WHAT a difference 12 months makes. Last September veteran former Saints hooker Micky Higham was jubilant after guiding his home town club out of the Championship wilderness and into the promised land of Super League.

The Centurions had spent two years building for that moment and had assembled a squad littered with experience to hold its own.

Alas, 52 weeks later you had to feel for Higham in particular after all their efforts – including tumultuous derby wins over Saints, Wigan and Warrington – added up to nothing.

Falling through the Super League trapdoor, via the Million Pound Game, is arguably the most excruciating way to lose top flight status.

Yes, and with that it invariably means job losses and pay cuts.

There seems to be a lot of words about this - talk about player welfare, mental health and so on.

Without sounding callous, what is the alternative?

Is the real concern that top-flight status, and the financial trappings that go with it, disappear in one single game?

That sure is a lot of pressure - but that is sport. Last year Leigh were the winners, up in one go and leaving Hull KR to battle with Salford to beat the drop. This year the boot is on the other foot.

Sounds daft spelling it out like this, but all the smiles we saw on and off the field at Hull KR last week are effectively paid for by the tears gushing out of Leigh Sports Village.

Of course, it could be decided differently and we could revert to the simple, but less dramatic, one up, one down where the team finishing at the foot of the table is relegated.

In its favour is that at least it is done on the merits of performance over the whole season - not one 80 minute spell.

And as a secondary, at least players have a better idea a few weeks out what their fate is likely to be and can come to terms with that accordingly.

But there is a problem with that, compared to the current system.

Namely, the team finishing top of the Championship- as happened in 1999 and 2000 - may be way off Super League standard.

And the system, which guarantees someone is relegated, simply creates a yo-yo system that was prevalent under the old four up, four down system of the 1970s and 80s.

For all its faults, winners and losers is what sport is all about.

Unlike licensing, where decisions are made behind closed doors, there can be quibble about what happens on the field.

That said, playing performance alone should not determine whether teams play in Super League.

Running a 19s and Reserves should be one condition of membership - to demonstrate that clubs are willing to work hard and invest in replenishing the game's player pot rather than simply taking the products of other club's labour.

And on top of that closer attention needs to be paid to the stadia – the same way that Knowsley Road was, often unfairly, scrutinised in the early noughties.

Is shelter for travelling fans really to much to ask?