Sports   (Talk about balls here.)

You answered your own question with the quote "we would be the number one sport in the country if we had wendy balls coverage"

If you took football coverage down to that of RL and RL to that of football, then you would see a rise in its popularity. That goes for any sport.

Football is the number 1 sport in this country, and the press will swarm over anything to do with it, both on and off the pitch.

Manchester has two of the biggest clubs in the world. No other sport can compete with that.

I think RL is a victim of media conspiracy. The Sunday Times, after a big Union match would have two broadsheet pages devoted to the match. There would be diagrams of a particular move, player ratings, and lots of type.
The same paper would hardly print anything about a Challenge Cup Final - usually just a column and a photo. The national papers anywhere apart from the North have bugger all RL news, yet have Union and football news on several pages.

As for London RL - getting across that damned city is a nightmare. The club has very few roots in a city with 14 professional clubs. The club are getting thrashed at the moment and the fans are fickle.

But take a look at Les catalans.....big support down there and the French love their league. Not always the case, as RL was banned by the Vichy Government, and although the ban was lifted in 1947, the game of RL in France was not permitted to use the word "Rugby" in its title. This was only changed as recently as 1991.

Proof indeed that RL is a victim of the establishment. Where else would you get that treatment, and why would the armed forces of this country actively discriminate against RL by prohibiting the game being played?