Correct, just like its not Catalans purpose but that doesnt stop people claiming Catalans have done nothing

Not me, Catalans have given a lot of retiring Aussies a boost to their pension pot, and away fans an excuse for a long weekend away. And the Castille bar has made a handsome amount of money.

Well, for a kick off, they've made it possible for plastic teams like Toronto (and New York) to have a league to join.
The irony of your comment is wonderful.









Do us a favour and give us your vision of SL in 20 years time, assuming that it still actually exists ??
Also, give a timescale on when there will be ANY N. American SL quality players actually playing the game.

Catalans as a club are doing OK and are competitive. They themselves are not responsible for getting more RL into France. However, the whole point of admitting them in the first place is that it would be good to help RL in France as a whole, which it clearly hasn't been (for whatever reason - lack of further investment?).

These new clubs might all be fine, but lets not pretend that they will help the game expand when they might all just turn out to be novelties like Catalans. In the end, they actually distract from the need to develop their domestic leagues properly and really expand.

And yes, more could be done in the UK as well, but if the RFL continues to work on overseas clubs, they are distracted again in the other direction.

New York RL would be fun to see, but lets not kid ourselves into thinking it is anything more than a novelty.

If Sky were to pull the plug on the money, in order to keep the game proffesional they would be some mergers to boost the attendances so only Sponsorship and turnstyle money is used to pay wages. Imagine the following Super League.

Greater Manchester Marauders (Leigh, Swinton, Oldham, Salford)
Wakefield Rovers (Wakey & Featherstone)
West Yorkshire Steelers (Hudds, Halifax, Bradford & Keighley)
Yorkshire Exiles (Batley, Dewsbury, Donny, Sheffield, Hunslet & York)
Northern Charge (Whitehaven, Workington, Barrow & Newcastle Thunder)
Combined French XIII (Catalans, Toulouse and rest of France)

Added to teams who could elf sustain due to larger crowds and long term backers in:-


St Helens
Leeds
Hull KR
Wigan
Hull FC
Leeds
Warrington

It would never happen but would be interesting if it did!!!!!

......and nothing below Warrington until you cross the water

nice one ditching cas now are we

Fans need to identify with a team and not have a load of made up Boll***
Look at the previous mergers ?

Gateshead Hull


Huddersfield / Sheffield



They dont work and each of those merged clubs are once again running under their own names, with differing degrees of success.
Certainly Gateshead and Sheffield got the cack end of the stick, although both Huddersfield and Hull both did quite well.

But dont let facts get in the way of yet another hair brained idea



I note that you steer well clear of the obvious merger of the 2 Hull clubs

This is the point I take real issue with, because to argue that the RFL are "distracted by overseas clubs" and "neglecting the heartlands" reinforces two very dangerous assumptions.

1. That the RFL is providing undue support to expansion clubs (be that financial or other resources) when there's more than enough evidence from failed expansion efforts to suggest that isn't the case.

2. That the heartland clubs are justified in relying too heavily on the RFL to perform tasks that fall very much within their remit - marketing, commercial, player development and media relations for example.

We hear a lot of people yelling "focus on the heartlands!" with very little explaination of what that means.

Does that mean marketing the clubs more? The clubs should be marketing themselves anyway.

Does that mean giving the clubs more money? Where is the return on investment in that? Most heartland clubs are absolute money-pits as they currently are - any money that you do give them will more than likely end up paying off last year's tax debt.

Does it mean throwing more money at youth development? If so, why can't our players of the future come from beyond the M62 corridor?

How does "focusing on the heartlands" make this sport more attractive to outside investment - from sponsors and broadcasters for example?

I'd be the first to acknowledge that overseas expansion to NA carries risks, but so does 'focusing on the heartlands'. The difference with NA is that whilst the risks may be higher, so are the [ipotential [/irewards. We have new clubs that are getting people talking about this sport and attracting new audiences that we often struggle to reach whilst, at the same time, we have 100+ year-old clubs going around and around in ever-decreasing circles because they can't work out that relying on dads and grandads to drag their reluctant kids to the next loop fixture isn't a sustainable model for attracting fans.

So come on you "RFL should focus on the heartland"-ers - what does this actually mean? And how does it actually tackle the key issues facing the sport?

Not in Castleford

There are so many things wrong with the game and with it's strategy for expansion, albeit, this is a closely guarded secret, but, when you get quotes saying "help deliver the RFL's vision" it does make you wonder what the agenda is.

Right now, it appears that if ANYONE comes along with a pocket full of money, "we" will encourage them to attempt to create a SL club.
On the surface this sounds like a half decent plan but, the reality is that dropping RL clubs into "barren" areas, usually ends in failure, which is usually down to the money running out or the new owner getting "bored" at how difficult it is to propel a club to the top of the sport.

Surely, a more "organic" approach would be better and IF we are serious about expanding the sport, why are we not investing time and effort into "creating" clubs in the Midlands, North East and Cumbria, which would give the sport wider coverage in the northern half of the country and then in 5/10 years time look again at where to move next.

We have a reasonably successful SL club in France and again, why is more help not being given to Toulouse. Indeed, why the hell weren't they (along with Toronto) promoted into SL when we had the latest re-structure.
This was a no brainer but, the men in suits with their global "vision" couldn't / wouldn't grasp the nettle and IF these two clubs offer so much to the sport and will help generate real additional income for the sport, why the hell wasn't it done. After all, Toronto will be blowing a fortune in the Championship and Toulouse probably need to be in SL to make a real go of things.

The major plus with Toronto has been the interest that they have been able to generate from a flat start and The RFL should seriously think about either hiring the people who have achieved this or, at the very least, fid out how they can o the same over here.

When you consider that clever publicity can make us interested in just about anything, why cant RL work out a formula to make the sport more attractive.

Unfortunately, it requires a sustained effort in advertising and clever work through social media and of course, money and these 3 things seem non existent in the sport of RL.

This I do agree with. I do was suprised when the press release about Hemel and NY used the phrase "our strategic vision". I don't necessarily expect the RFL to bare all in public (there are good commercial reasons not to), but it does need better communication on what, if anything, this means.



Isn't "creating" clubs incredibly similar to "expecting someone with deep pockets to create one"? At the moment we have encouraged clubs to work from the bottom (Coventry, Newcastle, etc) and there have been some successes, but to get these types of clubs to a position where they are going to make any meaningful impression on the sport's reach, commercial value or TV value is time that the sport simply does not have.

Cumbria cannot and will not be able to sustain a professional Super League club. The three clubs that are there already are money-pits as they are, and TV companies and sponsors aren't falling over themselves to 'break into' Whitehaven or Barrow.

And whether it's Toronto, London, Newcastle, Coventry or Hemel, the same tedious objections come up time and time again - "away fans", "travel for part time players" and so-on and so-on. The reality is that whatever the RFL expansion vision is, there will still be a core of the supporter base that won't be happy unless the RFL is putting more money into the same black holes.

The question stands - what does "focusing on the heartlands", "helping the traditional clubs" or "making the heartlands strong" (or whatever hue of that viewpoint you prefer) actually mean?



What does this "help" look like exactly? Is it money to Toulouse or the FFR? Is it development officers (which is th FFRXIII's role surely)? Is it marketing and promotional resources? The club's most recent home game attracted a crowd that's comparable to many Super League gates - they seem to be making a good fist of it with their own resources.



Here's the paradox though. People take issue with "guys with deep pockets" coming into the sport and putting teams in barron wastelands, but at the same time we want to learn from them, copy the good things they do and even hire them? The two are a contradiction. Either we want these people to invest in the sport (and we have to accept that they will invest on their own terms) or we don't.



That question needs to be posed to the clubs as much as it does the RFL.



Agreed. As I've said before we have 12 SL clubs and so we have at least 12 people with "marketing", "media" or "PR" in their job title. Most of those 12 people are not earning their salary.