fevnut's blog: Fev v Barrow

Match 33: Barrow Raiders  (Home) 
Championship Shield

fevnut's musings

They have gone stark staring bonkers!

We want rugby league to be taken seriously as a great game that deserves and needs to attract many more players, spectators and media coverage.

But who can take it seriously when clubs start the season with the knowledge of the consequences for the following year and then it is all changed with less than a month to the season’s end. Of course, it didn’t affect Super League but it does make a very big difference to the clubs at the bottom end of the Championship and the top end of League One.

When they went to bed on Thursday September 13th, Rochdale Hornets knew that they were being relegated to League One in 2019 and at Swinton Lions it would take a miracle if they were not to suffer the same fate. Now, following the meeting on September 14th, one of them will remain in the Championship and the other will have to play a preposterous game against the losers of the League One play-off final a week after the season was due to end.

We all like holidays, but professional and semi-professional players can’t take theirs during the season so many book their holidays for straight after the season ends. And for semi-professional players that also means that they have to book their leave from work for their holidays.  Which players are affected by this crazy decision won’t be known until hours before some of them were due to go away. Maybe we will end up with promotion and relegation decided by a 7 a-side match! What makes it even worse is that the venue for this match is to be decided by the toss of a coin. Honestly, what a way to determine promotion and relegation.

Given that such a crazy scenario was decided upon it would have been better if the League One play-off final had been brought forward to the Wednesday and then the extra match could have been played on the following Sunday. Even then there is a possibility that some of the players from the relevant Championship club would have been away on holiday as they would have known for months that there season would be ending this coming Sunday. Maybe it would have been more sensible to say that, in the light of increasing the Championship teams to 14 that there would be no relegation this year. We don’t like that but anything would be better than the cock-eyed plan that was brought in.

We would like to see a simple rule introduced to the governance of rugby league. That no changes can be made to the structure for the following season once a season has begun.

Future Changes

Who believes that the structure cobbled together in September is there for a long time to come? If you do, then we think you are deluded bearing in mind the regular changes over the years. Surely the fans will find the Super League 'loopy' fixtures to be unattractive and we have no doubt that sooner rather than later there will be cries for them to be got rid of.

We do, however, believe that the reversion to the 1998 play-off configuration is very welcome. It provides real excitement with one club going out per week and also gives a real reward for finishing top of the league.

But there has to be a huge question mark over the structure of League One. Several journalists have written about how exciting it was, but they were only referring to the top end, the fight for the automatic promotion place between York and Bradford and the equally interesting battle to claim the play-off places. At the bottom end things look very different. Before this year the highest number of points conceded in the entire history going back to 1895 was the 1,604 shipped by Highfield in the 30 match second division season of 1994/95. Never before have three clubs in one league had over 1,000 points scored against them in the same season. It happened this year to Coventry Bears, Hemel Stags and West Wales Raiders with West Wales conceding a totally unprecedented 2,106 points. That’s more than 500 greater than the previous worst. In fact, West Wales have averaged more than a point a minute against them over the whole League One campaign.

This seems to tell us that the way these clubs have been brought into the professional game is deeply flawed. Of course we want to see professional clubs developing all over the UK but the current way of doing things simply doesn’t work.

Perhaps the answer would be 16 teams in each of Super League and the Championship underpinned by a Development/Recovery league (no, we wouldn’t call it that). Promotion from the bottom league would be subject to meeting certain criteria, such as a clearly strong and viable business plan, the team actually based in the area they purport to represent (Hemel Stags are currently based in Sheffield!) and a minimum average home crowd figure, possibly 500. Being in such a league would allow these clubs to grow and strengthen and in the knowledge that they need to develop before they can make progress.

There were also four Championship teams who conceded over 1,000 points in 2018, Barrow Raiders, Sheffield Eagles, Rochdale Hornets and Swinton Lions suffering that ignominy. That re-inforces the point we made previously that the Championship has become two separate leagues in one with the bottom teams being regularly beaten by a very large margin when playing those at the top.

Astonishing and very worrying

To illustrate the point we are making we want to put on record a statistic that no-one seems to have published so far. Seven clubs recorded their highest ever score against West Wales this year. They are York City Knights (144), Bradford Bulls (124), Keighley Cougars (112), Doncaster (102), Oldham (102), Newcastle Thunder (98) and Coventry Bears (64).

But it doesn’t end there because Hunslet (86) and London Skolars (76) equalled their record highest score and Whitehaven (84) recorded their highest score in the summer era.

Fev and Barrow: Comparative 2018 Match Stats

Fev and Barrow: 
Comparative 2018 
Match Stats

T’Other Side: Barrow Raiders

T’Other Side: Barrow Raiders

Barrow Raiders 2018 shirts

LAST TIME OUT

Head Coach: Paul Crarey

Paul Crarey is Cumbria (and particularly Barrow) rugby league through and through. His first spell as the Raiders coach was in 2006 and 2007. In 2008 he was the coach of Whitehaven for a few months. He returned to the head coach role at Barrow in 2015 after they had been relegated to League One the previous year. In his first season back they finished 7th, improved to 5th in 2016 and then achieved promotion last year. Now he has guided then to comfortably retaining their Championship status for next season. He has also coached the Cumbria representative team.

As a player he was a hooker. After starting at Dalton ARL he joined Barrow in 1987 and played for them for eight years. The only other professional club he ever played for was Carlisle.

Captain: Martin Aspinwall

Barrow Raiders captain, Martin Aspinwall, brings a lot of super league experience to their side. He began his career as an 18 year-old with Wigan, his hometown club in 2001 and stayed there until 2005. That was followed by five years at Huddersfield Giants and then a year each at Castleford Tigers and Hull FC. He had three years at Leigh with a short loan spell at Swinton. He joined Barrow in 2016. He has also played for Lancashire, England A and Great Britain.

At the back

Ryan Burroughs joined Barrow on loan from Toronto Wolfpack at the end of June. He plays mainly on the wing but has also filled in at fullback. Earlier this season he played 5 games on loan at London Skolars. He is a genuine United States international (born in Virginia) but ‘learnt his trade’ playing for Wentworthville Magpies in Australia.

Brett Carter usually plays on the wing but has also played at fullback. His career started with Barrow in 2008 as a fullback but moved to Workington the following year where he stayed for 8 years gradually moving to the wing position. Last year he returned to Barrow. This year he has also been used as a goal kicker when Jamie Dallimore is not available. Brett has played for Cumbria and Scotland.

Georgy Gambaro is on loan from Catalans Dragons where he has been playing for their reserve team (Saint Estève). He is one of three players from Catalans that Barrow signed on loan in July. He is a winger who can also play at centre and last year he made two appearances for the French U18 team.

Ryan Fieldhouse is Barrow’s regular fullback. He started with Halifax in 2011 and moved to Dewsbury for a year in 2015 and joined Barrow in 2016. In 2016 he represented Cumbria. Ryan is the son of the former Great Britain prop John Fieldhouse.

In the halves

Scrum half Lewis Charnock had a long lay-off this season but returned to the team at the beginning of September. His career started at Saint Helens in 2013. In 2015 he played for Rochdale on dual registration and the following year he went on loan to Bradford Bulls. He signed for Barrow last year. In 2013 he played for the England Academy.

At stand-off is Jamie Dallimore who is Barrow’s main goal kicker. Before joining Barrow in 2016, he played for Oldham (2011-12) and North Wales (2013-2016). In 2013 he played for a Wales Select XIII and in 2016 for Cumbria.

Ryan Johnston made 4 appearances for Barrow in 2017. This year he went back to playing for amateur club Dalton but was persuaded to return to Barrow in April.

At Hooker

Nathan Mossop made his début with Barrow in 2009 and has been there ever since apart from a single season with South Wales in 2012.

Australian, Dean Parata, who plays predominantly at hooker but has also played a couple of games at scrum half, was previously with Wests Tigers. He is an Italian international.

In the Pack

Arnaud Bartès is another of the Saint Estève players who came in on loan in July. He plays either at prop or loose forward. Despite not speaking any English he seems to be having a major impact.

Playing in the second row, Jono Smith was at North Wales from 2012-2015 and then had two years at Rochdale before joining Barrow this season. He plays with huge gusto which has led to more yellow cards than the average!

Playing at either second row or centre is Australian Jarrad Stack, who came to England to join Workington in 2009, joining Barrow in 2017. He is a good ball-handler and a regular try scorer.

Another Australian Alec Susino who plays at prop or loose forward was signed from Mounties in New South Wales. He, too, is an Italian international.

Dual Registration and Loan Players

Barrow Raiders do not have a dual registration agreement. They currently have three players from Catalans Dragons reserve team on loan: Georgy Gambaro, Arnaud Bartès and Saloty Mendy. Jon Pownall came on loan from Toronto Wolfpack but is now at Bradford Bulls. Also on loan from Toronto is Ryan Burroughs who is still with Barrow.

The Fev connection

There are no members of the Barrow squad who have players who have played for Fev, but there are two in the Fev squad who have been at Barrow. They are Keal Carlile who had a six match loan spell there in 2010 and Jason Walton who played two games for Barrow on dual registration from Salford in 2014.

Player Birthdays: September 30th to October 6th

Player Birthdays:
September 30th to October 6th

Past Matches against Barrow Raiders

Past Matches against Barrow Raiders

LAST TIME

Sunday's referee: Fev v Barrow

This Week's Referee

There have been many occasions when fevnut has been asked questions like: Who's the referee today? Have we had him before? Where's he from?

So we thought we would answer those questions in our blog.

Tom Crashley, from Wakefield, is an occasional referee. This only his 11th this year. For Fev this is his 2nd and prior to that we hadn't had him since 2014.

Below you will find all his Fev matches and all his 2018 matches. 

Championship Talk: Super Saturday

fevnut's blog is absolutely delighted to have received permission to bring you a regular column from Gareth Walker.

Gareth is a top rugby league journalist who has one very exceptional distinction. He chooses to write about matters pertaining to the Championship and League One.

Although this blog is devoted to Featherstone Rovers it is always good to read opinions about matters relevant to us, but not specifically about us. We hope you enjoy reading Gareth's column each week.

Super Saturday

LAST Saturday was one of the most significant days for rugby league outside the top flight in living memory.

         

Within a matter of hours, London, Toulouse and Toronto had beaten Super League opponents Salford, Hull KR and Widnes in the Qualifiers to throw that competition wide open.

         

That all three come from outside Lancashire and Yorkshire made the results even more eye-catching, and certainly showed the progress that the competition as a whole has made in recent years.

         

The whole trio run full-time squads that has allowed them to compete with their Super League counterparts, and in some people’s mind justify the current Super 8s system.

         

But whatever your opinion on the demise of that structure, there’s little that can be done to change it now - so can the Championship continue to thrive under the new plans?

         

There are a number of issues to consider.

         

The central funding at the top end of the second tier is unlikely to be as large as it is now, with an evening-out of the distribution set to be introduced and end what can be a £600,000 difference between top and bottom in the competition.

         

That was in place to allow the leading clubs to challenge top flight opponents in the Qualifiers, and has clearly worked to an extent, although it should be pointed out that Toronto are self-funded and Toulouse didn’t receive the windfall this year having missed 2017’s top four.

         

But with no Qualifiers, the clubs will only be competing against each other from next year, so a levelling out of funding does make sense - although some kind of incentivised prize money would also be sensible.

         

From next year Championship clubs can concentrate solely on being the best team in their competition with one automatic promotion place open to the winners of the Grand Final - although parachute payments for Super League clubs dropping down will give them a considerable advantage.

         

Still, it’s that window of opportunity that will hopefully be enough to attract the necessary investors to the sport at this level - and a new TV deal wouldn’t hurt on that front either, both in terms of money and exposure.

         

It’s a changing landscape for the competition and it would be a massive loss for the sport as a whole if it doesn’t have strong clubs in the second tier pushing up.

         

Among those next year could be York City Knights, who must be mentioned after securing promotion on the final day of the regular season.

         

They have been outstanding this year under coach James Ford and have the ambition and vision to rival those clubs striving to join the elite in coming years.

Swinton v Fev: Teams and Scorers

Swinton v Fev: 
Teams and Scorers
Championship 
Shield Round 6