hmmm.. let me see South Wales has not turned out in numbers like the south of France for Super League Expansion??? who would have guessed that... however much the "northern" game wants & wishes to expand the core & loyal i.e. fan who will pay to see... is located in the North of this Isle. What if Leigh/Featherstone/Widnes or Halifax has been given the same funding & better Visa advice? Crowds better than 4k per home game would have been acheived, simply by by better away support alone, expand yes but small steps, if Wrexham had been the first step then yes a NL1 team 2 years ago would have been a good step.... but now to save face it is regression with Leigh and Widnes within spitting distance its laughable. Maybe a North Wales Wrexham "crusaders" will work in 2/3 time but it may have slowed or severed rugby league heartland (teams) to a slow beat in the process. We all want the game to expand but don't cut off the roots or the tree won't grow....

The over riding feeling about this is dissappointment, on a number of levels...

1) the Crusaders were built on the back of an excellent south wales conference league... building on the blocks put in place by the amateur game... to the point that the young Welsh born players performed admirably towards the end of the season. these players and the fans that stayed loyal deserve the opportunity to make the franchise work - in South Wales

2) about the franchise process, how on earth can a process as robust as the one the RFL claim to have in place have failed to mitigate the risk of a single financial backer... I though the process assessed the clunb's ability to contribute and prosper for the full 3 year stint!

3) the move to Wrexham makes no business or sporting sense... how can the crusaders meet the franchise criteria of community involvement, crowd pulling potential and junior development... in an area that has no grass roots to the game... The Super League is our Flag Ship Competition... it is not a Development League, that allows for experimentation...

where are the sponsors? where is the buy in from the local business community? where is the evidence of a core season ticket holding fan base? Have the Crusaders relocated their commercial team to Wrexham?

4) how far from the RL heartlands does one have to be to qualify for overseas player dispensation? Wrexham is around 30miles from a number of hotbeds both amateur and professional... that equates to a 30/40 minute drive to training... a very commutable distance to a ready made supply of British players... IMO absolutely no argument for a dispensation against the quota rules.

Did Sheffield get a dispensation when they joined Super League??


5) had the crusaders original application been driven from a base in Wrexham... would they have been admitted to the competition?


do we have to live with it ... the answer is yes!... if you support the view that Wrexham is the most obvious and supportable venue for the development of SuperLeague... yes... if you sit back and accept all the poop that life throws at you with a shrug and a "well... what can I do"


I generally support the RFL in the face of criticsm but I think they really screwed up on this, and the move to Wrexham compounds the problem rather than offering a viable solution...

If we believe in our game and what it stands for we should have cancelled the crusaders licence and admitted the next best licence application from the last round... then all the Welsh effort should be put into the new South Wales club to help them develop.

Obviously it makes business sense, the club would have gone bust otherwise

I meant for the game rather than the club

What else could they have done though? Gone with 13 teams and lost all the Welsh development completely? That would have been a lot more of a farce. I agree that this is not a brilliant move, but it was a necessary one and there are some positives.

Underground season ticket holders are asking for refunds (the majority) there is one confirmed signing and as yet no news about the shirt at all and as yet no mention of a shirt sponsor. In true crusaders fashion the first the club put up on the club site was that the deal was done and we were moving. all other details were revealed on here or by the BBC but the club didn't say a word. As yet there has been nothing from the club to say thankyou for your support we are sorry but we had to move. It's almost like they are too ashamed to face the locals so they are it appears blanking us

Oh the brightside, Wrexham Crusader's ground looks kinda nice.

Most of you lot can count yourself lucky you'll never have to experience Rodney Parade anyway.

www.skysports.com/video/inline/0 ... 68,00.html

www.skysports.com/video/inline/0 ... 68,00.html

Trust them to find a Widnes fans.

Widnes fans are everywhere

Which is more than can be said for fans of certain clubs....