Quote: Wellsy13 "The latter has nothing to do with the question.
You think Italy, a national team with very little experience and made up almost entirely of amateurs, should be playing Australia, New Zealand and England regularly?'"
Yes, I think the international game should consist of international teams playing against each other. Australia are an international side, Italy are an international side.
Quote: Wellsy13 "I explained why in the post you quoted.'"
No, you said the calendar fit in very few international dates, and we should be using them for tier 1 nations to play each other. You havent explained why, considering we have so few international dates, too few to play tier 2 nations, that we are using one to play a gimmick side.
Quote: Wellsy13 "This has more to do with the lack of an international window. A decision to make a reserve side for an international team should have nothing to do with the presence of nations around them that would want to capitalise on their heritage.'"
I havent said we shouldnt have one. I have said my reaction to the international reserves is a huge "meh". They dont even count as caps, who cares if someone puts together an England Knights squad. Its no different from someone putting together an England Gingers squad and giving them a game. Its pointless, pretty much worthless so who gives a damn. Im simply saying it has the effect of incentivising players to choose England over the celtic nations. This is a bad thing. I have no problem with 'all things being equal' a player with two nationalities choosing England instead of Scotland. I do have a problem with England and the established nations loading the dice in their favour. Which is what the current international calendar, the knights squad being a part, does.
Quote: Wellsy13 "In an ideal world, England would be playing the European nations more.'"
it doesnt need to be an ideal world. We are more than capable of doing that in this uncertain world.
Quote: Wellsy13 "But the fact that we'd stuff them pretty much every game (and the ones we don't, we'd still pretty comfortably win)'"
And?
Quote: Wellsy13 "would mean a lack of interest, a lack of attendance, a lack of profile, a lack of sponsorship and a lack of money.'"
and? I thought the point of international RL was to have nations playing against each other. You seem to see it as a money making excercise. That may be the root of the differences
Quote: Wellsy13 " International RL doesn't have that luxury. We need to do what we can to keep it going, and having England play Italy, Russia, USA, Kenya, Germany, Serbia, Ukraine, South Africa, Canada, Jamaica, etc. all year won't be cost effective, and probably won't help anyone in their development.'"
You think getting the American national side over here wouldnt help their development? you think that national sides wouldnt benefit simply playing in high visibility games? that more players wouldnt be attracted to play for them if they were playing in high visibility games? You think that an Italian internationals greatest achievement, something they told the kids about in 10-20 years time, that they played on the same field as legends like Peacock, Morley, etc wouldnt be the biggest inspiration to the next generation? wouldnt build interest in Italy? You think anyone in South Africa is as excited about friendlies against Jamaica as they would playing against England?
Quote: Wellsy13 "There needs to be avenues for nations to progress (which there are more now than there has ever been) to playing against the top nations in competitive games in non-WC years. Look at Wales and PNG. But not everyone can play the top 3 teams, and it's in most nations best interests that they don't. I think it's ridiculous that you do. Is it even possible to have everybody play the top 3 in a year?'"
Nobody is saying every nation plays every nation every year. It gets boring the amount of nonsense ideas you come up with, attribute to someone else then argue against. There are 200+ nations in the world, we should be aiming to have national sides for every one, are we going to play 200+ international games every year? no, that would be mental. We could maybe play between 4 and 8?
Quote: Wellsy13 "Kenya RL can arrange matches, build their international ranking, earn themselves places in more prestigious tournaments, and work their way up that way. It's a bit like the licensing system in SL were you have to earn your stripes in more ways than one. And I'm pretty sure you're for that.'"
It is nothing like the license system. It would be an idiotic analogy.
Quote: Wellsy13 "You can pretend there is one level of international competition if you like, but there isn't. It might be that way in football, but it isn't in other sports. How often do England RU play teams outside the top tier?'"
All the time. In 2010 the played Italy and Samoa, in 2009 they played Argentina 3 times, in 2006 they played Argentina again, in 2005 they played Samoa, in 2004 they played Canada, 2002 they played Argentina, 2001, they played Canada twice, the USA, and Romania.
