v Hull FC
Salford v Wakefield
Hull KR v Widnes

aye, 3 years ago wire got widnes and with all respect to widnes it was their first season back up and they got dicked on. 2 free points for wire, whilst we had to play a still competing bradford. very disappointed with the fixtures.
as has been stated, it should be a "cup" draw. completely random, but hey ho. still be an awesome weekend out on the toon

Surely the magic weekend should have been after the split, and the games count as the extra home/away game in that phase.

I would have everyone plays everyone home and away up to the split, then 1 vs 8, 2 vs 7, 3 vs 6, 4 vs 5 on for the top half, and similar in the other parts. That way all teams get the same number of home and away games. And its more fair as it rewards teams higher up.

The main downside is that magic would either just have to be the top 8, or there'd have to be all the top 2 mini-leagues to be totally fair.

We used to get Bradford many years ago ,but they had to change that one on account of Mick Gledhill throwing wobblers

If you're going to make regular season fixtures meaningful, these extra ones have to go.

Hypothetically, if we lost to Wigan and Cas beat Wakey, what happens if they beat us into the top 8 by one point? OK, I know what happens, but that wouldn't seem the fairest thing.

I doubt it will come to that, but there does seem to be a bit of an issue with this, and as the league gets more competitive (look how close the top 6 were last year) people might start to ask questions.

I've said it before, get rid of the magic weekend & only play one round of fixtures over the Easter Weekend.

Yup, I'd go with that.

IMO Magic doesn't introduce new fans to the game. It doesn't generate coverage in the mainstream media. So by those criteria, it's failing as an event.

Get rid, use the free weekend for either a round of games moved from Easter or an England squad get-together and maybe a game against the Rest of Europe.

Didn't we lose to Wakefield last year? The way we finished the season we'd have to play Dewsbury U12's to be guaranteed 2 points.