CONFERENCES MIGHT BE THE SOLUTION
IT HAS been mooted that from the 2024 season, Super League will comprise two leagues of ten.
Presumably each team would play the others three times to provide a twenty-seven-match league season.
However, rather than a Super League One and Super League Two system, based on league positions at the end of the 2023 season, what might be the merits of having two conferences, a Super League Eastern Conference and a Super League Western Conference?
IMG might need initially to adjudicate who would go into each conference.
Most would be clear-cut Leeds and Hull (clearly Eastern), St Helens and Wigan (clearly Western) for example, but there might be some debate about others. Catalans say, and possibly Toulouse. But the benefit would be more derby matches and some reduced travelling distances for supporters.
There would be two Conference Champions (the teams finishing top of each conference), followed by cross-conference play-offs to determine the overall Super League Grand Final winner.
It wouldn't work however, without equal central funding for all twenty teams, which might be a stumbling block.
Brian Langthwaite, Leeds
RELEGATION INTEGRITY
There has been a lot of talk about this season’s relegation battle.
It was mentioned on Sky Sports that if St Helens have already won the League Leaders' Shield by their last match of the season, they could field a severely weakened team against Toulouse in that match.