roofaldo2 wrote:
There are not enough quality players to justify a 14 team SL. That was always the trouble when the league expanded, because at the same time the RFL reduced the allowed number of overseas players as well as now removing the reserve team leagues, meaning players have to be 1st team ready by the time they're 19 or they're out on their ear.
I've always thought that if a player is good enough then they'll break into the first team organically regardless of the overseas players in the team. I'd prefer overseas quotas were removed entirely and replaced with a reward system for clubs who develop and promote junior players through their ranks.
But back to the MPG, it is the illusion of promotion and relegation, nothing more. Will Wakefield be as poor next year as they have been this year? Only time will tell, as well as how much they're able to pay out to actually put together a team for next season with their dropping crowds and lack of investment. But even so, I wouldn't bet against them making a second appearance in the MPG in 2016
If we keep reducing the number of clubs in SL and baring in mind the number of imports seems fairly constant, it's obvious that the talent pool will diminish.
The argument has been that we should be looking at quality rather than quantity but with the threat of relegation back on the agenda, clubs at the lower end of SL will keep on signing players to try and keep themselves in SL and this will certainly have an effect on youth development.
For Championship clubs to compete more evenly, we have to close the funding gap between the top two divisions.
What we have now is a system that will close the gap slightly for the clubs that finished top 4 in the Championship but this will have a detrimental effect on those that didn't make it into the top 4, which is likely to mean the same clubs occupying the top 4 next season and the season after that (sorry Fev).
Therefore we could have exactly the same middle 8's next season, fantastic (not).