Why are you bringing me into this again as I was happy to agree to disagree and leave it alone? I'm only replying as I didn't call you 'myopic' as I would never be so disrespectful - I said that while you made some good points, some of your arguments were rather unbalanced/myopic. If you took that the wrong way then I apologise.

Mr Woods is a minor shareholder at Bradford and not on the board, never mind the club's chairman. And I suspect Mr Campbell at Featherstone might argue with your list......

You may have some figures for this but, do you think that Sky's priorities lay with generating advertising revenue or selling subscriptions.
It's a strange situation but, IF there were millions of people watching Sky but, getting the service at a "discounted rate" via a dodgy Sky box, it would still be worth it for companies to pay Sky for advertising and it's quite possible that the number of subscriptions isn't the b-all and end-all.

If you want to sell your products or services via a TV network, you wouldn't be bothered whether the people taking note had paid Sky or not.

Of course, Sky would much prefer that everyone watching their channels was paying full whack but, second prize is heavy demand from advertisers and in relation to your post, is these adverts were reaching the public in N. America and those people were spending big on those products, everyone's a winner. The same applies in France or, any other country.

It would be interesting to know if there is an appetite for the sport in any of the non playing countries or the smaller playing nations and perhaps those places should be where we try and expand the game

Interesting times indeed, unfortunately none of us know how it will play out. However I do think it will be bad for the game if your prediction of a 10 team Super league comes to fruition.

You have no need to apologise I didn't take anything personally so nor should you. But you chose to enter the debate and you said“It obviously isnt a necessity to feature English clubs. Sky shows a lot of international sport; NFL for example which dominates the Sunday evening schedule and has plenty of advertising between plays, so it obviously isnt a necessity to feature English clubs”. [/i

Far from being a "myopic" view, my counter view is it is a factual reality borne out by Adam Pearson's statement on this. It is most necessary to feature English clubs to get Subscriptions SKY don't get from abroad, and have English eyeballs on advertisments set up to stimulate the English market. SKY MUST have 9 English clubs in SL and that doesn't mean we must have three overseas clubs beyond this. Clearly SKY would be happier with the whole of Superleague being English. why would we not offer them that? You can OF COURSE choose if you wish to reply or if you want to leave it alone it's your choice to take, but not to impose on me the idea I can't reply to you.

I wish to correct your view so the debate can be advanced. SKY don't want overseas clubs. No SKY no game.

What would be bad for the game is the game going Trans-European. The very first time the clubs sit down with SKY as regards 2022 onwards the elephant in the room will be "substitution".
Note I do not say "Expansion" what "expanded" when TWP replaced London?? NOTHING

SKY have already said there is no deal if there aren't nine English clubs, what they haven't publicly said is that the more English clubs the better the deal. As above if the chair of the SKY/SL meeting on behalf of SKY says [i"of course we would prefer English clubs, but we can live with nine"[/i will Lenegan still push for the inclusion of Catalans, Toulouse and Toronto (forget for now the pipe dreams and stick with the reality)???

On the ten club thing is appears everyone gets to play each other 3 times. It appears if it's an English league everyone gets 3 derbies. I suppose that we would be merely following Scottish soccer? We already do the repeat fixtures thing where some clubs play each other 3 times? However the ten club thing could have just been invented as a short term tactic to freeze Toronto and the French out so I concede SL could still stay at 12 - we shall see.

You had already replied so I was confused why I was getting a second reply? Anyway all I’d like to add to my point on NFL is that the rights are not free. I’m sure they are not nearly as much as Superleague but Sky outbid BT for them so they won’t have been cheap and I can guarantee they will be more next time (which is soon I think).

I’m fully aware that NFL markets itself on much more than just the action on the field and RL would struggle to come anywhere near that currently. However, my point is simply that there is a precedent for sports without English teams to be successful here and turn Sky’s head. Elstone/Super League seem to have no interest in pursuing this avenue though so my point is fairly irrelevant.

It's a very good point and apologies for me misunderstanding it, I felt it was important to be clear as I understood it, that as we stand we offer just an English League - and yes IF we could offer an international game then we may get rights from all over - and as Eric Perez himself indicated NATV deals in particular can be very big.

1. On the issue of developing the game in North America success in doing that - which could have come from Perez being highly successful with grid iron players being converted to professional RL players could have seen a home grown Toronto Wolfpack and led us onto home grown SL clubs in New York, Boston, Ottawa and Montreal.

2. At that point Perez predicted a big TV deal, probably even more so with six clubs so let's add Jacksonville for balance. Imagine that - a half European half North America league!!!

3. The only problem then is where do we go on the TV deal(s) after that? Does North America add Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Halifax Nova Scotia, Los Angeles, Vancouver and Calgary to their existing six clubs, break away and capture a massive double the size and more NATV deal? They can then buy up the best players from our clubs here here whilst they further develop their own player development systems.

4. And then we die.

5. I was rightly pulled on this argument by a chap who said if North America can make Rugby League huge there and we can't, then we have to suck it up, for the good of the game itself.

6. But from where I am standing North America has failed to produce a single pro player or a cent from a TV deal, and the French can't get TV deals and just want to buy all their players from here.

7. AND SO as we are the ones who CAN make a success of RL in the Northern Hemisphere by getting a TV deal and producing quality players then Superleague needs to be an English league and the Americans and French should stand aside and let us make the best of the game here.

8. Because the bottom line is the more you bring in overseas clubs that cannot develop players or find a paying TV deal and get rid of clubs that DO produce players and get TV deals (that's how it's working Catalans up Widnes down, TWP up London down) the more you destroy the player development system and the more you lose your value to English broadcasters. Nobody then wins and RL is lost altogether...... Superleague won't work with just six English clubs. Nobody then wins.

9. This is why I don't feel I am myopic quite the reverse "foreseeing"?

TWP, only 18 players available, SBW not fit for another three weeks and TWP asking for cap dispensation... brilliant this expansion lark.

Quote: IR80 "TWP, only 18 players available, SBW not fit for another three weeks and TWP asking for cap dispensation... brilliant this expansion lark.'" it's just makes you laugh the bull they come out with what club can survive on 18 players I can see them struggling all season, resting SBW just in case he pulls something https://www.skysports.com/rugby-league/ ... nto-action

Quote: IR80 "TWP, only 18 players available, SBW not fit for another three weeks and TWP asking for cap dispensation... brilliant this expansion lark.'" it's just makes you laugh the bull they come out with what club can survive on 18 players I can see them struggling all season, resting SBW just in case he pulls something https://www.skysports.com/rugby-league/ ... nto-action

Nope, no bells ringing, can you give an example of a SL side that couldn't or struggled to field a team?

Championship teams, iirc Fev had quite a few issues and are the beneficiaries of dual reg.