Donnyman,
On one of the other threads you created about overseas clubs you mentioned the French club failed to bring youngsters through.

Your now favourite journalist,because he reported information about Toronto Wolfpack,now reports - '' Catalans Dragons academy products Corentin Le Cam, Mathieu Cozza, Joe Chan and Mathieu Laguerre, who were playing this season with the club’s reserve team, have all signed a new two-and-a-half year contract with the club until the end of the 2022 season.''

Give Ottawa time.They are just about to start...

Well that may have pushed Elstone into speaking on behalf of Superleague.....

[i" Fellow Canadians Ottawa are joining League One next year while New York are lined up but Elstone believes the vision should be closer to home. He saidToronto had asked to speak to Super League clubs about restating that. I was sympathetic to it but they’d been introduced on what I believe was a very clear set of rules. “Strategic expansion into areas where there’s an affinity to the game, where it’s played, where it’s connected geographically, makes sense. “This felt to be a different expansion strategy……"[/i

ROBERT ELSTONE FOR SUPERLEAGUE

Elstone is clear SL had nothing to do with TWP's collapse, and he's clear that the view is North America doesn't work here. With Perez signing a coach and a player it's absolutely fair play to warn him and whoever is supposedly bankrolling Perez that there's no Superleague pot of gold (or place) at the end of this rainbow.

As for the championship they won't want Ottawa to do a Toronto and spend wildly to get to the top of the Championship. Given that Ottawa would NOT be promoted as above they would block ambitious English clubs who would qualify for Superleague and central funding - Bulls, Widnes, York, Leigh, London, Fev, Newcastle........

Where did this quote of Elstone's come from, I'd like to read it for myself.

Everyone should read Matthew Shaw's piece on Trl. Pretty much sums up Toronto and what I have been trying to tell people.

ROBERT ELSTONE [i"“Strategic expansion into areas where there’s an affinity to the game, where it’s played, where it’s connected geographically, makes sense".[/i

Well Robert Elstone said it, and he wouldn't have said that without Lenegan, McManus & Pearson etc signing it off. So (real not phoney) expansion is well and truly on.
But as usual SL could not make a strategic announcement without some level of ambiguity!! What does "connected geographically" mean? what does that look like?

a.The M62 b.The M1 or c.The Channel Tunnel...... or two of those or all of them?? He certainly didn't leave the door fully open for France for 2022 but neither did he close it. Superleague aren't ones for clarity of vision, they didn't have much at all to say about Canada even when they entered Superleague, and if Canada wasn't their "vision" why did they let them in?

Anyway that's well and truly over and the question is where does that leave France's clubs and Superleague. Two very real and historic clubs in which the geographical connections arguably have been going regularly for what 85 years?

In the first instance both Catalans and Toulouse don't follow the Superleague vision of clubs with player development systems to a proper standard. They sometimes bring a TV deal in - probably more chance if they were both in Superleague. Gausch may have spoiled France's chance going forward with him falling out with the whole of Superleague big time and stopping talking after the Folau situation.

So nothing can be assumed. Add to that a now long queue of English Superleague wannabees - Widnes, Newcastle, Leigh, London, York Bradford, Newcastle and possibly Featherstone (although I don't see how) then Elstone's comments remain ambigious....Where are we going if NOT to Canada?

There is a lot of ambition in the Championship not just Leigh and Fev trying to jump in now, but York. Newcastle, Bradford, London and Widnes.

I don't think you can leave SEVEN ambitious clubs looking at an empty place. Not sure about cherry picking either, Hetherington wants to work on a set of solid criteria like licensing. The boring option. Fans want a fight to the death on the field. Not something we can do at the monent.

11 clubs doesn't do it, it's not just the weekly bye's, it's leaving the horrible legacy Argyle and Perez left us with - a hole in Superleague. I think Superleague want that closing. I think the Championship clubs want to help do that. So that's the obvious answer. Some sort of competition on or off the field, it is how it's always been done....

Let's not leave a hole!!

They were the runners up in the play offs, but you could argue that Toulouse the team that came second in the regular season were the second best team in the competition.

The "connected geographically" sounds like an admission that N. America wasn't geographically connected and it most definitely wasn't.
As for Catalan, you are desperate for them to be evicted and once again you make quantum leaps about Gausch falling out with the rest of SL.
Every club owner will do whatever they feel is best for their club, not just Catalan, EVERY CLUB.
Although it's stereotypical to say this, French people dont like being told what they can and cant do.
They will toe the line, up to a point and then all hell breaks loose.
With only 2 clubs over there of any ilk and with the game on both sides of the channel needing some kind of boost, perhaps, now is the time to be brave and expand to 14 clubs.
Lets assume that Toronto have gone, never to return, so why not Include, Toulouse, London and one other from, Leigh, Fev and Widnes (still too soon for Bradford I'm afraid) and see if the sport get some kind of boost, lets face it, the game needs something after the Toronto debacle.

Just figured out why you, Donnyman, never include a link to a source.

It's so you can put your own spin on the original article, cherry pick certain quotes that are out of context and control the conversation.

Tell me if I'm wrong because your game is over.

Nothing wrong in him wanting as many UK RL clubs as possible to prosper.
It's the spin and spite towards the "outsiders" that I find unpalatable.

As RL fans, we should all want as strong and divers sport as possible.
"Our" problem is that all too often, RL looks for a quick fix / silver bullet and then has to quickly rein back form it's plan.

It's difficult to think of any other professional sport that has anything close to the number of failed clubs and ideas over the same period of time (SL Era)
Just how many changes to numbers of clubs, structure of the league, new ventures, new clubs, insolvent clubs etc, etc has RL had over the past 25 years. It's not great, is it.

That's not what decides promotion though is it? Otherwise what was the point of Fev's (comprehensive) win at Toulouse in the play-offs?

I just don't understand why folk keep saying such a team should go up because of...............To cherry pick any team is a no no. If there is not a comp/playoff in the championship this season, then SL will just have to go ahead with 11 teams next season.

I agree that, it's nigh on impossible to select ANY club for promotion.

However, magic weekend cant really function without an even number of clubs.
How do you select a club not to play and thus deprive them of the chance of 2 competition points ?

The RFL and the clubs will be desperate for the revenue that "magic" generates and it's a decent event.

Assuming that Toronto dont come back and lets face it, they have, partly through no fault of their making, stuffed to job completely by dropping out of the comp.
Perhaps more should have been done to keep them in, even if they had to "borrow" (loan) some players to allow them to complete their fixtures.
They made great play of not having had any home fixtures but, most of the clubs had only had 2 or 3 home games so, this was a bloody poor excuse, especially for a club that had already "blown" well over £10 million.

Let's be honest rimmer doesn't know what to do, I'd of gone for removal of Toronto and let the super league vote for the replacement but it's now gone on too long.

Until the RFL confirm what's happening with Toronto for next season it will continue to be a farce

Rimmer show some nads and get it sorted please

My personal view is that rl should use and embrace what it has and turn what it does have into it's strengths.

Turn NA expansion into a strength as we have all seen the positive effects after only 3 years.

Same as the heartland clubs and the French. Diversity is a strength and I don't believe anyone should be actively looking for reasons why certain clubs shouldn't exist. If you have a variety of clubs, certain clubs will pick up the shortfall where others aren't as strong and vise versa.