What if there is no answer?

Rugby League is an innovative sport. If you've followed this sport for a while, you'll have heard this one a lot. It's usually uttered when our latest barnpot idea that we briefly convince ourselves will be the saviour of the sport is implemented.

Take the Challenge Cup. For years, Super League clubs entered the Challenge Cup at the last 32 stage. That was until we realised there wasn't a great deal of appeal in watching St Helens beat London Skolars in a foregone conclusion in front of 3,000 fans.

We therefore decided it was better to have Super League clubs enter later. That was until we realised there wasn't a great deal of appeal in seeing fixtures repeated too often and the competition essentially becoming a Super League cup. 

Around 7,000 watched Leeds v St Helens in the Challenge Cup this year. The week before 15,000 watched the same teams at the same venue in Super League. That is despite the Challenge Cup fixture being the far more consequential of the two. Yet, the empty spaces speak for themselves.

We have now attempted a half way house in which we try to amalgamate these two formats. The Challenge Cup for 2025 essentially has the same format as it does now, except Super League clubs have to play a lower league club to reach what is now the entry point.

If you think this is going to bring the crowds flooding back, I suspect you may be disappointed. The faded memories of no-contests of yesterday will come back into sharp focus. It may seem appealing now, but will Swinton hosting Castleford seem quite so appealing on a freezing February day?

It isn't just the Challenge Cup though. Super League is the same. We want automatic promotion and relegation one year. Then we want three year licenses. Then a system where some sides can be relegated but others can't. Or one where we want clubs to have 'stability' but review places in leagues annually, after a season finishes. Work that one out!

We had a first past the post system. Then a top five play off system. Then a top six play off system. Then a top eight play off system. Then a top four play off system. Then back to the first top five system. Now a top six system but a different one than the last time we had a top six system. Clear?

We keep changing things to try and find that magic formula to grow. Maybe we are missing the obvious. Maybe we do not want to admit it. There is no answer. No matter what we do maybe our sport doesn't have that mass appeal we think it does.

Many hark back to the good old days of 80,000 or 90,000 at Wembley for the Challenge Cup finals of times gone by. 

What they don't tell you is that the average league crowd then was 4,000. Now it is around 10,000. What they don't tell you is that more people attend Rugby League matches now across an average year than they did in the 1960's, 70's, 80's or 90's.

We are a sport with very little money and very little influence. The fact that around 2.3 million people per year go through a turnstile at a Rugby League venue each year is pretty decent.

Whereas once, more people attended big events and less attended league games, the opposite is now true. Big events have declined and regular league matches have increased.

It's strange because society has gone the other way. In wider society we have an event-driven culture and the routine is considered mundane. Our season ticket culture means fans will attend regular weekly round fixtures which are often inconsequential but forego the few matches in a season which actually have meaning.

Our habits of consuming sport has changed. That has offered clubs a guaranteed stream of season ticket income and has brought more people than ever through our turnstiles. This has come at a cost of harming our big events, or anything that is not covered by a season ticket.

Is that a good thing or a bad thing? I'll leave that for you to decide.