Monday 20 August 2018

UK's Qualifying 8's : 2015-17

This is the most exciting part of UK RL. The bottom four from the elite Super League, taking on the top four from the second division Championship. The top two qualifiers from each division get four home games, the others three home games in a seven round competition.

The top three are automatically entering Super league the following year, the bottom three are likewise consigned to the Championship. That leaves 4th and 5th to play what they call the Million Pound game. The 4th placed team has home advantage. The winner into SL, the loser goes to the Championship.

The negative is that SL clubs in general don't like the scope of the jeopardy. The feeling is exposing four top clubs to possible relegation is too much. One team promoted and one relegated is less disruptive. Is the concern valid? So far, the answer is no. Of course, with the Qualifying 8's there is the possibility that four could swap places but even more possible no team will.

The brief history of this system indicates the worry is ill-founded. In the first year (2015), the was no change, with all SL clubs retaining their status. The following two seasons, one team has been promoted. In 2018, already it looks like there will be no wholesale demotion of SL clubs.

The reasons are simply that SL teams have larger budgets and play in a tougher league. That gives them an advantage that few Championship sides can overcome. In 2018, Halifax isn't even a full time club so inevitably is just making up the numbers. So the current system is exciting without being too disruptive.

Below is brief history of the current Qualifying 8's. The blue background is for SL clubs, yellow Championship and the (M) shows the winner of the million pound game. 2018 is still in progress so not included. You will notice for the three completed years, Championship sides took the three lowest places. Also, it has taken a minimum of ten points to qualify for SL without going the Million Pound game route.


2015
2016
2017

1 Hull KR 14 1 Leeds 12 1 Warrington 14

2 Widnes 10 2 Leigh 12 2 Widnes 10

3 Salford 10 3 Huddersfield 10 3 Hull KR 10

4 Wakefield (M) 6 4 Hull KR 8 4 Leigh 8

5 Bradford 6 5 Salford (M) 6 5 Catalans (M) 8

6 Halifax 4 6 London 6 6 London 3

7 Sheffield 4 7 Batley 2 7 Featherstone 3

8 Leigh 2 8 Featherstone 0 8 Halifax 0




Wednesday 15 August 2018

Balkans 9's : 2018

In 2014 and 2017, there was the Balkans Championship, a brief overview of the competition can be seen by clicking here. In 2018, a 9's version was held in Belgrade, Serbia. If you are unfamiliar with what 9's RL is simply click here. Five nations took part and I have what transpired outlined below.

There seems to have been two groups, Turkey, Albania and Bosnia & Herzegovina in one and Serbia and Bulgaria in the other. The results were:

Group One:

Turkey 16-0 Bosnia & Herzegovina.
Turkey 28-4 Albania.
Albania 22-10 Bosnia & Herzegovina.

Group Two:

Serbia 24-6 Bulgaria

3rd-4th Place:

Bulgaria 8-4 Albania

Final:

Turkey 14-10 Serbia

Unofficial Games:

An invitation team made up of players from several European nations played Bulgaria and Bosnia to give them more exposure to the game. Both of these were won by the invitation side, but more to the point was an excellent initiative to give those two nations greater experience.

Summary:

Serbia as host and most experienced of the nations would have been expected to take it out but that was not to be. Of course, this format creates upsets due to the reduced time as happens in Cricket's Twenty/20. The hope is Greece and Montenegro will be involved next year.

The final can be seen below:

Tuesday 14 August 2018

European U19 Championships : 2018

Serbia hosted this event from August the 5th to 12th. The teams that qualified were: Serbia, Italy, Russia, France, England, Ireland, Scotland and Wales. Russia had to pull out due to finances and the Ukraine  took their place.

The games initially pitted experienced teams with inexperienced ones, so results were initially going to be one sided. That's what happened and here is the first round of results:

August 5th:

England 64-0 Serbia
Scotland 30-18 Ireland
Wales 90-0 Ukraine
France 70-0 Italy

August 8th:

Serbia 54-26 Ukraine
England 44-4 Wales
Ireland 26-10 Italy
France 38-6 Scotland

August 12th:

7th-8th place - Italy 58-6 Ukraine
5th-6th place - Serbia 36-24 Ireland
3rd-4th place - Wales 42-18 Scotland
1st-2nd place - France 26-24 England.

It was a successful event with the next one to be held in 2020 at a location still to be decided. Hopefully more sides can be invited next time and finances sorted so that all who qualify can attend.

Serbia v Ireland

Wales v Scotland

France v England
Picture source: The official site.

Wednesday 8 August 2018

NZ National Competition : 2018 (Introduction)

The 2018 season is about to kick off on 11th August 2018 NZT. For a summary of 2017 and links to years earlier, simply click here. For the 2018 season, these are the top four regions (Premiership) playing a three round comp.


 Then below that there are three regions of ten teams that produce a winner from each .


It then seems the best of the Championship plays the lowest of the Premiership to decide whether p/r takes place. It's not a huge competition but important in the context of where RL in New Zealand is. It's not overly expensive to run, yet gives a national structure of RL above regional club competitions.

Sunday 5 August 2018

UK Championship Attendances : 2016-18

The regular season has concluded and an exciting competition was enjoyed. The attendances were up on 2016 but down on 2017. The changing of teams involved each year has an impact on the averages so in reality it's hard to read too much into the total figures.

What we can see is the Summer Bash festival wasn't that successful this year, in terms of attendees. Also, because Toronto played its first two games away from its Lamport home ground and forfeited a third home match to compete in the SL Magic Weekend meant its average wasn't as high as it would otherwise had been. Let's look at individual clubs over the past two seasons (2016 vs 2018) to see how their attendance numbers have fared.

Pluses: London (+15.4%) Sheffield (+13.1) Toulouse (+13.1, one season comparison) Featherstone (+11.8) Average (+11.5) Swinton (+1.3).

Minuses: Leigh (-0.2%, middle season in SL) Batley (-1.6) Halifax (-11.8) Dewsbury (-15.2) Summer Bash (-25.8) Rochdale (-37.5, one season comparison).

Toronto and Barrow weren't eligible to be gauged.

CHAMPIONSHIP – Regular season only

2018 2017 2016
1 Toronto 5,781 Hull KR 7,351 Bradford 4,621
2 Leigh 3,539 Bradford 4,119 Leigh 3,545
3 Toulouse 2,437 Featherstone 2,457 Featherstone 2,071
4 Featherstone 2,316 Toulouse 2,154 Halifax 1,986
5 Halifax 1,752 Halifax 1,695 Dewsbury 1,181
6 Barrow 1,239 Batley 1,150 Batley 1,100
7 Batley 1,082 Dewsbury 1,089 Oldham 877
8 Dewsbury 1,001 Rochdale 878 Swinton 829
9 London 861 Oldham 815 London 746
10 Swinton 840 London 804 Workington 704
11 Sheffield 704 Swinton 791 Whitehaven 702
12 Rochdale 549 Sheffield 626 Sheffield 623

Summer B 11,805 Summer B 16,444 Summer B 15,912
Total 249,125 Total 279,664 Total 225,100
Avg 1,805 Avg 2,012 Avg 1,619

Summary: Hull KR's presence was huge in 2017, not only home games but travelling supporters too. Bradford too was missed in 2018 and those teams not being there took the average down. Toronto doesn't provide travelling fans despite it's strong home support, which is another factor to consider. Teams from offshore will never bring fans along but that is a small price to pay for expanding the game.

With those points taken into consideration, it was a reasonably supported competition. Many of the clubs are in smaller population centres, so will never have huge numbers turning up. Some in larger cities are clearly flying beneath the radar. Could they do more to enrich the game day experience and attract better crowds? Of course and that is something that they should be taking on board.

Thursday 2 August 2018

UK SL Attendances : 2016-18

Attendances have been advancing in the UK over some time but for the last few years, they have slipped slightly. SL wants to reduce the number of teams they claim to increase the standard. However, it's really to provide greater TV revenue to each team competing. The stupidity of that logic would turn the competition into a repetitious yawn fest. No, the numbers need to go up and hopefully from teams outside the northern heartland.

Anyway, to look at the data. Total attendees for the 23 rounds of regular matches has decreased 6.4% over the last two years. A breakdown by clubs comparing 2016 and 2018, best to worst are:

Pluses: Hull FC (+6.7%) Huddersfield (+5.5) St Helens (+3.3) Hull KR (+2.4) Castleford (1.7).

Minuses: Wakefield (-1.5%) Warrington (-9.2) Wigan (-13.1) Widnes (-13.2) Catalan (-14.4) Salford (-18.3) Leeds (-19.4).










SUPER LEAGUE 2016-18 Excl Super 8's


2018 2017 2016

1 Leeds 12,807 Leeds 14,950 Leeds 15,886

2 Hull FC 12,175 Wigan 13,983 Wigan 13,541

3 Wigan 11,773 Hull FC 11,661 Hull FC 11,407

4 St Helens 11,479 St Helens 10,749 St Helens 11,116

5 Warrington 10,088 Warrington 10,478 Warrington 11,112

6 Catalans 8,354 Catalans 8,777 Catalans 9,764

7 Castleford 7,848 Castleford 8,734 Hull KR 7,775

8 Hull KR 7,965 Leigh 6,522 Castleford 7,719

9 Huddersfield 5,721 Huddersfield 5,842 Widnes 5,643

10 Wakefield 5,244 Widnes 5,767 Wakefield 5,322

11 Widnes 4,898 Wakefield 5,287 Huddersfield 5,422

12 Salford 2,966 Salford 4,455 Salford 3,630


Magic W/E 64,319 Magic W/E 65,407 Magic W/E 68,276

Total 1,178,800 Total 1,244,664 Total 1,259,996

Avg 8,542 Avg 9,019 Avg 9,130









Leigh was not included in the percentages as they were only there for the 2017 season. Poor weather early in the 2018 season wasn't helpful and Leeds may have been affected with major stadium improvements. Widnes and Salford were already low so sizable drops in numbers was the last thing they needed. The Magic Weekend was down 5.8% for the last two seasons.

Summary: New teams would enliven SL and if Toronto was able to join in 2019, that would be the sort of change that would add new interest. It would also add a new market in Canada to the game, increasing sponsorship opportunities and media opportunities. There is enough talent to increase the number of clubs, but doing so while maintaining (or increasing) revenue is the issue.