Was initially undecided but the more I read on the pros and cons and seeing all the arguments offered I'm in the FOR camp.

The intial 12 team 2 league structure will see people going tooth and nail to be in certain positions and avoiding others.
The spilt will in theory rid us of blow out scores and give the higher lower league teams realistic indications of were they are playing the lower end of SL, also scope for heavier lower league investment.

I don't buy the loading teams full of journeymen argument either, if you're good enough you're old enough, franchising hasn't exactly made us any better on the international front either, if anything this new structure gives more options to the young guys without having to find another job in the semi professional set up, more teams will be able to go fully pro, slowly but surely.

Reducing dead rubbers in the round of 22 games.

Middle Tier Round 2
SL Team A finish joint fourth on 9 points
SL Team B finish joint fourth on 9 points

Give fourth place to the team who finished highest in the first round of games.

If one of the tied teams is from the Championship settle fourth by another method relevant to the second stage only.

That is to operate on a one season delay. The top 8 from 2014 will enter the cup at round 5 in 2015. The top 8 from 2015 will enter at round 5 in 2016 and so on.

It has not been mentioned whether the other four top 12 teams would enter at round 4 as now or at round 3, or whether the teams in the second tier of 12 would enter at round 3 as the championship teams do or at round 4 as the SL teams do.

The only major issue I see with the new system is the resetting of points after the split for the middle tier.

Magic Super Beetle has suggested that maybe more advantageous home ties for the higher placed teams could balance this out. Or maybe the highest placed SL1 team getting to play all the championship clubs first. So giving them the advantage of racking up points against the 'easier' sides.

I still think a 9th placed team would be extremely unlucky to get relegated. I just can't forsee it, especially given they will be likely spending £1.5 - £1.8 million compared to those spending £900k tops.

Well I know SL is not very good at fairness but the only way the kiddle tier can work is by zeroing the points and just to pee you off a little more, the Champ sides will get 4 home games

*middle

Thats just it though, if they lose to 3 othe Sl sides and at least one championship one, they deserve to go down. But as you say, given that a team in 9th (think it was HullKR last year) will be a hald decent side, they're very unlikely to lose to evry team that they came above in the SL and a championship side as well.
The system is quite good as for a championship club to get promoted, they dont just have to be consistantly good in their league, they Have to beat SL opposition as well.

Don't forget, in the middle tier 4 v 5 playoff for the fourth promotion spot. To be automatically relegated you'd need to finish below not one but at least two champ teams.

The second twelve should, if they can afford operate with the same salary cap as the first twelve otherwise it's a stacked competition. Say for instance Batley get a beneafactor that enables them to buy far better players and can easily compete salary wise with Leeds why should they have to operate with a lower cap.

If the whole of the second 12 could then this would be fair enough, but as it stands the competition is going to be stacked somewhere. With the amount of money coming in now it just isn't going to work how you suggest.

What about quota rules, how will they work?

then what's the point in them being in it?

Because people would complain if there were 9 teams in "the playoffs"?

I agree 9th falls into the awkward category of not good enough for the playoffs but probably too good for relegation. In an ideal world 1 - 8 would continue to compete and 11 and 12 have a playoff with the championship clubs.

Unfortunately that would leave 9 and 10 only playing 23 games which has been deemed not enough financially.

Seems like an inherent flaw in the system. If the 9th and 10th teams are going to be comfortably good enough to stay up, then their games are likely to be blowouts, almost certainly against the 3rd and 4th placed sides.

I think every system will have flaws, no doubt, but then the reality is, if a club is looking for promotion they're going to need to be able to play teams far better than 9th, so they might as well test themselves. This isn't of benefit to the team finished 9th - but then reward those who finish in the top half of the table!

This makes interesting reading on why the Swiss ditched the system the RFL thinks will save the game www.dailyrecord.co.uk/sport/foot ... ds-1524036 The most concerning part is this Switzerland used the model for 15 years, from 1988 to 2003, but after attendances fell through the floor and sponsorship and television revenue dipped they voted for change

This makes interesting reading on why the Swiss ditched the system the RFL thinks will save the game www.dailyrecord.co.uk/sport/foot ... ds-1524036 The most concerning part is this Switzerland used the model for 15 years, from 1988 to 2003, but after attendances fell through the floor and sponsorship and television revenue dipped they voted for change

A bbc article in far more depth giving the pros and cons www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/scotland/21313899 This quote is very telling From the 10th game the pressure began [to be involved in the top eight and this pressure made the clubs really careless - signing players, changing the coach and taking financial risks. Apart from the two or three big clubs, it was not sustainable And another at the end, the difference between the teams in the 'championship' league and the teams from the second division was too big, so it wasn't interesting at all. There are also comments about how the smaller 2nd division clubs liked being in the promotion dogfight, because then they knew they would not be relegated. However at the same time they weren't interested in getting promoted due to their financial structure and lack of on pitch playing quality. Wonder how that will go down with RL fans from the likes of fax, fev and Leigh if they achieve promotion, but then find their club owners turn it down.

A bbc article in far more depth giving the pros and cons www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/scotland/21313899 This quote is very telling From the 10th game the pressure began [to be involved in the top eight and this pressure made the clubs really careless - signing players, changing the coach and taking financial risks. Apart from the two or three big clubs, it was not sustainable And another at the end, the difference between the teams in the 'championship' league and the teams from the second division was too big, so it wasn't interesting at all. There are also comments about how the smaller 2nd division clubs liked being in the promotion dogfight, because then they knew they would not be relegated. However at the same time they weren't interested in getting promoted due to their financial structure and lack of on pitch playing quality. Wonder how that will go down with RL fans from the likes of fax, fev and Leigh if they achieve promotion, but then find their club owners turn it down.

Quote ="The Chair Maker"This makes interesting reading on why the Swiss ditched the system the RFL thinks will save the game www.dailyrecord.co.uk/sport/foot ... ds-1524036 The most concerning part is this Switzerland used the model for 15 years, from 1988 to 2003, but after attendances fell through the floor and sponsorship and television revenue dipped they voted for change'" The system as so bad they used it for 15 years.

Quote ="The Chair Maker"This makes interesting reading on why the Swiss ditched the system the RFL thinks will save the game www.dailyrecord.co.uk/sport/foot ... ds-1524036 The most concerning part is this Switzerland used the model for 15 years, from 1988 to 2003, but after attendances fell through the floor and sponsorship and television revenue dipped they voted for change'" The system as so bad they used it for 15 years.

Thats what I was thinking fevfan

We had licensing for 7 and automatic one up one down for 12. Key FACTS from that is sponsors won't interested and fans stopped been interested which is what I fear will happen here.

You're comparing different sports though, football has no real comparison, it's a sport commercially and numerically beyond any other.

Q

Even if the RFL read these articles it wouldn't make any difference. The majority of fans don't want it and the players voted no to it, but they don't matter. The most worrying part of the articles for me is that the TV lost interest in the system.

SKY won't be interested in the second tier. Another problem is we have a seven week round robin of the top 8, we'll be seeing the same teams every week more or less. Then we have the play-offs and see Wigan/Warrington for the the fourth or 5th time that year.

I hated it when we used to play Leeds 5 or 6 times evey year as that big derby magic went away. Thankfully we're now back to twice a year.

It seems like the RFL have thought "well the best games are Between the top clubs (which there are) so they seem to think more games of them will improve the quality. But I think they are going to end up saturating it as they did with The play-offs. I've seen some blinding games between the bottom and top clubs when the bottom club was fighting off actual relegation. Not this down for 7 weeks to win promotion play in the same league again.

If what I've read on twitter is correct then it seems the majority of the chairman that voted this in are, for want of a better word, the lesser teams, maybe the Wakefield, Bradford, London and Castleford fans could direct their moaning at their own chairmen.