WE are now six rounds into the season and the Super League table has an ominous look about it if you are one of the bottom four clubs.
Leigh, Hull FC, Castleford and London are in danger of being tailed off and the only surprising thing about that statement is that Leigh have managed to win only one league match out of five.
The Leopards have suffered defeats against Huddersfield, St Helens, Leeds and Salford, while only gaining one win, albeit by a 50-point margin at Hull FC.
Leigh were unlucky in that they didn’t have a game in week two of the new season because their opponents should have been Wigan, who were engaged in the World Club Challenge.
It seems unfair to me that the World Club Challenge is played after our season has started, forcing one team to be disadvantaged by having a blank weekend just when it needs to play itself into the new season.
I would be very surprised if Leigh don’t rise rapidly up the league, although whether that process will begin this Thursday, when they host Wigan at the Leigh Sports Village in the Battle of the Borough, is highly unlikely.
But it looks to me as though the other three clubs at the bottom of the league will be able to contest for the bottom place between them, although with no relegation this year that is likely to be a sterile contest.
At the top of the league, it looks likely that we will have the same three teams – Wigan, Catalans and St Helens – battling for the top three places, unless Hull KR can demonstrate that they are capable of upsetting one or all of those three leading clubs.
The Easter weekend was the first weekend in which all six Super League matches were played at discrete times, so it would be interesting to see how that affects the number of viewers who watched the Sky broadcasts.
Sadly, the viewing figures seem to be guarded like the Crown Jewels these days.
There was a great game in the Championship at Featherstone on Good Friday, with Wakefield prevailing against their near neighbours and gaining revenge for their Challenge Cup exit a few weeks earlier.
And in League One we saw Oldham run up 50 points against their neighbours Rochdale to demonstrate that that competition is likely to be a one-horse race this year.
Both they and Wakefield seem to be in the wrong competition this year, while the same can be said of London, who are showing plenty of spirit in Super League but are clearly out of their depth.
That’s no doubt thanks largely to the fact that even if they had recruited the 13 best players in the world, they would still be demoted to the Championship next season.
We have to thank the IMG grading system for that.
