Re: Today's big decision : Fri Jan 17, 2014 6:17 pm  

Viva La Vikings!! wrote:

You don't know that, you really dont.

I'm confident that Groupon or Wowcher will come to the rescue of the modern day tightwad fan of discounted SL by offering cheapo deals.

Re: Today's big decision : Fri Jan 17, 2014 6:18 pm  

SmokeyTA wrote:

So less guaranteed income for clubs at the beginning of the year?

Yes, but a lot more games for people to pay for.
Currently teams such as widnes get £167 for 13 games from their fans. On the new system lets say they get 11 games for £150 or there abouts, but now widnes are guaranteed another 3 home games, that's 3 x £20 or there abouts. Even if attendances half in these games, the average income from fans goes from £167 - £ 180 plus all extra revenue from food etc

Re: Today's big decision : Fri Jan 17, 2014 6:19 pm  

Him wrote:

The problem isn't with the 2nd league of 8, that's about avoiding relegation for the SL clubs and getting promotion for the Championship clubs (plus its hardly exciting finishing 10th, say, at the moment).
The problem is with the 3rd league of 8, playing for not much to be honest.

for me, I wouldn't bother with a competition where the sole focus is not being the worst. I watch sport to see people competing to be the best.

If we wanted to watch a sport where the only aim is not being the worst, let's give the players LSD first. At least then it would be funny.

Re: Today's big decision : Fri Jan 17, 2014 6:21 pm  

Saint Simon wrote:

Yes, but a lot more games for people to pay for.
Currently teams such as widnes get £167 for 13 games from their fans. On the new system lets say they get 11 games for £150 or there abouts, but now widnes are guaranteed another 3 home games, that's 3 x £20 or there abouts. Even if attendances half in these games, the average income from fans goes from £167 - £ 180 plus all extra revenue from food etc

That assumes people will pay for those extra games, all available evidence from the challenge cup and playoffs say they won't. And the difference isn't small it's pretty big. It assumes people will pay for an SL season ticket plus the additional games when it may very well simply encourage people to pick and choose the games they do attend

Re: Today's big decision : Fri Jan 17, 2014 6:22 pm  

Ok so the decision has been made but what i want to know is how the 2nd league of 12 will be made up.

Obviously it will include the bottom 2 from SL this year so that leaves 10 spots.

There were 14 teams in this years championship along with another 9 in championship 1. So how are the other 10 spots going to be filled? Is it the top 10 from this years championship or is there some sort of application process open to all 23 non SL clubs

Realistically Fax, Sheffield, Featherstone and Leigh will be 4 of them but just wondered what the official word was (if any!!)

Re: Today's big decision : Fri Jan 17, 2014 6:23 pm  

SmokeyTA wrote:

And if you finish 3rd in the FA championship you get and advantage over the teams which finished 4th, 5th, and 6th. The same in the SL playoffs. In this system your performance in the first 22rounds is entirely disregarded

Put another way, you are bottom, 10 points off 8th with 10 games to go, only 12 games into the season. You aren't realistically going to overtake 4 teams in 10 games, so are you going to go hell for leather for 80 min, for 10 games trying to qualify for a top 8 competition you aren't going to win risk fatigue and injury, or give up, keep your powder dry, rest players, put out a 2nd string and simply focus on not losing a million pounds in funding in those last 7 games?

not ideal preperation that is it

yeah then play cold against teams in the championship who are playing with momentum,

wouldn't fancy their chances too much

Re: Today's big decision : Fri Jan 17, 2014 6:23 pm  

SmokeyTA wrote:

That assumes people will pay for those extra games, all available evidence from the challenge cup and playoffs say they won't. And the difference isn't small it's pretty big. It assumes people will pay for an SL season ticket plus the additional games when it may very well simply encourage people to pick and choose the games they do attend

No, that's assuming only half turn up.

Re: Today's big decision : Fri Jan 17, 2014 6:23 pm  

Bovrick wrote:

Are you for real? If they think they can get away with reducing the number of games without changing the price that they wouldn't be trying to increase the price when there were more games.

These guys are trying to make money ffs

Well lets say they do drop the price of a season ticket from 167 to 130/140 so to speak. You will still have to pay another 60/70 extra later on in the year raising the price overall of watching your team. It could potentially and will be dearer to try and watch your team survive and regain SL status fighting the likes of Leigh and Fev than the current system. Its not about being tight either, I go most games home and away but to some it will matter and be a financial problem

Re: Today's big decision : Fri Jan 17, 2014 6:23 pm  

SmokeyTA wrote:

actually the wider point I made on that was that a club could finish 9th and earn 20points, earn 6 in the 2nd part of the season and be relegated, another club could earn say 10points in the first part of the year, and only 8 in the second and stay up. So we would have a situation where a team earned 26 points in total and a much higher proportion in a much harder league being relegated in favour of a team who scored only 18 points in total with a higher proportion in a lesser league.

In which case they should have performed better against the easier teams. As for the question of an injury crisis, it really isn't that different to getting an injury crisis in round 20 when you're 10pts clear of the relegation zone in 1u1d and ending up getting relegated. Sport is based on so much luck that these things happen.

As for the problem of funding, I'm 100% with anyone who fears for clubs getting relegated, going bust etc and wasting a ton of resources. That is the cost of any system with a gulf in funding between leagues, and I'm worried about that aspect of things (which is why I have always preferred a centralised/franchised system).

SmokeyTA wrote:

It would also incentivise a team with little chance of making the 8 to rest players for the 2nd part as their performance in the first part is irrelevant.

Sure, but again what difference does that make compared to now? Once a team has lost hope for making the playoffs, they may as well prepare for the next season too.

SmokeyTA wrote:

Not to mention the change in primary focus moving fro making the 8 to not being bottom 4 in the 2nd part of the league

...am I missing something? What's the difference between trying to make the top 8, and trying to avoid the bottom 4 when there are 12 teams competing?

Re: Today's big decision : Fri Jan 17, 2014 6:24 pm  

This decision is fantastic for RL. We are well known for being grumpy so and so's who love nothing more than to complain.

Well fill ya boots, this is going to keep the grumps going for most of the next 12 months.

All the arguments against that I have seen so far carry with them huge assumptions. (Stated as facts of course).

The biggest issue is the season ticket issue, but it's hardly an issue that will take all the powers of Stephen Hawking to solve.

Quite frankly I'm glad it's done. The only problem is that having to announce it so far in advance, we will have to put up with 12 months of sour grapes from those against the system.

Just like the RLWC we will have predictions of doom and gloom until the day arrives.

When actually I think most people will just get on with the new system and there will be very little in the way of people walking around puzzled by the Rubik's Cube that is RL.