Play-Offs
The system whereby the top clubs in a division enter into post League season competition has a long history in Rugby League in this country. We believe that that should continue although we don’t like the current system whereby League Champions are determined in a one-off, winner takes all, match.
We would far prefer to see a separate competition after the league programme has culminated and that was how it was from 1974 to 1997 with the Premiership Trophy and between 1987 and 1997 the Divisional Premiership for teams outside the top tier.
It is worth pointing out that in soccer, despite the fact that nowadays they have play-offs outside the Premier League, the champions of each division are determined on the league table with each team playing the other teams in their league home and away (with no ‘loop’ fixtures’ or Magic Weekends or Summer Bash).
There is very, very little where we believe that soccer does it better than rugby league but this is the one example where we think they do.
That is not to say that there isn’t real merit in having a weekend which brings together the fans of all the teams (something we do in rugby league and they wouldn’t dare do in soccer!) but we really don’t think it is appropriate as part of the league table. Perhaps the answer there is to use those weekends for a Nines tournament.
Our play-offs were initiated in the 1998 season and Featherstone Rovers part in that was amazing!
1998 Play-Offs
After the penultimate weekend of the then named First Division competition, three teams had already qualified for the 5 team play-offs. They being Wakefield Trinity, Hull Kingston Rovers and Dewsbury Rams.
That left the last two places still to be determined with three clubs (Hunslet Hawks, Swinton Lions and Featherstone Rovers) still mathematically capable of making it.
That year the First Division had 11 teams so each week one of the teams had a bye. On the last weekend, it was Hunslet who didn’t play, having completed their league season the previous week.
Here’s how the top of the table looked just prior to the last set of fixtures on August 30th.
As you can see, Featherstone were outside the top five, but could still book their place by going above 4th place Hunslet. To do that we needed to win our last match by a margin of more than 32 points. It was a big ask but in our favour was the fact that we were at home to bottom club Leigh Centurions.
The tension during that match was huge! After a slow start we began to pull away and by half time we were 26 points ahead (30-4) so it all looked possible. In the end we ran out winners 58-4 so we had secured 5th place and could look forward to the play-offs. But we didn’t finish 5th. Although Swinton won their game against Whitehaven, they only did so by 6 points (20-14) so we actually ended up in 4th place, having gone above Swinton on points difference.
The play-offs came and the Fev team performed magnificently. We beat Swinton at home and then Dewsbury away which gave us a game away at Hull KR with the winner progressing to the Grand Final. Hull KR were judged to be the clear favourites to beat Fev and what did we do. Not only did we win but we did so by the unbelievable score line of 58-4.
So, on to the Grand Final at Huddersfield against league winners, Wakefield Trinity. To lose would have been heart breaking but to lose the way we did was absolutely awful. With time running out, Karl Pratt got the ball on the halfway line and ran through to score what would have almost been the match winning try only to be pulled back for a miniscule knock-on when he picked up the ball. We were still ahead but then Wakefield scored and our dreams of Super League in 1999 were shattered.
2022 Play-Offs
We love quirks but the qualification for the 2022 Championship play-offs has to have one of the quirkiest elements of all.
Prior to last Sunday’s matches, with four matches still to go, five out of the six places in the play-offs had already been claimed by Leigh, Fev, Halifax, Batley and Barrow.
There were three clubs (York, Widnes and Bradford) that could still claim the last available spot.
Widnes lost to Sheffield, Bradford lost to Whitehaven which meant that York were in the play-offs despite the fact that they lost 100-4 to Leigh! What a way to book your place in the play-offs. There’s never been anything like that!!
London Broncos
We suspect that all the teams who have qualified for the play-offs are glad that London Broncos are not in it. After an awful first half of the season when they were looking very likely to be relegated they have now won five of their last six games. They had a bit of a blip at Summer Bash, losing to Sheffield but the five victories have all been by clear margins, beating, for example, Newcastle 44-0 and Halifax 38-10. To put that in perspective, the match against the Broncos was Halifax’s only defeat in their last 10 games.
An amazing turn around which deserves to be noted.
No comments:
Post a Comment