Nick Rawdthore, is that the biggest success story you could come up with? A 22 year old with 4 SL appearances under his belt..

Not rubbishing the lad by any means, i`ve seen him play and he is a decent young player that may come good but there are plenty of them all across SL and the championship.

I thought Toulouse Elite 1 side had its own Youth system? Which feeds through to the club.

Ok then Halifax v wire in the middle 8s

MOM went to chester butler one of the fax academy lads plenty of upcoming players in are youth team which most the sl clubs refuse to run

Castleford
Warrington
Widnes
Leeds
Wigan
Wakefield
Hull FC
Hull KR
St Helens
Warrington

All have youth teams that`s 10 out of 12 Are you saying that you class 2 as most of SL? Think your getting mixed up with a reserve grade which is a different conversation.

I think you're making 2 points here......maybe 3......it's hard to tell.

1. In the Academy league of 13 sides, London Broncos moved from 13th in 2016 to 8th last year with a W9, L9, D2 record. They took the scalps of teams of the standard of Wigan who were last years winners......I have no doubt that Catalans (4th last year) would disagree that IT doesn't work in terms if development.......

2. The other point you were trying to make (I think) was about "away fans"......I believe that in 2017, many Championship 1 sides had their biggest gates v the Wolfpack and none had their smallest gates.

Skolars v Toronto 1,542......
Other gates last year..... 287 v Bears, 362 Hemel, 335 Whitehaven, 291 v Oxford, 374 Barrow, 367 Hunslet, 225 South wales, .........
Average without Toronto 324.
So, in the case of Toronto, London pulled in 1,218 paying fans for their game v the "bring nothing Wolfpack".

Keighley averaged 687 at home, but got 1,128 for the Canadian game....Workington 628 average with 835 for Toronto.......Doncaster 557/943.......can you see where this is going?

3. Halifax were in Superleague.......you ended up with an average gate below 3,000, which for a side CLOSELY surrounded by other SL sides like Huddersfield, Castleford, Wakefield, Leeds and Bradford is terrible.....you brought little then and probably even less now.

I am no fan of the Business Plan of Toronto which seems to be chasing the SKY cash as a pre-cursor to world domination, but I've just shown that they DO bring fans, I've shown that expansion sides DO run academies and I've shown that Heartland clubs aren't assured of success when they are at the top table......

Hooligan is making the point about reserve sides. The problem with academies is when players start reaching their potential (particularly forwards) they run out of teams to play for. Fax are very proud to have a reserve squad, and having seen them in the pre-season friendlies, there are definitely a couple who could make the grade at a higher level.

Our last season in SL was a complete disaster. We won one game, which was the first game of the season away at London. We'd be really happy with an average crowd of 3000 now! The two crowd figures for the Fax vs Toronto games will be interesting this season. Our home game for the reasons you allude to above, and the other because it won't really be a home game for Toronto (albeit we don't know where it will be).

FWIW, I would expect a few more Fax fans to turn up for a Toronto game, but no more than when we play the likes of Leigh.

Its a strange one,without doubt there is some kind of aura around them which isnt really justified.Maybe its just the name "Toronto" that grabs the attention ? Anyway any club that doesnt try to exploit it is a bit daft

If I remember correctly London Skolars exploited it pretty well! Made it into an event at the New River Stadium. Granted it was Toronto's first league game ever but Skolars certainly benefited from it! Pretty much 5 times their average gate, plus all the takings from bars, food etc. Very profitable day for Skolars.

It should be a very interesting Championship season this year, I for one will be watching as much as I can on Premier Sports and also other games/highlights online. Looking forward to the Leigh/Toronto/Fax/Fev games this year.

Good point.

Well done for running a reserve team, but it was the frequent use of the word academy that through me....easy mistake to make. Also, there are plenty of sides for these reserve grade players to move onto.....I'd say currently the top 24 sides in the top 2 tiers would be better than Fax reserves.....then there's NSW/QLND cup sides, a couple of Elite 1 sides and our buddies in North America who have no forwards of their own.

Point was your average over 8 seasons in SL was 4,837 and that was wth visits from sides a bus ride away.....and that sort of figure is the one delivered by sides like Salford who get grief for it on a regular basis.......



Fax (as the other sides should) should market the hell out of the Toronto game.....and the visit of London and Toulouse, because if the trap door is pulled up at the end of this year, we'd better pray Bradford get buck up!

Toulouse brought nothing to the summer bash it looked daft on sky. Its ok fax filling one end when we have no fans making a noise back as it is totally empty this is getting stupid. Yes its expensive to travel week after week but this was the summer bash weekend and they can not even travel for that.

This stupid expansion needs to stop. Its like some of these championship 1 teams e.g hemel stags etc which the rfl through together. Put these against siddal I know who my money would be on and it would not be the so called championship 1 team

Ralph Rimmer has confirmed no decision will be made on promotion/relegation and the number of teams in 2019 in the foreseeable future. Unbelievable to start the season in this way.