I'll try and be as blunt as humanly possible:
1. Very poor match day experience. You would swear that there is no money being pumped in to make the spectators come to the games and enjoy themselves at the game.
2. Food and drink prices
3. The game is BORING! I'm the wrong demographic, but my brother is the right one. He watches his team then doesn't watch another game. I can see his point. 5 tackles, kick, boring. Game needs to develop rules to promote tries through the hands. I have actually said for a while that if a try is scored through a kick, you lose the opportunity to kick the conversion as you have already taken the kick option.
4. Video refs, they take way too long. If you can't make a decision in 2-3 replays, move on, refs call.
5. Strip rulings are an absolute lottery, clean the mess up.
6. Too many big boppers coming on to bash up halfbacks. That isn't skill. Reduce the interchange to 5, make the little me more important and stop reducing the skill in the game.
Just a few thoughts.
On point 3. That seems to be a perception many are holding onto but from the footy i have watched this year and i watch say 75% of games most of the games have not been "one out affairs". I have seen plenty of footy played but it may take a while for it too catch on with fans who have turned off partially. Add in the close games and thrilling finishes and imo its been a great season on field so far, sadly the fan base has become more apathetic and seemingly not willing to go to games even in perfect conditions (see crowds at big matchups on sunday arvo in sydney, very very average)
But some changes wouldnt hurt, in particular the reduction of the interchange to bring back the small players and reduce influence of battering rams by fatiguing them
I definitely agree with point 3...
Sport is all about incentives and RL has none that promote expansive play...
If a team has the ball in their own end, their best choice is "5 hit-ups, kick, defend and hope for error".
IF they did choose to run the ball, they take on massive risk with almost no reward; Assuming they dont score a try (which rarely happens in long distance sets) putting it through hands means they will either drop the ball in their own half or hand it over down the other end (something a kick could achieve without the risk).
We need some kind of restart rule that gives teams a reason to play expansive football. We encourage kicking by give restarts for 40/20s and tackled-in-goal (the best chance outside of penalties to get the ball in good position), yet we complain that there is too much kicking.
If you want more attacking football, there needs to be some incentive that kicking CANNOT achieve; eg a 6-again for carryng the ball 50m or crossing the attacking 20m line.
You complain that the players are boring, but the rules of our game make it so only the boring players win...
