Road to Wembley - Round Five

Road to Wembley - Round Five

When the draw for Round 5 was made the following Tuesday after York had brilliantly knocked out Championship side Rochdale Hornets I was listening intently to find out whether it would be a third consecutive trip to Bootham Crescent or a kinder draw closer to home.

It turned out that I did have to go to York for a third time but the disappointment of not being able to visit another new ground on my travels was cushioned by the fact they were drawn at home to Barrow Raiders!  I’ll not shy away from it ... Barrow is my home town, I  grew up there and have watched the Raiders since I was a young lad, so I was particularly excited about this one.  Having moved away from Barrow around 12 years or so ago I don’t get to as many games as I used to any more but I was pleased that this years’ Challenge Cup journey would allow me to see at least one Raiders game.

York had successfully managed to shirk off the challenges of both Egremont Rangers and Rochdale in the previous rounds and Barrow had enjoyed a relatively comfortable run thanks to beating Rochdale Mayfield 60-6 and Keighley Cougars 20-0 in their previous outings.  Plus with the added incentive for one of these sides to be the last League 1 side in the competition (providing Doncaster and Toronto didn’t win their games against Super League opposition) it promised to be a decent game.

For the first time this season I was joined on my ‘Road to Wembley’ by my dad who travelled down to meet me in Manchester where we continued our journey on to York around lunchtime.

After a couple of pit stops along the way we arrived at Bootham Crescent (again) in plenty of time and I was able to take advantage of Dad’s connections to bag a parking spot on the club’s car park, a complimentary ticket into the game and a free pint before the match (winner!!).  This made a change from the last round where I got there with half an hour to spare and had to park a few hundred yards away on a back street somewhere.

Talking to a number of fans before the game the general consensus was that Barrow would win but in my view, this was a potential banana skin game for one of the form teams in rugby league.  Barrow’s excellent defensive record could be at threat today and it would take a big effort to overcome a resurgent York side that had beaten Rochdale and, more recently, Doncaster.

I took my place in the stands and began to flick through the match programme I had picked up and came across York’s results so far.  I was surprised to see that they had lost to both North Wales and Oxford since beating Rochdale, as they looked so good in that game, but not knowing what teams they were able to field or if they were/are struggling with injuries I won’t comment any further.  York were once a team that would threaten Barrow in years gone by and all form goes out of the window with it being a cup game (just ask Hull KR when they lost to Oldham last season.)

The game began with plenty of noisy support from both sets of fans.  A blistering start for the Barrow saw them burst into an early 6-0 lead but the first half was tit-for-tat in terms of scoring.  York’s first try came from an excellent kick over the top which was collected by a super fast David Foggin-Johnston (who impressed me a lot in the previous two rounds) and he easily claimed his side’s first try.

Barrow were never behind throughout the first period but York came back from ten points behind at one stage to being just two points adrift at the break.  It was beginning to look like Barrow’s three unsuccessful kicks at goal could come back to bite them with a slender 20-18 lead, including a penalty right on half time which would have edged them four points ahead.

As the half came to a close Barrow had rested two of their big influential forwards and they remained on the bench as the second half began.  This allowed York to turn the screw and within the first ten minutes found themselves 28-20 ahead with two tries from the centre.

Barrow managed to snatch a try back to move within two points of York and then a huge game-changer happened where a York player was disallowed his try for crossing in the build-up.  This seemed to be the wake-up call Barrow needed as they quickly scored two tries of their own to take back the lead going into the final ten minutes.

Tempers were flaring on and off the pitch as the noisy Barrow fans were chanting and goading their York counterparts and the York bench players and staff seemed to still be upset about their disallowed try.  The RFL Match Commissioner who was in attendance was certainly earning his bread on the touchline trying to control both benches from boiling over.

Thankfully for the Barrow fans and any neutrals in attendance the entertainment didn’t end there as York scrum-half, Harry Tyson-Wilson, saw red mist and tried to throw a punch in frustration at a Barrow player which ultimately saw him receive a yellow card which meant York had to finish the game with 12 men.

Barrow ran riot in the final few minutes with three more tries including a fourth of the match for winger Luke Cresswell, but it was the final try by sub Tom Walker which enabled the Raiders to reach the 50 point mark.

For me it was a thoroughly enjoyable game.  I guess most of you are sat there thinking “well, you would say that” but even for a neutral it had a bit of everything and I would say it was probably one of the more entertaining Challenge Cup games I’ve seen in the last couple of years.

Afterwards, York’s supporters bar was overrun with ecstatic Barrovians (well over 200 had made the trip over for the game) claiming they were “having a party”, checking they could still spell the word Barrow after a few pints, and claiming they were off to Wembley!  The biggest noise arose when their players joined them in the bar and it looked to me like any York fans left in there swiftly supped up and made their exits.

So York’s journey is over for this season but Barrow’s continues.  Wherever the next round takes me there is a good chance that I’ll have to travel further afield again.  Then again, I wonder if it will be kind to me and let me go to Swinton, Salford or Wigan.  Who knows?

Roll on Tuesday!!

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League 1 Round-up

League 1 Round-up

This year’s League 1 campaign has been carefully watched by most rugby league fans this year, particularly those supporting clubs above the third tier who are looking to gauge how strong Toronto Wolfpack actually are compared to the other clubs in this division.

As you saw in my preview from earlier in the season I was one of those fans looking forward to a more competitive League 1 this and, as in my Super League and Championship reviews, I’ll look back again here at the questions I raised in that first post.

ARE TORONTO YET ANOTHER FANTASY CLUB?

I would like to say that as a club, no they are not, but looking at them as a team each week, yes, as the strength that this side have is far too strong for League 1 and everyone knows it.  Their closest challengers for promotion looks like it will be Barrow Raiders, a team who have prided themselves on their defence in the early weeks of the campaign, and know they will have to be at their very best come 20 May when the sides meet at the Lamport Stadium.

It’s a shame for the Barrow fans that this game will be played away as if they would fancy themselves to beat the Wolfpack even more if the game was being staged at Craven Park.

Anyway, moving back to the question at hand, another intriguing point has been raised lately as will the side be a victim of their early season domination?  Since narrowly overcoming Siddal in the Challenge Cup in their first ever competitive game they have strolled to some huge victories in their first five league matches – a 76-0 score in the opening round and 82-6 and 80-0 victories in the latest two games.

If they are winning games just as comfortably, plus more, against this level of opposition at home will their sports-mad Canadians be willing to come along and support them if they know it’s a foregone conclusion anyway?  Chances are that won’t happen but it’ll be interesting to see how things pan out.

Looking back at their results, they have played seven games so far including their two Challenge Cup matches and it is the results in those games which have given them their biggest tests.  Whitehaven and Keighley Cougars stood up to them well in their respective matches but the Wolfpack’s ultimate ability to keep up the intensity for a full 80 minutes made those games secured.  But a 30-26 victory over London Broncos in the fourth round of the Challenge Cup will have confirmed to some of their critics that they might just be here to stay and their match this weekend against Salford Red Devils will be another that the neutrals will be keeping an eye on.

WILL THERE BE A CUMBRIAN REVIVAL?

Most fans outside of League 1 and who are concerned about the standard of rugby league in Cumbria would be forgiven for thinking that both Whitehaven and Workington would be up there towards the top of the pile from the off having been relegated from the Championship last season.  But in reality there’s not much difference between the bottom of the Championship and the top of League 1 anymore.

As both clubs have stated neither are expecting to bounce straight back up to the Championship at the first attempt and both are using this first season to rebuild their squad and, in some areas, their club.  Both have also admitted that Barrow are by far the strongest of the three clubs and are much better equipped at having a crack at promotion this year having spent the last two seasons doing what these two are now planning and have built their squad into something that would probably be able to hold its own in the league above barring a couple of tweaks here and there.

Results aren’t lying either as after the first five rounds the Raiders are keeping the pace with Toronto with a 100% record of their own.  Barrow are a full four points ahead of their nearest rivals Hunslet with Whitehaven sitting fifth with six points (having played just four games) and Workington currently ninth with four points.

While Toronto are ahead on points difference Barrow are also matching them with some hefty victories of their own which includes an 82-0 drubbing of Hemel Stags (which saw them top the league for a week after Round 3) and their closest margin of victory coming from a 26-10 home win over Workington.

As for the Cumbrian ‘mini league’, the other game between the three sides so far saw Whitehaven snatch a narrow 24-20 victory on Good Friday.

Also, Barrow are enjoying a great start to the season which includes an unbeaten pre-season, a trip to York City Knights to come this weekend in the Challenge Cup, and are favourites for the League 1 Cup with that competition already at its Semi Final stage.

CAN WE AVOID ANOTHER NORTH/SOUTH DEVIDE?

This is a question that has been ongoing for a number of years.  In my preview I changed it slightly to could an ‘expansion club’ break the mould of the more traditional northern clubs and break into the top eight?

With Workington and Whitehaven coming down from the Championship and the introduction of Toronto to League 1 this looked to be an impossible task once again for the British non-heartland sides.  Including Newcastle Thunder and North Wales Crusaders, who both spent time in the Super League under previous guises, there are eight expansion sides in England and Wales.  London Skolars broke the mould slightly last season by sneaking into the top 8 but ultimately couldn’t win another game and I predicted in my preview that Newcastle would be my favourite to do so this year.

Both are going ok after five rounds with London in sixth and Newcastle in eighth, both with six points from three victories.  London recovered very well from their opening day drubbing by Toronto and have since gone on to beat Coventry Bears, Gloucestershire All Golds and Hemel.  Newcastle on the other hand won their opening three matches – impressive victories over Workington, London and South Wales Ironmen saw them occupy third place and level on points with Toronto, Barrow and Doncaster but have since fallen away after two defeats.

That means that the other heartland team that is currently occupying a League 1 Shield place after Workington is York who have had a terrible start to their league campaign.  The City Knights have lost to away at Barrow, at home to North Wales and surprisingly away to Oxford.  But narrow wins over South Wales and Doncaster currently sees the side occupying twelfth place with just four points.  Their Challenge Cup successes on the other hand have been very pleasing for their fans.

I will be very intrigued how the next few weeks will pan out for all the sides as just two points separate third from thirteenth!  And, at the foot of the table, it looks like we could see another shoot-out between South Wales and Hemel for the wooden spoon as both have lost all five of their opening matches.

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Amateur Focus - Part 2

Amateur Focus - Part 2

We’re now six weeks into the new National Conference League season and already the four divisions are starting to take shape with some interesting results coming through.

Of the three divisions that kicked off the first weekend of March - Premier Division, Division Two and Division Three, all three have new leaders.  And as for Division One, starting a week later may have been the right decision as that’s the only division to have a full list of fixtures to be completed each week following postponements and abandonments elsewhere.

PREMIER DIVISION

Unsurprisingly, this division is turning out to be the most unpredictable of the lot with some big names sitting at the wrong end of the table at this early stage.

The pace-setters so far are Thatto Heath Crusaders, who are top of the tree thanks to six consecutive victories.  They’ve notched up impressive victories at home to both Leigh Miners Rangers and Wath Brow Hornets already and have comfortably beaten previous league-leaders Kells and Egremont Rangers.  An impressive start from a side that was promoted from Division One last year!

Current champions Siddal are hot on their heels with four wins from four games so far.  After their opening weekend abandonment they began their campaign with an emphatic home victory over Skirlaugh before another postponement meant they had to wait another two weeks before kick-starting their season with three consecutive victories, one of which was an emphatic 32-point triumph over Leigh Miners.

Just below those two in the remaining play-off places are Wath Brow, Myton Warriors (another side who started well after earning promotion last term), Rochdale Mayfield and Kells, both of whom missed out on the play-offs last season.  All but Myton have played just five times this season.

However, it’s the bottom end of the Premier Division that makes for interesting viewing.  Two heavyweights from recent years are languishing in the relegation zone after awful starts.  Both Wigan St Patricks and Leigh Miners have collected just a solitary victory each from their six games.  And propping up the table is Egremont Rangers, who looked like they were in for a good season earlier this year having reached the third round of the Challenge Cup but are yet to win a game in the league.

DIVISION ONE

Having started a week later that the rest of the NCL all 12 teams are level on five games each and there’s a nice symmetry to how the teams are split.  The top eight teams all have points totals of 10, 9, 8, 7, 6, 5 and 4 which for me means this could become a very open league.

Currently topping the pile are Underbank Rangers.  This is a team I remember from my first Challenge Cup game last season when they surprisingly knocked out treble winners Leigh Miners in the opening round and they are currently unbeaten with five wins from five.  Having narrowly overcome Shaw Cross Sharks 24-22 in Round 1 they haven’t looked back and recently recorded huge 66-0 and 62-10 victories over Blackbrook and Hull Dockers respectively.

The other unbeaten side is Normanton Knights.  After a 24-24 draw with Blackbrook on the opening day they’ve gone from strength to strength with victories over Lock Lane, Featherstone Lions, Hunslet Club Parkside and Shaw Cross.

That defeat to Normanton Knights was the only one of the campaign so far for Hunslet CP who have won all of their other four matches and sit in third place.  Behind them in fourth is Milford Marlins with three victories and a draw, in fifth are Hunslet Warriors on three wins and the final team occupying a play-off spot is Lock Lane with two wins and a draw from five games.

At the wrong end of the table, Featherstone are the only side without a win to their name and Shaw Cross and Ince Rose Bridge join them in the play-off places with two points each.

DIVISION TWO

Askam were the early season table-toppers after Round 1 but have been unable to keep up that good start which has meant Crosfields, last season’s Division Three champions, are sitting a point clear at the top of the pile.  Five victories from their six games has seen them record a 74-0 trouncing over Salford City Roosters and narrow victories since.  Their only defeat has come away to Bradford Dudley Hill by 26-24.

And it’s Dudley Hill that are hot on their heels in second places just a point behind with four wins and a draw from six matches.  Their best result coming in Round 2 when they overcame Millom 42-6.  Their latest game saw them play out a 24-all draw with Oulton Raiders.

Thornhill Trojans sit in third place with eight points thanks to four victories in six.  Just behind them in fourth are East Leeds who also have eight points but have a slightly smaller points difference.  The final two play-off teams are Oulton Raiders and previous leaders Askam who are in six all because of an impressive 62-20 victory over Salford City Roosters in the last round.

Down at the bottom, Salford look like they’re in for a long hard season having lost all six games, scoring just 56 points and conceding 268.  If they carry on at this rate they could easily leak over 1000 points.  Just above them in the final relegation spot is Drighlington who have a solitary win but a game in hand on some of the clubs above them.

DIVISION THREE

Dewsbury Moor Maroons, who led the table after the first round of fixtures, have been overtaken at the top by Rylands Sharks.  The Sharks opening fixture against Gateshead Storm was postponed but they’ve since surged to the top thanks to four wins and a draw from the following five rounds.  Their only dropped point coming away to West Bowling in a 34-all draw.

One of those victories came at home to Dewsbury Moor and, coupled with an earlier defeat to West Bowling, have seen the West Yorkshire side slip to second one point behind the leaders with four victories from their six games.

Level on points with the Maroons are West Bowling and Stanningley who are third and forth respectively thanks to points difference.  Then there is a group of four teams all on four points with Eastmoor Dragons and Gateshead Storm in the final two play-off places.  They will have to fight to stay there though as Barrow Island and Stanley Rangers are breathing down their necks.

At the wrong end of the ladder is Elland, who dropped down from Division One at the end of last season and look to be another team staring at a long, hard year ahead with just one point from six games.

If you like what you read you can follow all my blogs on Twitter through @TheRLBlogger.

Focus On ... Restructure of Rugby League

Focus On ... Restructure of Rugby League

I’ve wanted to write a blog about the possible restructure of the game in this country for some time and, as you may have noticed, it’s started to raise its ugly head again.

It is inevitable that at some point over the next couple of years the RFL will adjust the league formats and there has been some talk already this year that it could happen as early as next season.  This is the final season of the RFL’s current three year cycle of allowing automatic promotion and relegation back into Super League by way of their revolutionary ‘Super 8’s’ concept.  In a way, the system has done what it was designed to do as is evident from Leigh Centurion’s rise into Super League and, already this early in the season, it looks a foregone conclusion that Hull KR are too strong for the Championship and will be fighting for a spot in the Million Pound Game if not having already been promoted by virtue of a top three finish in the Qualifiers.

If they do win promotion at the first attempt, and well done to them if they do, the RFL may decide to stick with this concept for a while longer.  I’ve got no problems with the Super 8’s/Qualifiers format in itself but I feel that Hull KR are already a SL standard club and, only if the likes of London Broncos or Featherstone Rovers joined them in Super League next year, would I be confident that this format is actually working.

I did like the idea of where they were going with it, but the slogan they tried to sell the concept with – “Every Minute Matters” – got lost somewhere in the final rounds of the campaign as clubs had all but secured their league positions by the time of the split.  Particularly in the ‘Super 8’s’ there were a lot of dead rubbers later on in the season for me.

However, this season seems to be a bit livelier earlier on, particularly in Super League, where games have been increasingly hard to call.  The Championship is having that same effect with the likes of Toulouse and Rochdale doing so well early on and even League 1 is looking exciting with some names inside the top half that we haven’t really seen there before.  It’s still very early days in all three divisions so we’ll wait and see how it pans out by Rounds 23 and 15.

Another aspect that has raised its head over the last few weeks is the possibility of some top-end National Conference League clubs being promoted into League 1.  Performances by those teams over the last couple of years have shown that they are fully capable of holding their own against clubs that are often lower down the League 1 table and, if it happens, it would hopefully show that the NCL clubs have not been forgotten.

Also, the press release that was published by the RLIF last week brought some interesting ideas to the fore.  As international rugby league is pretty close to my heart as well, the concept of a 9’s World Championship, the Emerging Nations World Cup, and the possible return of the Great Britain touring side is all very exciting stuff but will it ever happen?

That brings me on to the reason I’m writing this blog - the structure of the game in this country.

A few months ago I was reading up on Toronto Wolfpack, who would be venturing into competitive rugby league in our League 1, and happened to extend my research into the leagues they have in North America, predominantly the USA.  I noticed that the 12 or so rugby league clubs were split into the typical American sports style of divisions and conferences, between four and five teams in each division, who then play a number of games before qualifying for the Play-offs by virtue of finishing top of their divisions and conferences.

My brain got ticking and I started wondering if this could be worked into our system and whether supporters and clubs would like this idea.  Rugby league has been going through a bit of a stale period over the last few years and needs something that would bring the interest back into our game and provide some much needed income for the clubs that have struggled financially.

I decided to try and split the 40 current professional sides into three larger divisions and see if it would be viable to split each division into conferences based on America’s style.

SUPER LEAGUE (16)

Western Conference             Eastern Conference

Catalans Dragons                   Batley Bulldogs

Leigh Centurions                     Castleford Tigers

London Broncos                      Featherstone Rovers

Salford Red Devils                  Huddersfield Giants

St Helens                               Hull FC

Warrington Wolves                  Hull Kingston Rovers

Widnes Vikings                       Leeds Rhinos

Wigan Warriors                        Wakefield Trinity

If we take Super League first I believe it could work as a 16 team league split equally into two geographical conferences.  To make things simple, I decided to keep this season’s SL teams in here with the addition of the four teams that competed in last season’s Qualifiers - Hull KR, London Broncos, Featherstone Rovers and Batley Bulldogs.

When plotting those teams on a map I found the easiest way of splitting them was to try and go for the old Lancashire and Yorkshire style divisions as there would be eight Yorkshire sides and the rest from made up of four from Lancashire, two from Cheshire plus London and Catalans.  This was only an idea but another option would be making it literally east and west of a central line between all the clubs.  If we did that, Batley and Huddersfield would be in the Western Conference and Catalans and London part of the Eastern.

The idea would be that teams and supporters would have fewer miles to travel for games in the first part of the season and there would be more enticing derbies and, hopefully, more income for the clubs.  This structure would not be set in stone and could be chopped and changed in future seasons depending on the location of the clubs that year and to break the monotony of constantly playing derbies.

The first stage would compromise playing every team within their conference twice plus an inter-conference ‘Magic Weekend’ game for 15 games.  The top four from each Conference would then qualify for the ‘Super 8’s’ and play each other once for seven more matches, starting again from zero points, and the same would apply to the bottom eight who would play in a ‘Super League Shield’ group.

The final Play-off stage would see two sets of top fours, with semis and a final for the Super League and Shield titles, which could be set as a double header at Old Trafford on the last weekend of September.

The interesting part would be the bottom of the SL Shield group where two teams would automatically be relegated and the sixth place team would play third place in the Championship in the ‘Million Pound Game’.

Therefore the outcome would be that no SL team would play more than 24 league games in a season, with the season starting in early March and the World Club Series continues to be played at the end of February but as a season opener (as long as the NRL clubs remain interested!).

CHAMPIONSHIP (16)

Western Conference             Eastern Conference

Barrow Raiders                      Bradford Bulls

Keighley Cougars                   Dewsbury Rams

Oldham Roughyeds                Doncaster

Rochdale Hornets                   Halifax

Swinton Lions                         Hunslet Hawks

Toronto Wolfpack                    Sheffield Eagles

Whitehaven                            Toulouse Olympique

Workington Town                    York City Knights

The Championship would be based along the same lines as the Super League season and could pretty much run concurrently with SL.  The clubs that I have selected to play at this level are purely the eight teams from last season’s Championship Shield, the top seven from last season’s League 1, plus Toronto Wolfpack (who should have won promotion to the Championship for next season anyway) and are by no means a show of favouritism on my part.

Again I have split the clubs on the basis of east and west.  I could have put Toulouse into the Western Conference and moved Keighley to form another all-Yorkshire Eastern Group but felt the western teams probably wouldn’t appreciate having to travel to two foreign venues so early in the season.

As in SL, the first stage would compromise playing every team within their conference twice plus an inter-conference ‘Summer Bash’ game for 15 games.  The conferences would then split into ‘Championship 8’s’ and ‘Championship Shield’ and play each other once for seven more matches.

The difference comes in deciding which team is considered to be the ‘third placed’ Championship team for a place in the Million Pound Game but the but the easiest way of deciding that would be to base it on final league positions between the two clubs not contesting the 'Grand Final' after the full 24 rounds and semis.

Again two teams are automatically relegated with the sixth placed Shield team playing a play-off match to decide the final promotion spot.

LEAGUE 1 (16)

Northern Conference            Southern Conference

Leigh Miners Rangers             Coventry Bears

Manchester Rangers               Gloucestershire All Golds

Newcastle Thunder                 Hemel Stags

Rochdale Mayfield                  London Skolars

Siddal                                    London Chargers

Wath Brow Hornets                 North Wales Crusaders

West Hull                               Oxford

Wigan St Patricks                   South Wales Scorpions

League 1 proved slightly more tricky to determine which teams would compete in it but I picked it from the bottom eight League 1 clubs and top six NCL clubs from last year, and two ‘others’ to make up the 16 places.

The six clubs from the NCL would be joined by Newcastle Thunder and Manchester Rangers (who have aired hopes of joining League 1 in the near future anyway) to make an eight team ‘Northern Conference’.  The seven remaining southern teams could be joined by last season’s Southern Conference champions London Chargers to make up the eight ‘Southern Conference’ teams.

I felt that splitting the league in this way would provide more opportunities for the non-heartland teams to enjoy a better experience compared to what they usually see these days of travelling back from the north deflated after suffering heavy defeats.  Hopefully having the ability to play against teams of a similar standard with less travelling earlier on will help them build their confidence and be able to attract more fans, build a winning mentality and feel ready to face the heartland teams in the latter part of the season (I hope I didn’t sound to patronising there?).

Because it would be run on a similar basis to the SL and Championship, League 1 could then introduce their own ‘Magic/Summer Bash’ weekend and would therefore play a total of 24 games before play-offs.

CHALLENGE CUP

This brings us on to the Challenge Cup.  The current format of nine rounds would be able to stay with the first and second rounds both being played in February and the Final remaining on August Bank Holiday weekend.

Each of the early rounds could have up to 32 teams in each which would allow more clubs from the community and regional game to be allowed in and give them the experience of playing in a top level competition.

It could also give the lower league clubs a better chance of meeting a top Super League side if all the clubs from the same division enter the round together which hasn’t been the case in the last few years.

Round 1 (16-32)

·         Regional league and cup champions from the community game, student champions, armed forces, GB Police and selection of other National Conference League and southern teams enter competition

Round 2 (32)

·         Top 12 National Conference League teams plus other regional/national champions enter competition

Round 3 (32)

·         League 1 teams enter competition

Round 4 (32)

·         Championship teams enter

Round 5 (32)

·         Super League teams enter

Round 6 (16)

Quarter Finals (8)

Semi Finals (4)

Final (2)

CHAMPIONSHIP & LEAGUE 1 CUPS

The first difference that came to mind for the Championship clubs would be the introduction of a Championship Cup, similar to that currently played by League 1 clubs, which would give second tier teams a chance of winning some silverware of their own.  The finals of both competitions could be held at a neutral venue the same weekend as the Challenge Cup Final, possibly at another venue in London if not Wembley, and fans could purchase a ‘weekend ticket’ which would allow them to see all three games.

Round 1 (16)

Quarter Finals (8)

Semi Finals (4)

Final (2)

INTERNATIONAL RUGBY LEAGUE

This leads on to my final thoughts on what the international calendar could look like.  I like the concept of having a full international break mid-season.  It’s probably not to everyone’s taste but hear me out on this.  As a country we have often berated the RFL for not giving our English players more time together in an international team environment.  Therefore, two weeks out of the season at a training camp and playing an international match against a top tier nation in May would hopefully work wonders for the national team in the long run.

The Aussies and Kiwis play each other every summer so why can’t we get a regular fixture in place against another Pacific Island nation, France, or even a home nation?

By starting the season a week or two later there would also be room for a possible 9’s tournament at the start of the year, similar to that which is played in Australia, which would hopefully build interest for the coming season.  This could be played at a neutral venue or even moved around the country each year to try and showcase rugby league to the rest of the British Isles.

Let me know in the comments below what your thoughts are on what I’ve said.  I don’t mind if you like it or loathe it but I just thought it would make an interesting read.

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