I feel this may be one of those "Greater good" moments. I know that we can never compete with the NRL in any time soon.
However, I do think that if there starts to be an exodus of talent (which will sadly probably have to include Sam) then the RFL might finally see it as something to worry about and start to make changes.
The main change that is needed is definitely the size of the league. The NRL only has 2 more teams and has more than double the money coming in from outside sources that we do. If thats all they can accomodate then how can we even begin to think that we can accomodate 14 teams in the long term?
Secondly there needs to be blanket changes at the top. Preferably a completely new management team.
Then we need a big change in the player's conditions. The way that sponsorships etc is frowned upon is madness. I know that its started to be relaxed slightly but there needs to be more.
For me if I had a choice between playing RL for 50k or playing RU for 50k + a car and other sponsorships like many have then I would choose RU.
We need big changes to the international scene but that wont come any time soon as the Australians arent really bothered about it it seems, much like the WCC which needs a bit of a rethink too. An end of season thing would be better than the game at the start that always means that two teams have played 1 less game until half way through the season.
I dont want the Cap to go but relaxing of it wouldnt go amiss. For example what Paramatta are supposedly doing for Folau is what we got done for with Fielden in effect. If a team is making much more money then they should be allowed to spend more money.
There needs to be REAL punishments for teams not running themselves in a satisfactory manner. If I were in control I wouldnt give a damn how famous the Bradford name is theyd be out the super league and in a lower league.
Finally we need to take our time and not expect everything at once. Im talking mostly about expansion. We need to build a heart that is stable enough to support the expansion first. Once we have 12 teams in the heartlands that are strong enough to sustain themselves if more are added then add more. Ok Catalans has been a success of sorts but London have been there for a while and arent really that stable and we all know about Crusaders. If Crusaders had been given a few more years to stabilise in the lower leagues they'd probably still be here.