All back up in the air now, the meeting to ratify the new structure that was to happen tommorrow has now been cancelled amid rumours of a possible vote of no confidence in the RFL by the SL club owners

I despair, I really do

Personally i would push on with the vote of no confidence, I mean look what leigh have done, and dewsbury for that matter, Assembling a decent squad that will be cosing them plenty in wages in the hope of competing for the money in the new structure, the RFL allow players to be signed mid way though the season and all the clubs had is the hope of this new structure being pushed through. Who is wagging who here, the dog wagging the tail or the tail wagging the dog, This is bordering on the final straw for me personally and i am glad i havn't yet purchased my season ticket, Potentially another pointless season coming up. 7 chairmen are not happy so the whole of rugby league suffers as a consequence.

But does the whole of RL want it?

What about the clubs who probably expect to finish at the lower end of the Championship, will they want to lose their current position in the leagues?

And there, in a nutshell, is a statement about who is probably running our Sport.

PROBABLY Alan? there are no probabilities involved they do run the sport.

Definatley a ' Conundrum ' , which side do we support?

The clueless inept * RFL ?

Or the seemingly greedy * SL bosses on our doorstep?

* These are the personal views of Steven Pike without any base other than personal contact and what I've read on here, if that nice mr Lenigan does have a viable ' All Sport ' solution I retract the ' greedy ' bit

All good fun, innit?

Who'd have thunk it eh? , That nice Mr Wood selling the Championship Clubs something that seemingly he doesnt actually have to sell, unless he can now convince those nice ( because they are

) SL club owners to accept it

Perhaps a more ' Frank ' ( not salfordlad ) discussion around the full council meeting table should have taken place, instead of it seemingly being done in split sessions

I think this may be one of the sticking points and teams spending a lot of money on that presumption may now find themselves over stretched. Poor planning once again by the RFL.

Yes definatly see the fan getting smeared in brown smelly stuff, But the SL clubs cannot dictate who gets the funding and make it a closed shop, If they do, then i damn them all to hell and give up with rugby league altogether.

Ultimatley it is their money

It is, but if the RFL had any balls (at the inception of SL) then it wouldn't be.

The moment a faction within a sport gets control over significant portions of money, it's practically game over for anyone else. The SL clubs will continue to protect their own interests, and the RFL do not have either the foresight nor the power to force through the changes that would result in a fairer and more balanced sport.

I'd be willing to put money on this not being finalised by the start of next season, and I wouldn't be surprised if we were nearing the end of next season with no knowledge of what will happen the following year.

The SL clubs have woken up to the 'threat'.

Maybe if the Championship Clubs had ' Woken Up ' a few years ago then maybe all this wouldnt be an issue now?

They'd have needed to have been awake the day the RFL dangled the big money sky contract in front of them. A few years of decent money, all for trading away any ability to influence the future path of the sport.

Then of course, the money dried up.

I mean a bit nearer Michael, at the inception of licencing the Championship clubs should then have been looking at collaberation on external income , being locked into a structure at that time did provide opportunities, but even in our leagues, a refusal to work together for our ' common good ' prevented growth, and extra income that could have eventually resulted in self susstainability and control of your own destiny

But what do I know?

Far too late by that point, imho.

Licensing was the culmination of what started with the original big money contract from Sky.

It's a little late to be trying to climb out of the coffin when most of the nails are already in the lid, especially given the voluntary nature by which the clubs climbed in to said box.

Its never too late, as confucious's dad ( frank blackburn ) said, " the longest journey begins with but 1 step " , " especially if you are going to a pub "

I find the journey home from the pub longer than the one to it.

It's too late when you've ceded your control.

There's only 1 thing could change the situation, and that is if the entire sport, minus Super League, walked away and took away all the support structures. SL couldn't survive on it's own. Then and only then, we might be able to bring about a fairer structure in the game.

Such unity in the game hasn't been known since 1895, so it's not likely. Without it, we only see more SL self protectionism.



(Now let be careful here, I think we're in risk of this thread breaking out in to actual debate.)

Ah, yes, but, if I continue I will start to criticise, so I'll leave it there

Go for it. Can't have debate with criticism. It's those that can't handle criticism (despite those same people handing out quite generously) that are the biggest problem.

When all the SL licensing began I posted then it would only be a matter of time before they broke away from the rest, and encouraged by SKY there will be a combined new code, involving the top SL and Union clubs, making it a truly national game, the only restraining factor will be Unions International’s.

RUBBISH, BLOODY BEDFORD CLUELESS FANS

Maybe the SL chairman and the RFL chairman could get together.......oh hang on its the same person isn't it.

Get ALL the RFL member clubs around the RFL council table one club one vote....or is that too simple.

Info regarding money from a report I read stated 1.3M for the 12 in SL1. 650k down to 150k on a sliding scale for SL2 and 75k for Championship 1 clubs. An increase for all so whats the pie eaters problem. This won't now be sorted until after the World Cup.

Stupidly or otherwise existing Champ clubs may have started strengthening with the carrots in mind especially the 5 who may have been in danger of dropping out of the Championship at the end of 2014. This could cause serious problems.

There are doubts at the moment on 3 clubs involvement in SL next season Bradford again, Wakefield and of course London.

What a fecking mess the game is in!

Actually that was my Uncle Chairman Mao we discussed it at length when we were having an argument about Feng Shui and the health benefits of pot noodle.

Sorry to be pedantic but he said Frank one single step and not just 1 step.

I never liked him.