Anyone who thinks British Rugby League can afford to even consider the loss of more top flight teams for another expansion experiment needs their head examining. And then hitting with a brick.

The WMDC area is absolutely key to RL, one of the areas strongest in RL tradition. Don't make the mistake the RFL have too often and disregard that, or take it for granted. Once lost it's never regained. Remove teams from the top flight and interest begins to wane. Dangerous for a largely regional professional sport.

I am absolutely 100% for Toulouse developing into a Rugby League powerhouse. But do it properly, organically. Not by shoving them into British competitions and hoping the fans will come. Develop in the schools, develop local corporate links and partnerships, let a chain of youth teams develop to feed to senior team. Build the next level of fan base, funding and tradition and then think what comes next, including the move to full time.

Ideally this is done while a strong French league is developing. Laying my cards on the table I don't want another French team in SL for reason stated above: British RL simply cannot afford to lose more top flight teams (and by extension, fans). I want France to thrive, but diluting the British pool and chucking in a team of a couple of French players and numerous Antipodean journeymen is not the way to go.

When Huddersfield, Widnes and Hull KR were removed from the top flight, interest did not wane. They got fewer spectators in the lower division but that was because the lower division was of a lower standard and poorly promoted. The fans remained latent or dormant. When the team finally made its way back into the higher division it actually bounced back into Super League stronger.

Merged clubs can work in retaining support at the top level, as we have seen in the NRL with Wests Tigers, and St George-Illawarra.



When Catalans were "shoved" into Super League the fans came in huge numbers. The Catalans crowds went from 1,000-1,500 in the French Elite, to 7,000 - 9,500 in Super League. No reason to doubt that Toulouse would emulate that success, and perhaps exceed it.

Toulouse would not play Super League with just a couple of French players. It would have to have 13, or preferably 15, with just 8 Antipodeans, most whom would not be journeymen --- as we see at Catalans (Pray tell which Antipodean at Catalans is a journeyman?).

All of them and at all the other clubs as well.

I'd love to know where these mythical "13, or preferably 15" French players at SL standard are going to come from.

strawman argument. They will come from improved jnr programs and more opportunities for French Jnrs to participate in FT training.

Where will they play if they got admitted?

The question for the clever people that run our sport is, just how do we expand/ grow the game, especially at International level.
France is the best option for having a fourth "competitive" nation and there does need to be some help for them as a nation and without going back 15 years and getting rid of Catalan and telling The French to "get on with it", we have to try and build on where we are.

The inclusion of an additional French team is a good one and if done properly, there is no reason why this should be at the expense of an existing SL club, it could of course be an additional club in the top flight or second tier.

As we have seen in recent years, our top flight works with any number of clubs (we've had 12, 14 and 16 in recent years).
Ok, we've got the all new "every second counts" stuff to look forward to next season but, this could just as easily work with different numbers, if it in fact stays for any length of time.

The French need to keep improving their domestic talent pool but, without going full time, this will be a very long haul indeed. Therefore, adding 1 or maybe 2 more clubs and building slowly would appear to be the most sensible option.

A second French team is a must in my opinion, a French derby would create interest amongst casual fans in France I would think and maybe get more people through the gates. Somewhere that never seems to get mentioned for a team is Avignon, last 3 France games there got 14,500, 17,000 and 17,500 fans in so even if only half of those went to the local team it would still be a decent average at Super League level.

Hey how about a league of 12 French teams based in France, now there's an idea, then we can lose this Europe rubbish, French teams bring nothing to the British game. Only my opinion

The same could be argued for British teams in the British game

Have to agree. Now go put your tin hat on!

Would you like to name these 12 teams and tell us where the money is coming from?

Why don't we just refer back to Yorkshire and Lancashire leagues whilst we're at it?

European Super League?!