What comes through the turnstyles belongs to the individual clubs, ie better supported/better marketed teams would be better off. RFL funds used to be shared on a graduated scale to ALL member clubs depending on position on the ladder. Maybe we should send begging letters to Nigel Wood (204k salary + 30k to his pension fund a year).

Exactly!!

It's laughable to talk about Chamionship clubs pi$$ing their money away on journeymen players, when SL since day one has been a pension fund for the Aussies!!

SL was supposed to raise the standards, so that our national side could compete with the Antipodean nations. Are we any nearer? - are we $hyte!!
There are 16 clubs in the NRL (with only a handful of British players among them) who I reckon could all give England/GB a game.
How many SL clubs could compete against the Aussie/NZ test teams??

Come back to me when England/GB have won a test series against the Aussies, or won the 4 Nations, or won the world cup......then i might believe that the SL 'experiment' is working!!

Oh, and when that GB team contains a couple of London, or Wales born, league raised players - then I'll believe that expansion is working as well!!

How have the RFL changed the rules for Saints?

In 2000 Leigh were in the NFP Grand final, and had plans in place to re-develop the Glebe St. end at Hilton Park, and perform other upgrades to the ground as per "Framing The Future" (the then RFL 'blueprint' for SL clubs). We sought permission, had we won the GF and been promoted, to play some of the following seasons games at the Reebok stadium while this work was done - this was refused by the RFL, on the grounds that we were asking too much of our supporters by asking them to travel that distance (about 6-7 miles!!) to home games, and that we shouldn't be playing at a football ground!!

Since then:

Bradford bulls were allowed to re-locate to a football ground while works went on at Odsal.

Celtic Crusaders were allowed to go out of business, re-form, re-locate to the other end of Wales, and play at a football ground.

Saints are going to be allowed to play all next season at a ground that is several miles away from St. Helens!!

Like we say - different rules!

Championship clubs spending money from SL on journeymen is not the same as SL clubs spending their own money on Journeymen. Thats why IMO monies (if available) should be given to the actual roots of the game - the amateur clubs where the game can benefit as a whole.
I think you are giving the Pro-franchise argument a plug here too

Hopefully a few years down the line we will get closer to being the best in the world. But what you do miss tho is that Aus surely haven't been standing still, and also RL is much bigger over there. We also have the British culture of being losers in comparision to Aus - something we have to overcome because a lot of it is in the mind, that winning mentality they have over us. I thoroughly enjoyed Englands's efforts last season against the tide of "we don't stand a chance" brigade in support.

But we could go all year with this. Time will tell.

The RFL make it up as they go along, I'm suprised folk are still suprised at what they do. Hull, Wigan, and Huddersfield all play at football grounds; their decision was, and has since proven to be, a nonsense.

We also had to install more seats in the Tommy Sale stand to meet one of the other 'rules', but when Cas came back up, that 'rule' had been relaxed.