Im sure you would hark for a TV deal like the French had in those halcyon days of the 50's Gijou................

Not bad.



In fact, the press coverage we were afforded in France during the 1950s was very impressive.

We would be looking to get back to similar coverage. Albeit in the newer mediums now available...

They have a TV deal now for the internationals later in the year with an option of extending it with Direct8 (TNT), it's not the biggest at the moment, but being FTA and digital, over the next few years with the uptake of digital set top boxes and Digital TV's, it will def grow.

If these manage to get reasonable ratings for the games with some decent crowds at the smaller stadiums so it looks good, we could see this station or another one come to the party in regards to Les Catalans and Toulouse.

If that happens, none of us can say what the outcome will be for French RL, it could stay at that with those two/three teams, or they could end up getting some decent sponsors on board and that TV station or another going out on a limb to promote the sport.

The GF will also be shown on France 3 FTA and a semi or 2 (not sure on the semis) and I think the Lord Derby Cup final.

The FFR 13 have also done a deal with the same mob (direct8 TNT) where the channel will promote the games and the print media has done a deal to also promote the games.

That's just pineapple

Doubt it. Reckon you'd be in the league below in your scenario...

So what teams would be playing in this French 'top flight'?

Do you eat a lot of cheese at bedtimes?




Could the French find 12 or so clubs that could play RL to a high enough standard to even come close to providing clubs like Wigan with anything other than a training exercise?


It would be like that expanded 'World Club Challenge' from 1997 all over again

Being a dumb aussie, are you saying it's good or bad?

Fair dinkum, talk about confusing a bloke.

All of our ills come back to two things:-

1. exposure (or a lack thereof); and
2. misinformation.

(And that applies to the game worldwide...)

The impetus for France needs to come from an organised International body.

Unfortunately, I don't see the former happening until the latter is addressed...

because it would be a backwards step.

What TV company is going to pay millions of euros to pull french clubs away from european competition? it would be like Sky pulling the premier league teams from the champions league.

The ideal structure would surely be:

Top of the tree, SLE. The best European clubs playing in the elite division, be they English, French, Welsh or whatever.
SLE constructed as it is now with the top 14, 15 or 16 clubs playing across Europe, home and away.

The next division is national leagues in each country. The highest club in each division (or similar) play each other for one promotion place, the bottom SLE team returning to it's relevant national league. Obviously this will create an imbalance in those leagues affected, so the ultimate aim - should there ever be sufficient support in the game - would be to create second, third and fourth SLE divisions which would then be run as a straight professional league with one up, one down rules.

OK, it needs tweaking - but thats where we should be going. Forget national boundries and go truely European.