It would help if the LER was able to go full time and turn it into some kind of French Superleague.

Featuring Paris and maybe some other new teams.

Too right, Team full of aussies & kiwis if they get it off the ground....the stade francais oooonion side is full of merc..sorry foreign players

Also imagine what the playing kit would be like?....has anybody seen the above's over the last few years

It would provide an "interesting" challenge to the salary cap.

I think with the french rugby union sides spending riduculous amounts of money on foreign players overlooking the academy ranks, maybe the young french players will try thier hand at league, i doubt it but it could happen!

It's aaallll good publicity, especially for the game in France.
I wouldnt treat it as much more

So we can expect the ' Gay Paree weekend ' to be announced in 2011 when they decide all you SL fans are fed up of edinburgh

I agree, Toulouse are at a far more advanced stage, and also would provide a geographical 'derby' for Catalan.

Plus they actually have a RL team at the moment and are working very hard to get to the required level needed ,

While I disagree with them being in the Championship I cannot fault the effort they appear to be making to draw crowds and buid a fan base worthy of SL

What is it about their inclusion in the Championship that you disagree with?

The way the focus is almost totally on getting into SL

The excemption from relegation although if they had not been I think they would not have finished in the bottom 2

The declaring by the RFL that they would be allowed 5 quota players because " they have already signed them " , and yet they only announced who they were 2/3 months later

The cost to RFL central funds that could have been better spent

Apart from that I have no problem with them , I had a good time down there and wish them well [ in fact I'd stick them in SDL next season if it was up to me ] for the future

NZ became world champs with one NRL club and a stack of players at other NRL clubs in Oz. We need to get at least one or two French players in every SL squad, get them competitive and watch French RL grow. Top down development in non RL areas rarely works, Celtic and Quins prove that. Unless there's a massive long term financial commitment I wouldnt go near a Paris SL club. The RFL dont do common sense though.

I am totally shocked by the rampant level-headedness in this topic!

Stade in SL? They would aim for LER in 2012, Championship in 2015 and SL in 2018. Maybe they could accelerate that by a couple years, no better.

I think the RFL will have one eye squarely on how Celtic do, if they continue to struggle they will be unlikely to back another rootless expansion no matter what Stade promise, though the potential is worth investigating.

No matter what they say, this is great publicity, and a clear answer to the question - why was the Oz match played in Paris?

We have never had top down development though with a club that has had plenty of money behind it to allow the club to grow. All of our expansion clubs have struggled from the start due to a lack of finance and thus have had to cut corners with regards to marketing, player development etc.

Rugby Union with the likes of Sale and Newcastle have shown what can be achieved if millionaire owners are willing to bankroll a club. Even Leeds Tykes get bigger attendances than some League clubs such as Harlequins and have got to where they are due to having a wealthy owner. Even the likes of Saracens and London Irish have moved from their traditional bases and grown massively due to having plenty of money behind them. The same can be said in France where the likes of Stade Francais and Toulon have grown from more or less nothing due to having owners that are prepared to bankroll the club

Is this rhetorical

yet you argue for promotion/relegation by saying removing t gives clubs nothing to aim for,


yet you argue Championship clubs cant afford them in that league, yet your willing to force them upon smaller clubs in a lower league because of what is in a large part (especially this season) luck



because they had the same amount of overseas players as salford the year before (when you didnt complain) seems a bit of a grasp at straws



in your opinion,

i disagree, i think it is good they gave championship clubs a little bit of money in this instance