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2012 Super League season

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Super League XVII
File:Stobart Super League Logo 2012.png
The Engage Super League competition logo
LeagueSuper League
Duration27 Rounds (Followed by 4 round playoffs)
Teams14
Highest attendanceN/A
Lowest attendanceN/A
Average attendanceN/A
AttendanceN/A
Broadcast partnersUnited Kingdom Sky Sports

Australia Nine Network

France Orange Sport

United States America One

Europe Sport Klub
2012 season

The 2012 Super League season (known as the Stobart Super League XVII) is to be the seventeenth season of rugby league football since the Super League format was introduced in 1996.[1] Fourteen teams will compete for the League Leader's Shield over 27 rounds (including the Magic Weekend at Etihad Stadium), after which the highest finishing teams will enter the play-offs to compete for a place in the Grand Final and a chance to win the championship and the Super League Trophy.

The season will kick off on 3 February with two Round 1 fixtures being played. All clubs are also set to participate in the 2012 Challenge Cup tournament.

The first games of the new season are scheduled to be Leeds Rhinos vs Hull KR and Widnes Vikings vs. Wakefield Wildcats. It will be Widnes' first Super League match since 2005.

Teams

Super League XVII was the first year of a licenced Super League. Under this system, promotion and relegation between Super League and Championship was abolished, and 14 teams were granted licences subject to certain criteria. All team except Crusaders RL(who pulled out of the application process) earned a place in the 2012 season, Championship team Widnes Vikings were given a license after their application was deemed better than Halifax RLFC and Barrow Raiders.

Geographically, the vast majority of teams in Super League are based in the north of England, five teams – Warrington, St Helens, Salford, Wigan and Widnes – to the west of the Pennines in Cheshire, Greater Manchester and Merseyside, and seven teams to the east in Yorkshire – Huddersfield, Bradford, Wakefield, Leeds, Castleford, Hull and Hull KR. Catalans Dragons are the only team based in France and are outside of the UK and London Broncos are the only team to be based in a capital city (London).

The maps below indicate the locations of teams that competed in Super League XVII.

Team Stadium Capacity City/Area
Bradford Bulls (2012 season) Grattan Stadium, Odsal 27,000 Bradford, West Yorkshire
Castleford Tigers (2012 season) The Jungle 11,750 Castleford, West Yorkshire
Catalans Dragons (2012 season) Stade Gilbert Brutus 10,000 Perpignan, Pyrénées-Orientales, France
Huddersfield Giants (2012 season) Galpharm Stadium 24,544 Huddersfield, West Yorkshire
Hull (2012 season) Kingston Communications Stadium 25,404 Kingston upon Hull, East Riding of Yorkshire
Hull Kingston Rovers (2012 season) "New" Craven Park 9,471 Kingston upon Hull, East Riding of Yorkshire
Leeds Rhinos (2012 season) Headingley Carnegie Stadium 22,250 Leeds, West Yorkshire
London Broncos (2012 season) Twickenham Stoop 12,700 Twickenham, London
Salford City Reds (2012 season) Salford City Stadium 12,000 Salford, Greater Manchester
St Helens RLFC (2012 season) Langtree Park 18,000 St Helens, Merseyside
Wakefield Trinity Wildcats (2012 season) Belle Vue 12,600 Wakefield, West Yorkshire
Warrington Wolves (2012 season) Halliwell Jones Stadium 15,500 Warrington, Cheshire
Widnes Vikings (2012 season) (Stobart Stadium[Halton Stadium]) 11,500 Widnes, Cheshire, England
Wigan Warriors (2012 season) DW Stadium 25,138 Wigan, Greater Manchester
Legend
  Reigning Super League champions
  Defending Challenge Cup Champions

Rules

Rule changes

  • Teams will now only be able to make 10 interchanges in a match which has been reduced from 12.
  • If a player in possession of the ball hits the corner flag he will no longer be deemed 'In Touch'.

Operational rules

  • All Super League clubs agreed to operate within the £1.7million salary cap for their top 25 first-tier players.
  • Quota spots were reduced to 5, meaning only 5 players could be from abroad. However, players from France, Samoa, Tonga and Papua New Guinea all count as federation-trained and thus do not count against the quota.

Table

Main article: 2012 Super League season results
Super League XVII
Pos Team
 Pld W D L PF PA PD Pts Qualification
1 Wigan Warriors (L) 27 21 0 6 994 449 +545 42 Play-offs
2 Warrington Wolves 27 20 1 6 909 539 +370 41
3 St Helens 27 17 2 8 795 480 +315 36
4 Catalans Dragons 27 18 0 9 812 611 +201 36
5 Leeds Rhinos (C) 27 16 0 11 823 662 +161 32
6 Hull F.C. 27 15 2 10 696 621 +75 32
7 Huddersfield Giants 27 14 0 13 699 664 +35 28
8 Wakefield Trinity Wildcats 27 13 0 14 633 764 −131 26
9 Bradford Bulls 27 14 1 12 633 756 −123 23[a]
10 Hull Kingston Rovers 27 10 1 16 753 729 +24 21
11 Salford City Reds 27 8 1 18 618 844 −226 17
12 London Broncos 27 7 0 20 588 890 −302 14
13 Castleford Tigers 27 6 0 21 554 948 −394 12
14 Widnes Vikings 27 6 0 21 532 1082 −550 12
Source: superleague.co.uk and BBC Sport.
Rules for classification: 1st on competition points; 2nd on match points difference.
Competition points: for win = 2; for draw = 1; for loss = 0.
(C) Champions; (L) League Leaders' Shield Winners
Notes:
  1. ^ Bradford Bulls deducted 6 points on 25 July 2012 for entering administration[2]

Play-offs

See also: 2012 Super League season results - Play-offs

The play-offs commenced following the conclusion of the 27-round regular season. To decide the grand finalists from the top eight finishing teams, Super League uses its unique play-off system. The finals concluded with the 2012 Super League Grand Final.

Home Score Away Match Information
Date and Time (Local) Venue Referee Crowd
QUALIFYING AND ELIMINATION FINALS
Team Score Team Date Stadium Referee Attendence
Team Score Team Date Stadium Referee Attendence
Team Score Team Date Stadium Referee Attendence
Team Score Team Date Stadium Referee Attendence
PRELIMINARY SEMI-FINALS
Team Score Team Date Stadium Referee Attendence
Team Score Team Date Stadium Referee Attendence
SEMI-FINALS
Team Score Team Date Stadium Referee Attendence
Team Score Team Date Stadium Referee Attendence
GRAND FINAL
Team Score Team Date Stadium Referee Attendence
2012 Super League play-offs bracket

Week 1. Qualifying/Elimination play-offs: Fixtures decided by regular reason finishing positions. Higher ranked teams play lower ranked teams. Higher ranked teams receive home ground advantage.
Week 2. Preliminary semi-finals: Fixtures decided by regular season finishing positions. Higher ranked teams play lower ranked teams. Higher ranked teams receive home ground advantage.
Week 3. Qualifying semi-finals: Winners of Qualifying play-offs play winners of Qualifying semi-finals. Fixtures decided by club call. Winners of Qualifying play-offs receive home ground advantage.

Awards

Awards were presented for outstanding contributions and efforts to players and clubs:[4]

  • Man of Steel:
  • Coach of the year:
  • Engage Super League club of the year:
  • Young player of the year:
  • Carnegie community player of the year:
  • Frontline Fairplay Index winners:
  • Metre-maker:
  • Hit Man:
  • Mike Gregory Spirit of Rugby League Award:

Media

Television

2012 was the last year of a three-year broadcasting agreement between the RFL and BSkyB for Sky Sports to screen matches exclusively live within the United Kingdom.[5] The deal for the 2009, 2010 and 2011 season was worth in excess of £50 million.[6][7]

Sky Sports continued coverage in the UK that saw two live matches broadcast each week – one on Friday night at 7:30 pm and another usually on Saturday evenings. Regular commentators were Eddie Hemmings and Mike Stephenson with summarisers including Phil Clarke, Barrie McDermott and Terry O'Connor. Highlights were shown on Boots N' All, shown on Sky Sports and rebroadcast on the Internet.

BBC Sport broadcast a highlights programme called the Super League Show, usually presented by Harry Gration. The BBC elected to broadcast this only to the North West, Yorkshire & North Midlands, North East & Cumbria, and East Yorkshire & Lincolnshire regions on a Sunday. A national repeat was broadcast overnight during the week; the BBC Director of Sport, Richard Moseley, commented that this move was in response to the growing popularity and awareness of the sport, and the large number of requests from people who want to want to watch it elsewhere in the UK. End of season play-offs are shown across the whole country in a highlights package. Super League Show is available for streaming or downloaded using the BBC iPlayer in the UK.

Orange Sport TV in France aired every Catalans Dragons home match either live or via tape delay.

Internationally Super League is shown live on Showtime Sports (Middle East), Sky Sport (New Zealand), NTV+ (Russia), SportKlub (Eastern Europe).

2012 was also the last of a three-year deal in which the Nine Network in Australia showed up to 70 live games from Super League over the life of the contract.[8][9]

Radio

BBC Coverage:

  • BBC Radio 5 Live Sports Extra (National DAB Digital Radio) normally carry one Super League commentary a week on Friday Nights.
  • BBC Manchester will carry commentary of Wigan and Salford whilst sharing commentary of Warrington with BBC Merseyside.
  • BBC Humberside will have full match commentary of all Hull KR and Hull matches.
  • BBC Leeds carry commentaries featuring Bradford, Leeds, Castleford, Wakefield and Huddersfield.
  • BBC Merseyside (AM/DAB only) will have commentary on every St Helens match whilst sharing commentary of Warrington with BBC Manchester.
  • BBC London 94.9 airs all Harlequins games home & away, mainly via online streaming only.

Commercial Radio Coverage:

  • Wish FM will carry commentaries of Wigan & St Helens matches.
  • Wire FM will do full match commentary on Warrington Home & Away.
  • BCB 106.6 (Bradford Community Broadcasting) have full match commentary of Bradford Bulls home and away.
  • Yorkshire Radio increases its coverage to air 50 games in the 2012 season.
  • Radio Warrington (Online Station) all Warrington home games and some away games.
  • Radio Marseillette covers every Catalans Dragons Home Match (in French).
  • Radio France Bleu Roussillon covers every Catalans Dragons Away Match (in French).
  • KCFM Hull will no longer be offering commentary of Hull KR and Hull matches.

All Super League commentaries on any station are available via the particular stations on-line streaming.

Internet

ESPN3 has worldwide broadband rights.

Starting from Thursday 9 April 2009, all of the matches shown on Sky Sports will also be available live online via Livestation everywhere in the world excluding the US, Puerto Rico, UK, Ireland, France, Monaco, Australia and New Zealand. List of Super League games available on Livestation.com

References

  1. ^ "engage extends Super League deal". engagesl.com (Engage Mutual Assurance). Retrieved 20 April 2009. {{cite web}}: Italic or bold markup not allowed in: |publisher= (help)
  2. ^ "Bradford Bulls handed six-point deduction by RFL". BBC Sport. Retrieved 27 July 2012.
  3. ^ "Wigan Warriors face Leeds Rhinos in semi-finals". BBC Sport. 23 September 2012. Retrieved 23 September 2012.
  4. ^ "Man of Steel on SLTV". Super League. 6 October 2009. Retrieved 6 October 2009.
  5. ^ Sky Sports (26 November 2007). "Super League deal". Sky Sports. Retrieved 26 July 2009.
  6. ^ James Chapelard (28 July 2008). "Licence is Wilkinson's reward for years of support". Crain's Manchester Business. Retrieved 26 July 2009.
  7. ^ John Ledger (27 November 2007). "Super League cashes in". Sky Sports. Retrieved 26 July 2009.
  8. ^ engage Super League (Press Release) (15 November 2008). "Channel Nine to show English Super League and Challenge Cup". RLeague.com. Retrieved 16 November 2008.
  9. ^ SportBusiness (17 November 2008). "Channel Nine inks RFL deals". SportsBusiness. Retrieved 26 July 2009. {{cite web}}: |author= has generic name (help)

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