Unfortunately there are no other broadcasters who could come close to the £20m on offer from Sky.

its been that way in the most for about 10 years, add in the loop fixtures and over exposure of playing the same teams.



Which is replicated on here, go back about 15 years ago before franchising and promotion and relegation (new teams) were removed for a while and on here was a warzone in the week leading up to saints wigan or widnes games, the boards were unreadable due to trolling and arguing and back and forth, bans handed out left right and centre,



Most clubs have been asleep at the wheel since they were gifted a stack of money back in 2015/16 when the last tv deal was almost forced upon the league, in a lot of cases, just existing with dwindling current supporters, almost in a similar position to where they were at the inception of SL

maybe he was, maybe he wasn't but the point at the time was he was trying to be proactive in terms of promotion and trying to encourage 11 other SL clubs to get their finger out collectively and realise they can't just coast, because it was going to bite the compeition in the .



You'll have the likes of wakey KR and cas who are dependent on SL funding, what have they done for the league.we had wigan begrudgingly joining in, saints sort of letting us do some stuff and cas and Leeds outright saying they dont want to be involved.



Granted SLE should be taking the lead on this from the top.

What I think you are saying is that more play makers are needed?

The two approaches are not mutually exclusive but if you are going to wind up the opposition in any market you'd ideally make sure that your product was top notch otherwise you'll look foolish.



I'm sorry for the derailed thread but taking your pizza analogy further, I'd suggest that our board does generally give the chef the most expensive ingredients. If the customers are still dissatisfied, the question is have we got the right chef or has the board been buying him too much pineapple when he's been asking for peperoni

Yeh off thread again but PINEAPPLE on a pizza is wrong on any level.

Questions would have to be asked about the buying team. Are they using the right suppliers? Are they driving a good deal or getting taken advantage of by suppliers?

Agreed.

So Sky have used RL to promote their politics and now bent them over a barrel, that’s gratitude.

Sky can swivel and please don’t sign the private equity deal whatever happens.

It might be a big gamble but I think the RFL should try and agree a short term TV deal.

Apart from crowds being allowed back in the stadium the best thing that could happen for RL in this country would be that England win the RL World Cup.

I know it is a big if but we were an ankle tap away 3 years ago and even though the aussies have some great players I am not sure that they have the same attitude as the Smith, Slater, Thurston etc etc era.

If England can pull off a win in the world cup then the value of the TV deal would increase dramatically

It would just be the luck of Northern Hemisphere RL that they agree a bargain basement TV deal and we win the world cup but in the same year the England Football team go and win the European Championship and we go and grab a bucket load of Olympic medals so get no exposure at all and have already signed up to a TV.



Just imagine though if France made it through to world cup Semi final and England won it whilst the football team get dumped out of the Euros at the group stage and the Olympics were not our finest hour. I don't think it would on the scale as the interest in RU after Wilkinson stuck over that drop goal in 2003 but in terms of a shot in the arm it would be massive. We might be able to move on from Batchelors mushy peas to Fray Bentos pies sponsoring the SL or maybe even Bisto gravy.

It's amazing really how ,back in the 60s ,BBC 2 used RL as a shot in the arm to get it underway & sky did the same but now sky barely pay the game lip service in their promotional advertising.

Perhaps a major problem money wise is that sky funds are needed elsewhere to compete with other networks to provide coverage of what have been marketed as & turned into international sports with global appeal ....football ,motor racing ,cricket ,the other ruggah, golf & more recently the women's versions of all those sports. Sports that attract worldwide spectators & worldwide betting opportunities & 24 hours viewers somewhere in the world.



Sadly, from what was used as a crutch to get sky up & running, over the years our game has been dictated to & marginalised to the status of shelf filler in its schedules.



You only have to look at how much money is poured into football in the UK by Sky ,BT ,& Amazon & others to get the matches to sell subscriptions to potential viewers & advertisers & not to forget the betting revenue.

I would like to think this would be the case, but I'm sceptical. I think England could win the RL World Cup without the vast majority of the public being aware. There would be a bit of coverage around the final, and I think a lot of people would have heard that we had won it. But its not like the Olympics or the football or cricket world cup, where the tournament builds momentum and England progress through stages and the excitement builds. The RLWC is about winning relatively straightforward games and then either 1 or 2 games against Aus/NZ and then its over.



If England had won the WC in 2017, I wonder what real difference we would have seen in crowds/participation.



There was talk about how the London Olympics would lead to a boom in participation sports and Andy Murray winning Wimbledon would lead to a boom in tennis and England winning the cricket world cup would lead to a boom in cricket but has it? I'm not sure, particularly on the cricket. I thought there was more of a resurgence in cricket after the Ashes win in 2005, than the World Cup win 2019.