You'll be lucky to get anywhere near the HKR contingent. The rules have favoured us (well you'd like to think they had but seems to only be on paper at the moment!) with the signings we have been able to make. We have also not done anything other clubs have not done it is just so high profile because of who the most recent player is.

There wasn't such a big issue when Vella went on to a Maltese passport or when we tried to get Galea onto one too. Had it not been Dobson being deregistered I doubt many would have even mentioned how we had got Willie over here.

The fact we can have so many is because the RFL change the rules so often players we have kept hold of are still eligable under those old rules until they leave our club. We could have still had Gene and Aizue on our books and fielded a starting 13 of non-UK nationals!!!

Vella and Galea are likely to retire at the end of this year anyway while I'm not sure Fisher will stay with us if there is a top hooker come half back out there for us to sign (Fishers salary is pretty high from what I have heard). The year after I think Joel Clinton, Clint Newton and Jake Websters' contracts are all up for renewal and I can only see Newton getting an extention. That leaves us with Dobson and Green who I think are here for the long haul and Mason who will have a year left if he takes up that option.

Like it or not Lovegrove is as English as he is Australian and qualifies for our national team just as much as say Kevin Sinfield. He may have been born, raised and trained in Australia but he classes as home grown due to technicalities in the rules and/or dispensation given by the RFL.

As I said earlier Widnes would be very lucky to get anywhere near this amount of players (if they even wanted that amount) from Australia but without them are they just going to end up being Wakefield in a Widnes shirt??

To be fair the RFL are going to base their licence decision on Widnes winning one competition in three years.

And one which our own Benny Black handed to them on a plate

Yeah but he's crap though. It's all very well and good qualifying to play for England if you're rubbish. I do that.

You OD'ing on those bitter pills Jonny? Sense has gone out the window with you lately.

Leigh's recent ignorance of what Widnes have achieved off the field in the past 3 years may explain how your set up is! FFS you turned us over Sunday and you were moaning about the biggest by a distance away turn out you'll see in Champ all season. If your crowd for Widnes can only really match ours for Hunslet you may have more issues then you think!

And your ignorance of what Leigh have done to Widnes ON the field is equally staggering.

Thats nonsense Jonny and you know it.

Trust me it's not... Fritzl esq treatment they give us!

I dont think he is ignorant towards it at all. We were thumped well and truly but as you know that has no bearing on the bigger picture (I wouldnt have thought)

Franchises were brought in to reward the best clubs not the best teams. It has been said many times thats not Widnes's fault we are just playing to the rules that have been set out. We havent even been given the nod, we may well not do, but we are the only team who have "ticked all the boxes".

Quite correct Chris , but for beating you lot twice when we were ' Cack ' we'd have been relegated a couple of weeks earlier

It all just shows what a great on field competition you are leaving , pity nobody is that bothered about it in the towns it is played in

Chill out , only 2 days to go

I think Widnes should have been in SL years ago, I also think under the current rules they should go up this time. If you take the time to read what people have said you might realise that I was actually replying to a point that someone else made about being short sighted. It wasn't a pop at Widnes, it was a pop at the RFL's daft rules. If you want to get defensive because you've got a poor team, fire away, but like a Widnes fan has already stated, you will have a brand new squad next year anyway.

They were young man. They got relegated.

Ah, but that was when how good you were at Rugby League mattered. You can't blame them for doing as the RFL have told them to get in. They're just playing by the rules. They won the Buddies/Northern Rail Cup a couple of years ago so they don't need to be good on the pitch now.