Welcome to the fourth edition of Six to Go, looking at some of the things that have caught my eye over the last week or so in the great world of rugby league.

1. Where are the fans?
There was some concern that the South Sydney Rabbitohs vs Sydney Roosters game last Sunday attracted a poorer than expected attendance at the ANZ Stadium.

A crowd of over 27,000 attended one of the biggest games in the NRL calendar between the two of the clubs expected to challenge for the 2015 premiership.

On the same day on the other side of the world, the Salford Red Devils’ home game with Wakefield Trinity Wildcats attracted only 2,712 spectators – a pitiful attendance for a team that are improving, were looking to go three games unbeaten, and have the likes of Rangi Chase, Ben Jones-Bishop and Michael Dobson on their team.

Salford’s owner Marwan Koukash said last week that the club would lose £20,000-plus per home game with attendances around the 3,000 mark and that they would need much more than that just to break even as their ground rent is currently among the top three highest in Super League.

Koukash says it will be the most expensive next year, as it increases as per the contract agreement and the year after that it will 40 per cent more expensive than any other ground in the competition.

The AJ Bell Stadium was built at a cost of £26 million in 2012 and is co-owned by Salford City Council and property investment firm Peel Holdings. It is shared by Salford and rugby union side Sale Sharks.

The question is how long will Koukash be prepared to lose this kind of money and support a club that do not have many supporters willing to put their hands in their pockets and back the club, even when they are showing signs of improvement? The home hammering in Round 2 against champions St Helens attracted less than 5,000 fans and their next home game, against Hull FC, less than 4,000. Both of these teams have strong away followings – something Wakefield Trinity Wildcats don’t.

If the Salford public don’t start supporting the team soon they might see Koukash concentrating more on his dreams of buying an NRL club, which appears to have moved a step closer this week as he is reported to have advisers in contact with the troubled Gold Coast Titans.

2. Tough in London
The relegated London Broncos are finding life tough in the second tier of the game and are by no means having things their own way. Sides are relishing the prospect of knocking off the former Super League side and are doing so pretty successfully.

The Broncos have won only two of their five league fixtures so far – those wins coming at home against Doncaster and Workington Town – but they are yet to taste success away from home, losing to Sheffield Eagles (40-6), Leigh Centurions (25-12) and Whitehaven (18-16).

They attracted only 300 fans to their last home game against Workington and have already lost their coach, Joey Grima, who was released from his contract to return home to Australia for ‘personal reasons’.

Josh Cordoba, formerly of the Cronulla Sharks, and Liam Foran, brother of the Manly Sea Eagles and New Zealand half Kieran, have both been released from their contracts. Now fullback Richie Mathers, who has tons of Super League experience, will be out of action for three months after ankle surgery.

This all comes on the back of losing co-captain Nick Slyney for up to 12 weeks as he recovers from surgery to repair a pectoral injury.

The club are talking to experienced Super League-winning coach Brian Noble with a view to him having a role alongside interim head coach Andrew Henderson. Even with Noble’s undoubted talent and experience, the Broncos will find it very tough to get in to the Championship top four to play in the Super 8s tournament and have any chance of winning back their Super League place.

3. Hardaker in trouble again.
Is Zak Hardaker becoming too much of a distraction and, maybe a liability for Leeds Rhinos?

Hardaker missed the defeat to Warrington Wolves last week because he attended a local police station voluntarily to be questioned regarding an alleged assault on a student in Leeds in February. Academy player Elliott Minichella was also arrested and questioned over the same incident and was stood down from the U19s. Ashton Golding stood in for Hardaker and performed admirably with only 48 hours notice.

Hardaker is a world-class fullback, but his coach Brian McDermott admitted that it was disruptive having to pull him from the squad at such notice, particularly for the reasons given.

Hardaker and Minichella have now admitted the assault, but are free to play this weekend as they will not be charged by the police. They and the victim have come to a community agreement, which means that although they will not be charged, they will each pay the student £200 and write a letter of apology.

The victim of the assault must be a Rhinos fan if he is allowing two of their players to give him a kicking and he is willing to accept a letter of apology – obviously the £400 he will be getting in compensation will give him a good few nights out on the lash and that will be a cause for a major celebration.

Minichella is a 19-year-old kid who was out with a Rhinos first-team player in a massive rugby league town, and both are fit and good-looking, so will get their fair share of attention. Minichella needs to be counselled and looked after by the club.

But Hardaker is 24, has been around professional rugby league for a while now, and should know better.

This is not the first time he has been in trouble – he was kicked out of the England World Cup squad in November 2013 and was fined £2500 and given a written warning by the Rhinos after they carried out an internal investigation and found that he had acted unprofessionally while on England duty. Last year he was banned for five games for a homophobic comment while playing against Warrington.

McDermott has told the media today that the club will not brush this under the carpet and are taking the matter very seriously indeed with Chief Executive Gary Hetherington now heading up the internal investigation after returning from a scouting trip in Australia.

Remember that Hetherington tried to block the Catalans Dragons signing Todd Carney because he had been photographed trying to urinate into his own mouth in Australia last year, an act that led to his sacking by Cronulla Sharks.

4. Carney to the NRL?
Todd Carney was sorely missed by his new team Catalans Dragons against Hull KR. His team led 20-4 after 35 minutes, with Scott Dureau running the game, before the home side went on to hit the Dragons for 46 unanswered point to lose 20-50.

Carney missed the game with a broken rib and will be out for another few weeks, but at least he had some good news this week.

It was announced earlier in the week that he had won his case for unfair dismissal against the Sharks, who were ruled to have not followed due process in the events leading up to his sacking for the ‘bubbling’ photograph.

This decision could lead to Carney suing Cronulla and possibly his return to the NRL – something which seemed impossible after his latest misdemeanour, after having been sacked previously by Sydney Roosters and Canberra Raiders.

The return was brought into focus by Manly coach Geoff Toovey, who admitted Carney was in his thoughts after it was confirmed that Kieran Foran would be following Daly Cherry-Evans out of the Sea Eagles’ door at the end of 2015.

With those two contracts off the books the Sea Eagles have significant amount of money to throw around and they will want to show their fans some intent with a big-name signing.

Well, they don’t come much bigger than Sam Burgess, and it could be worth a pop if he fails to make the England Rugby World Cup squad at the back end of the year. New Manly CEO Joe Kelly knows Burgess personally from his time at the Rabbitohs and Sam’s older brother Luke recently signed on at the Sea Eagles.

5. Keep players safe
I caught the North Queensland Cowboys vs Newcastle Knights game at the weekend, which has obviously provided one major talking point.

I am not going to go on about the rough treatment Johnathan Thurston received throughout the match, because playmakers are fair game as long as the treatment they receive is within the rules. However, that tackle was not within the rules of the game.

What has amazed me this week that all of the attention has centred on Beau Scott, while his teammate Chris Houston has been forgotten.

The incident came about when Thurston stole the ball in a one-on-one tackle and was quickly into contact with Houston and then Scott. Houston lifted Thurston’s right leg, and at the same time Scott had his left arm on the back of Thurston’s neck, meaning that the halfback, although not lifted beyond 90 degrees and with his left foot still on the floor, was placed in a dangerous position. The combination of the Houston leg lift and Scott’s arm behind JT’s neck meant that when Scott took him to ground, with force, he was only going to go head first – there was nothing JT could do to prevent it.

A bit of a scuffle ensued, the incident went to the judiciary and they have ruled that although the tackle was ‘dangerous’ and put Thurston at an “unacceptable risk of injury” they only charged Scott with Grade 1 dangerous contact. Houston was not charged at all.

The tackle would have been nowhere near as dangerous had Houston not lifted Thurston’s leg – so how he gets away without a charge makes no sense.

However, Scott has avoided suspension and he and Houston are free to take their places in the Knights team to play the Titans.

Melbourne Storm forward Jordan McLean received a seven-week ban for his part in the Alex McKinnon tackle, which I don’t think was anywhere near as bad as Houston and Scott’s. Knights management also pushed for Jesse and Kenny Bromwich to be charged for their part in that tackle.

More recently, Parramatta’s Junior Paolo received a nine-week ban for a Grade 3 dangerous throw on Manly’s Matt Ballin in Round 1.

Seeing the Knights players had ‘Rise for Alex’ emblazoned prominently across their shoulders in relation to their injured colleague incensed me even more; that players from the Knights, with all that they have seen their teammate go through, could put an opposition player in a dangerous position by lifting his leg and driving him head-first in to the ground.

I would have thought that the club management would have sent out an edict to players never to put an opposition player in the position that has caused so much carnage to a friend’s life.

The players involved have officially been dealt with, but I hope that someone at the club, be it management, coaches or teammates, has a word with them to make sure that kind of tackle does not happen again.

6. RFL red faced at Red Hall?
Sport England – the Government and lottery-funded body that provides grants and funding to enable sports governing bodies to, among many other things, increase participation numbers in sport – fired a bit of a shot across the boughs of the RFL this week when it cut the amount of money provided to the governing body for failing to meet targets agreed upon in 2013-14.

The target, primarily, involved increasing the number of people who were actively involved in playing rugby league.

The RFL were awarded just over £17 million in the award period for 2013-17, and the decision has now been made by Sport England to remove 10 per cent of the remaining funding for the period, £573,133.00, to be used on local community projects supported by Super League clubs using their facilities and staff.

Basically Sport England are not happy with the work done and the initiatives that the RFL have put in place since the award was made. The money to the sport has not been reduced but it is clear that Sport England do not have full confidence in the administration at Red Hall, the RFL headquarters, to deliver the targets that have previously been agreed.

The RFL have reacted positively to this slap in the face, as you would expect from the masters of positive spin, but it is clear that they have a lot of work to do to regain the trust of Sport England and ensure that there is not another major cut to the funding received in the next award period, from 2017 to 2021.

The RFL’s funding from Sport England was £29 million in 2009-2013 and was cut by £12 million in the most recent award period for missing 13 agreed targets.

In this day and age it is very difficult to get young children away from their comfort zone of warm bedroom, TV, Xbox, iPad and iPhone onto a cold, wet playing field getting bashed about by kids bigger than them.

More emphasis must be put on physical fitness, discipline and respect, self-confidence, life skills and above all else friendship to make this great sport of ours more attractive to youngsters.