So the question was asked on the Super League fans
Twitter page, if you could change anything in rugby league, what would it be?
This got me thinking and a number of things came to mind but one suggestion
made on there really stuck out to me, the licensing system.
Like many rugby league fans, I was quite happy with
the old promotion and relegation system. One of the best games I have ever been
to was the Wakefield v Castleford relegation battle in 2006. The passion,
tension, jubilation and despair were something that I will never forget but I fear
the magic that was created that night will never be seen again.
There is a divide in Super League, the teams who
will always finish in the top 8 and the ones who will not. The top teams, they
have the League Leaders Shield and Grand Final to fight for but what about the
teams at the bottom. Yes, no one wants their team to be relegated but surely it
would heighten the stakes. You get a sense that towards the end of the season,
the teams that are at the bottom of the table give up because at the end of the
day, what’s the worst that can happen?
Then there are the teams at the top of the
Championship, teams like Featherstone who have finished at the top time and
time again, what’s in it for them? Yes, the fans say it’s nice to win all the
time but what do they have to show for it? Surely they deserve the place of the
teams who have finished bottom of the league above; it’s how it works in most
other sports.
Only the other week it was claimed that Super League
has massive debts. Maybe that’s down to teams being forced into building
stadiums that they cannot afford to, in order to retain a Super League
franchise. I personally don’t see what’s wrong with the old stadiums, where the
fans can mix and you are so close to the action. Most teams with the big
stadiums can’t even fill them and the atmosphere is lost.
To me promotion and relegation makes the game into a
competition, something to fight towards. For those teams who never make it into
the play offs or past the first stage, it’s hardly been worth the 27 rounds but
knowing you have survived relegation would be a bonus.
The licensing system means that rugby league has
lost some of its spark. Promotion and relegation is a fair way of deciding who
deserves to be in the top flight. The matches are just not the same knowing
that no matter what, everyone is safe. Just because you can’t afford to build a
big, pointless stadium doesn’t mean you don’t deserve to play at the highest
level, it should be the performance on the pitch that seals your fate.
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