2026 Championship Discussion

[Tigers1986]

Salford, Featherstone, Oldham, North Wales, I guess being bought by the NRL isn't looking so bad now huh

 

[Perth Red]

Salford, Featherstone, Oldham, North Wales, I guess being bought by the NRL isn't looking so bad now huh

Clubs have always gone bust. Nature of the game it seems to spend more than you can afford.
How many NRL and NSWRL/QRL clubs would have gone bust without pokies to prop them up? Nothing new to see here.

 

[Taking The Two]

The answer to it isn’t to shrug and say “well, it’s always happened” and carry on and to point at a totally different culture and sporting landscape and create a hypothetical.

Nothing changes if nothing changes. We’re stuck on a merry-go-round of clubs chasing a dream and going pop and then just starting again. Oldham have lurched from one financial mess to another, as have Featherstone, the Cumbrian teams seem to take it in turns to get the begging bowls out and Keighley never seem to be far away from ruin.

 

[Tigers1986]

Clubs have always gone bust. Nature of the game it seems to spend more than you can afford.
How many NRL and NSWRL/QRL clubs would have gone bust without pokies to prop them up? Nothing new to see here.

Then fix it? Always someone going belly up in England. Even your joke club at a time.

 

[Perth Red]

Then fix it? Always someone going belly up in England. Even your joke club at a time.

Given it’s been going on for as long as the game has maybe it’s just a reality that some clubs end up being badly run.
Like Wests losing $5.5million over 23&24, being at bottom of table forever and a laughing stock of nrl? You should be thankful they don’t have relegation in NRL!

 

[Tigers1986]

Given it’s been going on for as long as the game has maybe it’s just a reality that some clubs end up being badly run.
Like Wests losing $5.5million over 23&24, being at bottom of table forever and a laughing stock of nrl? You should be thankful they don’t have relegation in NRL!

3 years is forever? Ok then.

 

[Perth Red]

3 years is forever? Ok then.

Haha 3 wooden spoons in row and 13 years since making top 8, you should be thankful you’ve got a pokie den to stop your club going bust. People in glass houses…….

 

[Tigers1986]

Haha 3 wooden spoons in row and 13 years since making top 8, you should be thankful you’ve got a pokie den to stop your club going bust. People in glass houses…….

and? Newcastle won a treble of spoons. Plenty of teams have a rough patch.

If I wanted to speak WT matters, you'd be last on the list, wannabe.

 

[Taking The Two]

The English RL problem summed up very well here. “Oh well” and “yeah but what about…”.

Rather than address problems, it’s bury your head in the sand behaviour.

 

[Perth Red]

The English RL problem summed up very well here. “Oh well” and “yeah but what about…”.

Rather than address problems, it’s bury your head in the sand behaviour.

or we could be realsitic maybe And stop the hand wringing?
Sports clubs have gone bust since time immemorial, it’s not an English rugby league problem. It’s a professional sport problem! Badly run companies go broke, such is life.

 

[Perth Red]

and? Newcastle won a treble of spoons. Plenty of teams have a rough patch.

If I wanted to speak WT matters, you'd be last on the list, wannabe.

People in glass houses and all that. Calling any club a joke when you support Wests is very amusing.

 

[Taking The Two]

or we could be realsitic maybe And stop the hand wringing?
Sports clubs have gone bust since time immemorial, it’s not an English rugby league problem. It’s a professional sport problem! Badly run companies go broke, such is life.

Yet rugby league continues to let badly run companies return time and again and in Bradford’s case FIVE times.

 

[Perth Red]

Yet rugby league continues to let badly run companies return time and again and in Bradford’s case FIVE times.

Hull,kr went bust, you saying they shouldn’t have been allowed back? lol

 

[Taking The Two]

Hull,kr went bust, you saying they shouldn’t have been allowed back? lol

Maybe. Allowing clubs to go bust over and over is like putting your hand on a plate after being told it’s hot, getting burnt, taking it off and putting it straight back on to the hot plate.

Hull KR entered administration. They never went bust. It’s very different from actually going bust in the way that Bradford have multiple times, as have Hunslet and others.

 

[Taking The Two]

With the news about Halifax, covered elsewhere on here, what becomes of the Championship. It was supposed to be a 21 team competition, then Featherstone weren’t admitted and now Halifax have been served a compulsory liquidation from the courts. We’ve already revised the fixture list so clubs can play a certain amount of games and now, who knows what happens if Halifax don’t make it.

Self preservation is about the best that can be hoped for now. Get through the competition, week-by-week, scrambling fixtures together and getting through to the end of the season without losing any more teams, though that may be easier said than done given recent history. Ultimately though, change is needed and hard conversations need to take place.

 

[Tigers1986]

Can they appeal the order? That way the club continues to play etc.

Would've made the cup complicated if Goole didn't get the upset

 

[Tigers1986]

People in glass houses and all that. Calling any club a joke when you support Wests is very amusing.

How many times have your clubs gone bust?

 

[Pippen94]

Last team standing wins championship

 

[Tigers1986]

Maybe that's why they merged. Clubs to collapse to bring the numbers down into 2027.

 

[Taking The Two]

Can they appeal the order? That way the club continues to play etc.

Would've made the cup complicated if Goole didn't get the upset

No, they can’t. There option appears to be setting up a new entity, buying the intellectual property of the club and assets (kits, balls etc) and starting as a new club but I believe that has some potential issues that don’t make it particularly straight forward, especially when the season is a few weeks old.