Am I missing the point here?
I know its late and I keep getting poked and told to do some work but....

The Franchises were not announced at the end of the season so to assume our final position would have stayed the same is your opinion only.

Had we not been given a Franchise we would have been forced to fill our team with players for the remainder of the season instead of continuing to blood our much coveted youngsters.

I don't think some of our fans are whinging but having been the team that gave way for Catalan and were edged out by Wigan/Creative accountancy the assistance being given to Celtic would suggest they were not as ready for SL as the RFL were for them to be in and jetisoning the more traditional teams i.e. Widnes.
I am in the traditional camp more than the expansion for expansion sake.

Which 3 matches did they win? Will the losing clubs now be trying to get the points back because Crusaders fielded inelligble players?

Lets not forget we were having the same thing said about us last season when we finished bottom.
Other fans were saying cas should'nt be in SL blah blah.
Do tell me why cas fans in your opinion should'nt have an input on the CC situation on an open forum.
All fans have different opinions, imo its good to hear them all and the reason why.
I dont know you saints fans in your untouchable ivory tower. Oh not so ivory this season though is it

Bradford, Wigan and 1 other team - Salford?

Correct

They've not fielded ineligble players in those games. They were fielded in previous years.

As I remember the use of holiday and student visas to sign players in the lower leagues was widespread. This was outlawed at the start of this year and thus a number of lower league sides were unable to bring back players that they had played quite happily in previous seasons.

I suspect the players in question probably played under such visas but it's now become apparent that they weren't studying or were employed for more hours than permitted.

It would be naive to suspect that no other club has flouted the rules in the same manner. I'm sure some of our players in 2005 and 2007 would have been recruited on similar visas. However, it's the Crusaders who are the ones that are caught and pay the price. I wonder if similar "intelligence-led investigations" are prompted at other clubs.

[sizeI feel dirty doing this, but [/size

According to the Excess



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RFL statement on Celtic Crusaders



The RFL has asked the UK Border Agency for a copy of its report into alleged discrepancies in the visa applications of six Celtic Crusaders players.



The RFL is also speaking to Celtic Crusaders about the matter and feels it would be inappropriate to pass specific comment until further details are available.



The RFL would like to point out that the awarding of visas is an issue between players and the UK Border Agency, not the RFL. For clarification, the governing body would not refuse a player’s registration if the UK Border Agency approved a player’s status and the appropriate documentation was provided.

are we talking forgery here???

Where have I said they shouldn't? That's just silly. I simply expressed my own POV, on this open forum, that some - some - Cas fans, the Cas fans who were condemning the Crusaders out of hand, may want to remember that the franchise system saved them from certain relegation. I don't know what the big steam up is all about. It's a fact. And because of that fact, they came across as hypocritical (which I also said).

However, other Cas fans have been very sympathetic.

The 2007 NL 2 promotion winning team , the promotion they had to achieve to be in a position to apply for a licence

These players were all involved at that point

Not passing judgement , just the facts

That's not strictly true anyway, I mean we all knew that the franchise system was going to be brought into play and that we weren't fighting on the field for a place in Super League, but off it with the application for a franchise.

We used last year as an opportunity to build a solid foundation using our youngsters to give them valuable experience for this season and future years.

Had the system been the same, we probably wouldn't have played the youngsters as often and we'd have looked to bring in more experienced players to scramble to finish anywhere but bottom. The fact that we could do this shows the true value of the new system anyway.

I still maintain that I don't think Celtic were ready to be brought in, and throwing them in at this stage was just an attempt to fast-track some interest in the sport in a place where there isn't nearly enough. They should have left them to develop in the national leagues until the next round of applications by which time you could gauge more accurately whether they were ready.

That being said, I reckon if Widnes or someone else had been brought in at their expense, it would have only increased the probability that we would be missing out next time around when Celtic would have almost certainly been brought in anyway.

Ultimately Celtic will be judged on what they do over the course of the 3 seasons, and if they end up competing with the rest of the league and have an improved fan base then I suppose the experiment will be deemed a success. If they don't, will the RFL persevere or give up?

Tigerman10 was referring to that when he wrote of "the promotion winning team last year"? Somehow I doubt it.