English lower leagues

[langpark]

First win of the season today for Doncaster.

As the table now stands, no team is in 'no-mans land' and EVERY team is still fighting either for a place in the middle 8s, or to avoid relegation. LOVIN' IT!

 

[UNION TROLL]

First win of the season today for Doncaster.

As the table now stands, no team is in 'no-mans land' and EVERY team is still fighting either for a place in the middle 8s, or to avoid relegation. LOVIN' IT!

Dewsbury are both out of the Middle 8 and safe from Relegation.....but yep, the new format has made the race for 4th spot and the opportunity to get hammered in the 7 extra games really exciting!

 

[Rodney]

Dewsbury have a game in hand, they're in a better position than London imo.
However the race for fourth spot is effectively over with Halfax's win over Batley.

Halifax play Dewsbury next which will put them up to 30 points bar a miracle.
Then only Fev will be mathematically capable of catching them, but their F&A is over 100 behind Halifax.

Interested to know whether the Championship is considering following Super League in the marquee allowance or at least trying to match the fixed cap of Super League.
Even if the Super 8's end up relatively even surely the gap is going to cause more and more problems into the future. The potential gap from next year going to substantially increase with the marquee allowance.

eventually if the RFL want true promotion and relegation surely the salary cap system will either have to be standardized (ala. French Rugby) across all tiers or abolished completely.

 

[Evil Homer]

Interested to know whether the Championship is considering following Super League in the marquee allowance or at least trying to match the fixed cap of Super League.
Even if the Super 8's end up relatively even surely the gap is going to cause more and more problems into the future. The potential gap from next year going to substantially increase with the marquee allowance.

eventually if the RFL want true promotion and relegation surely the salary cap system will either have to be standardized (ala. French Rugby) across all tiers or abolished completely.

What kind of 'marquee' players do you think are going to sign for second-division clubs? Also you are aware that most of these teams are located in small towns/villages with crowds of roughly ~1,000 and many of them only pay match payments to players? If they were forced to spend a Super League salary cap most of them would go bust within a few weeks.

 

[Rodney]

What kind of 'marquee' players do you think are going to sign for second-division clubs? Also you are aware that most of these teams are located in small towns/villages with crowds of roughly ~1,000 and many of them only pay match payments to players? If they were forced to spend a Super League salary cap most of them would go bust within a few weeks.

they wouldn't be forced to spend Super League dollars, but those who had the potential could spend super league dollars.
With P & R you traditionally embrace inequality and allow teams to perform to their maximum potential regardless of what league they're in.

The small town teams would spend the same as usual but the bigger teams would have a fair chance at matching the potential of their Super League counterparts who will act at the ceiling to their progression.

Allowing teams like Toulouse and Bradford to try and get marquees and super league quality talent into the lower leagues only improves the quality of the league in my opinion.

 

[langpark]

Bradford vs Leigh this weekend. Any chance they'll get close to matching the 7,449 crowd they got back in Round 1?

 

[Evil Homer]

they wouldn't be forced to spend Super League dollars, but those who had the potential could spend super league dollars.
With P & R you traditionally embrace inequality and allow teams to perform to their maximum potential regardless of what league they're in.

The small town teams would spend the same as usual but the bigger teams would have a fair chance at matching the potential of their Super League counterparts who will act at the ceiling to their progression.

Allowing teams like Toulouse and Bradford to try and get marquees and super league quality talent into the lower leagues only improves the quality of the league in my opinion.

None of the teams can spend Super League dollars, only Bradford, Leigh and London can even afford to run full-time squads and their caps are close to SL anyway as the whole thing is scaled based on finishing positions from the previous season. Toulouse aren't even in the competition so I'm not sure what you're talking about there and again, I'm not sure what kind of marquee players you think would want to play in a second-grade comp.

 

[deal.with.it]

Fui fui is the closest u would get. Far from marquee, but great for leigh

 

[Wilson1]

None of the teams can spend Super League dollars, only Bradford, Leigh and London can even afford to run full-time squads and their caps are close to SL anyway as the whole thing is scaled based on finishing positions from the previous season. Toulouse aren't even in the competition so I'm not sure what you're talking about there and again, I'm not sure what kind of marquee players you think would want to play in a second-grade comp.

A marquee player is just a player who does not have to be included in the salary cap. It makes perfect sense. A marquee player in the Championship is not going to be as good as a marquee player in the Super League. It just allows those teams who attract good crowds and sponsorship to spend a bit more and get promoted.

 

[Rodney]

Pretty much what Wilson said.
Even though a real marquee is unlikely to sign to play championship the marquee allowance expands the cap substantially.
SBW wouldn't be drawn to play championship rugby league but the championship would have more pull with out of favor first grade talent and have the flexibility to potentially match the Super League is the initiative is there.

I'm not that familiar with the flexibility within the Championship cap but I thought there was a rough limit of around £1mil which is over half the Super League cap, but with Marquees next year it'll be effectively half.

Especially if the competition intends on the middle eights being competitive in the long term I don't think they can allow the Super League to leave the championship behind.
You want potential Super League teams in the championship jostling for Super League spots.


Similarly in championship 1 you want teams capable of competing at a higher level being able to step up without being chained to a capacity of the teams just staying afloat.
Toulousse next year are going to have to play under a cap with is about a quarter of what they're playing as now in Ch1.
Its a massive arbitrary roadblock for a team with a tonne of potential.
And similarly you wouldn't want an ambitious Championship side forced to play with half the cap of the teams they're required to beat at the end of the season to go up.

 

[Evil Homer]

A marquee player is just a player who does not have to be included in the salary cap. It makes perfect sense. A marquee player in the Championship is not going to be as good as a marquee player in the Super League. It just allows those teams who attract good crowds and sponsorship to spend a bit more and get promoted.

It doesn't make any sense at all. No clubs need or would use 'marquee' cap exemptions in the Championship, it's complete nonsense. What would make far more sense would just be increasing the cap, and that isn't done for a reason, to stop clubs going bust. The likes of Leigh, Halifax, Widnes and Doncaster have all gone bust in recent years due to overspending trying to get into Super League, while clubs like Wakefield, Bradford and London went bust just trying to maintain a SL squad. Again, I understand where these ideas are coming from and why you are suggesting them but they just aren't consistent with reality, cap restrictions are not and have never been an issue in the Championship, there are no clubs clamoring to spend more money than they already can.

 

[langpark]

Sounds like Bradford/Leigh was a top match, 36-36 draw and a crowd of 9,181!

 

[Evil Homer]

Leigh, Bradford, Sheffield and Halifax confirmed for the middle 8's after today's results.

 

[roughyedspud]

And oldham back to the top of league one,2pts clear of keighley who have a game in hand on us..

We play north wales away next week then keighley at home the week after...a massive 2 weeks ahead

 

[siv]

Any of the Middle 8 games on tv ?

 

[Evil Homer]

Any of the Middle 8 games on tv ?

One a week supposedly.

 

[CC_Roosters]

I hope middle 8 games make it on to fox sportss. They have shown every game i know off so far so fingers crossed.

Reported that sheffield are going full time next season

 

[roughyedspud]

If sky don't show all the middle 8 games the rfl should split up the tv rights to the 8s and give them to someone willing to show them..

 

[langpark]

I hope middle 8 games make it on to fox sportss. They have shown every game i know off so far so fingers crossed.

Reported that sheffield are going full time next season

That's right, I just read it now, fantastic news!!

http://www.skysports.com/rugby-league/news/12196/9919929/sheffield-eagles-will-go-full-time-in-2016

 

[Evil Homer]

It is good news but they really need to secure a return to Sheffield in some way, playing in Doncaster is a joke.