Around 5 years with South Wales as a catchment area. They have known they will be in SL since spring 2008. They are based around 30 miles from Widnes but find it more convenient to fly in players from Oz than to recruit in the UK. they had around 13/17 non fed trained. A joke.

Point taken, but its hardly sustainable is it?Being at the whim of some rich benefactor is not a business plan in itself,this is the road that football has taken and look where thats leading. I know our game has taken steps to prevent us following suit,but at the end of the day it does not benefit the sport because what happens if the rich guy thinks sod this i'm off when the end result doesn't match up with his expectations(
and this doesn't only apply to Huddersfield).
The Artist makes a good point about the LeedsvHull game with a lot of these players being uk and locally brought through the system. Is it a coincidence that these are the two most profitable clubs in SL?

Nope, but Mr Davey will see a return eventually. Look at 50,000 over 6 games so far and compare it to 2005's average of 5.3k........that's nearly 20k more bodies at 3.3k a game....and these people, regardless of free ticket offers and cheap ST's will keep coming back. That's 3,300 more opportunities at every game to sell merchandise, ST's, Beer, Food etc......Mr Davey didn't get wealthy by giving cash away. He knows exactly what he is doing.

Huddersfield v Leeds....2000. Attendance 5,019...
Huddersfiels v Leeds....2010. Attendance 10,116...

Whilst the team may be a mismatch of players trained all over the shop, he now has a team that challenges the best and attracts decent gates....what I wouldn't give for some of that in London.

This thread is irritating. The OP has made an opinion based on one fact and will not change it even when presented with other more informed facts.

The most annoying one is "Crusaders have been going for 5 years". Yes, this is true. However, 3 of those years were outside of SL. So the "5 years" is irrelevant, it's just to try and add weight to a poor argument. They can't recruit SL players when in NL2 can they?

Other arguments:
"They've had since Spring 2008 to recruit...". Last time I checked, it was July (Summer) 2008 that they were granted a license (which I'm guessing is the date you are referring to). However, again this is just adding weight to a poor argument. Everyone who is everyone knows that Crusaders have only been able to recruit properly for this season as of January, when the move was confirmed. It's next to impossible to recruit players if these players don't know where (or if) they'll be playing.

"British clubs, British players, blah blah...". The point of having a Welsh club was to produce Welsh players for a Welsh national team. Having English players in a Welsh team is about as useful to Welsh RL as having Aussie players.

"Recruit...." Should clubs not produce anymore? Is that not a factor? Are you suggesting that, when in Bridgend, Crusaders should have recruited a majority British squad (which would have been majority based in the M62 corridor as they haven't had time to produce any players yet)? How many British players are there of this quality? And how many British players do you expect would be willing to relocate hundreds of miles to the South of Wales? This is the same situation that Quins found themselves in, but now are PRODUCING their own players (after years in SL), so now they are in a position you yourself find is favourable (yet look at where they are in the league...).

Basically you are twisting arguments to suit your opinion, rather than forming an opinion based on arguments. If you have the answer before working out the theory, most of the time the answer won't be any good!

Probably more due to the fact that excluding london these are the two biggest population centres.

No probs, what the troll also forgot to mention was that Crusaders Under 18's won their Grand Final last year, the Colts won the National Conference Grand Final the year before and the good news is a fair few of those players are either with Crusaders or playing for the Scorpions. Rome wasn't built in a day but the evidence that Wales has firmer RL foundations being built shouldn't be ignored either.

But hey what would a troll know who seems to be missing of late?