They do. They need to be there. They are competing with clubs with relatively huge sponsorship deals, relatively huge corporate markets, attendances much bigger than 10, who own their stadiums and have other revenue streams.

Selling a few extra pies and pints isn’t going to get Fev in to a position where their 4k average means they can compete with Leeds £13m turnover.

I have to be honest. If 6k seats impresses you as ‘good facilities’ for a 21st century sports stadium in a top level fully pro league, you are being particularly unambitious.

Yes. I can't entirely rule out that it was probably a human being that took the call, though. As I can't rule out that some cretin out there somewhere might actually believe that I literally spoke to an inanimate stadium, and that it answered.

I really do believe you are being far too negative for your own good. You should be encouraging teams to continue to grow, develop and improve. Rather being negative!

In the space of 7 years, we have seen the club grow from a National League 2 club, into a team who has won the league leaders shied 3 years on the trot (hopefully 4) on Sunday.

Improve the fanbase, facilities, commercial deals, playing structure, off field structure and youth development.

Do you honestly believe that any team could magically increase there turnover to £13m from the Championship? Infact I bet there isn't another Super League club that does! It takes years to do this.

But those clubs have been allowed to stay as they are struggling along with no threat to their status. Other than Widnes which took 6 years to get in and in the end those clubs mentioned remained as Wrexham folded and took the hit.

If you have standards then it's not about drawing up the bridge to keep undesirables out, it should mean those in are booted out too, but then we would be looking at a SL with more like 10 clubs or maybe 9. At which point it's less of a league more of an association and money would fall away faster.

I'm not a fan of London being replaced if they go, as I think it's a 12 month busted flush with 2 down none up for 2015.

A club dropped in to the 2014 season could scrape 13th, but 12th would be very unlikely.

However, from 2015 if Featherstone get promotion, there is no reason why they should not replace the bottom club of SL, if they want to???? We are a sport after all, Licencing does make it feel like more of a dragons den competition, which for me is a big turn off. If it's all about bean counting, then why play, just count up the beans, award the trophies and lets pack up and go home.

I want teams to grow. Im not being negative at all. Im being supremely positive. I see no reason why the game can’t have a top 12 filled with WIgans, St’s Leeds, Hulls, Wires, Les Catalans etc, im asking how Fev can be one of them.

And that’s great. Its not really relevant to what we are talking about here. But good on them.

By a large magnitude.
No, I don’t believe any championship club would make that jump in a year. In fact I don’t think many could ever. That’s why im asking the question. Are Fev ever going to catch up to the Leeds, St’s, Wigans, hull’s of this world or are they always going to be reliant on the big boys being hampered by an SC which hasn’t increased in a decade already? Do they have a realistic plan to get from where they are to up with those bigger teams or are we simply restructuring the entire game so that they can be also rans in perpetuity or until they go bust?

Its not about ‘undesirables’ this just feeds in to the misplaced paranoia and conspiracy this game is famous for. Its about making sure that teams are playing at the right level. A team getting stuffed week in week out does nothing for them and nothing for the competition. A team overstretching itself to compete is simply slow suicide. Holding back the top so that someone who can’t compete without it, damages the entire game.

If Fev are wanting to come up and be promoted as part of a plan to grow to the level of the big boys (and lets not forget, it is an unfortunate fact but they are playing catch up aswell) then fine. If they want to be promoted because they like the idea of mixing it with the big boys but have no realistic plan for growing to a level where they can be sustainable competing with the big boys then it is a terrible idea which damages the competition they are promoted to, and themselves.

The ‘bean counters’ aren’t counting beans to see who wins, but to make sure that clubs are competing at a level which maximises games and the clubs potential.

Unfortunately i'm not a club shareholder or director and don't know the strategy they have in place.

I think the answers are relevant, because without improving what we have then how can we become a powerhouse? You have to build it up slowly over time and they are.

In regards to the changes of the game, where are we? Has anything been officially announced?

Seeing 12, 14, 16, 18 or 20 teams all at the same level as Leeds would be incredible. I think the licensing system has started to see some clubs really improve, whilst others have had some major hiccups on the way.

IMO the top of the Championship this season has been the most exciting yet and was shown last night.

How are you going to catch up by building slowly? Is everyone else expected to only build slowly aswell? Im not having a go at Fev, but simply this idea that clubs can just keep doing relatively small things and improving relatively small things and everything will be ok. It wont. Im not saying that we don’t need to improve these small things but for Fev to catch up to the big boys its going to take some bloody huge improvements and im not saying they can’t do these huge improvements, just that the system we put in place needs to A)give them the best chance of making these improvements and B) not promote to a level they can’t sustain if they can’t make these improvements.

Should be confirmed pretty soon I would think.

I agree. And the championship is a good competition that people enjoy. Helping to build and facilitate that competition as a breeding ground, in pretty much all ways should be the way we should go. The best youngsters should be playing in the championship and not in youth teams or not at all, marketing and building that competition would give a club like Fev the opportunity to get the infrastructure they needed in place if they are to ever be an SL side.

This new format will destroy the 2nd tier of the game.

Also they are not looking to compete with the Leeds/ Hulls etc on promotion. Like any sporting club the first challenge is to compete with the lower end before taking on the big boys.

Only in RL do we ask a team to compete at the top end of the game on promotion. In the PL, teams are just left to get on with it. No one expected Stoke FC to prove they could topple Man United from the number 1 spot to gain access. They simply had to stay up and build from there.

So you're happy to have a team in the league that is uncompetitive and getting flogged every other week?

And football in this country has a worse record of clubs going into admin that we do. I have also not said that I ask for a club to challenge on promotion, I would ask that they are competitive, and also that they are in a position to be challenging at some point in the near future.

Let me ask you this. In all honesty, without putting in place rules deliberately designed to hamper the top clubs (and that includes the deliberately low SC we have now), can you see Fev growing to a level where they could feasibly compete in 5 years time? 10 years? Ever?

and if we allow clubs in SL that are never going to challenge, are always going to be second best, why do we have an SC to protect them and keep them competitive?

Second best to the NRL? Well, yeh-eh. Does the A-League constantly beat itself up because it can't compete with the English Premier League? Is the CFL in a permanent tizz that it isn't as good as the NFL?

We have to build a competition based on what we have, rather than what we wish we had.

Sounds like this SmokeyTA is just jealous that Featherstone are on the up at the same time as Bradfords Bulls are on the slide.

He's a Leeds fan.

Thankfully what he wants for the game is not the direction that it's heading in. Hallelujah!!

O I see. Thanks.

Well, the new structure is coming in whether he likes it or not.

Sounds like he'd be better off trying to persuade Hetherington to apply for Leeds to join the NRL instead of SL!

TBH, for their own good anyone involved with British RL should be looking to move to the NRL ASAP.

Thankfully the game will still be here long after you clowns are dead.

Okay, slowly may have been the wrong word, but the progression at the club could be seen last night from where we were 5 years to today. A crowd of under 4,000 at this level of rugby is very good, especially when there was such little support.

I agree that the club needs to make huge improvements and knowing the chairmen, directors and staff like I do, they will be working there best to achieve this.

One major difference at the club is the positiveness and understanding what the end goal is.

Really enjoying the debate Smokey.

If the club understand and acknowledge that they have huge improvements to make to even be in a position to compete, then why are we introducing a system which will likely see them promoted to SL before they have chance to make those improvements and in fact take the emphasis away from making the improvements in favour of short-term on-field success? How will that be of benefit to anyone?

Problem is, you could apply that to half the clubs in SL !!! Perhaps they should cut it down to 10 teams.

That's fine, but it effectively means promote no one as the odds are against them and keep clubs in SL as they are the best we can hope for.

Also we can cut SL right down as I mean seriously what are the odds of clubs like Huddersfield, Warrington, Hull KR ever achieving.

Decades of going no where, decades of mediocrity. Should have been merged with Halifax, Saints and Hull FC to allow them to succeed.

Ok I'm being sarcastic, but no one can predict the future of clubs, todays SL is a hell uv a lot different to the first SL.

Only 6 club surviving, Bradford and Leeds swapping opposite ends of the league, London from a successful start slowly fading over time. Warrington annual contenders rather than annual pretenders. Clubs in the mean time have flirted with relegation, been down and come back merged, restarted. None of it is predictable as you make it sound. Whose to say Featherstone will not thrive and others fall back, that is sport. You cannot predict 10-20 years ahead.

But I'll let you try. £10 to you if you can predict 3/4ers of SL 2030. I'm happy to make it a one way bet.

1. St Helens
2. Wigan
3. Bradford
4. London
5. Warrington
6. Halifax
7. Sheffield Eagles
8. Oldham
9. Castleford
11. Paris St Germain
12. Workington

1 Huddersfield Giants
2 Warrington Wolves
3 Wigan Warriors
4 Leeds Rhinos
5 St Helens
6 Catalan Dragons
7 Hull FC
8 Hull K R
9 Bradford Bulls
10 Wakefield Wildcats
11 Widnes Vikings
12 Castleford Tigers
13 Salford City Reds
14 London Broncos

When are all the nobbheads on here going to realise we dont have half a dozen big city potential mega clubs just waiting to despatch Leeds and Wigan from their lofty perchs at the top of RL in this country

We have what we have, any improvement to it should be applauded, to belittle it just shows how completely out of touch with reality these idiots are

You're Padge on TotalRL aren't you.....





....

Hoping that was aimed at Smokey clown and emptyHead....

£10 on a 17 year bet, nice.