The criterion of being competitive should be being able to get within 20 points of a major nation 80% of the time.

Rugby Union has 10 competitive nations:

England
Ireland
Wales
Scotland
France
Italy
Australia
New Zealand
South Africa
Argentina

On the fringes of competitiveness are Fiji, Samoa, Tonga and Japan.

It is inconceivable that rugby league could achieve that number of competitive nations witin the next 10-20 years.

Right now rugby league has 3 competitive nations:

Australia
New Zealand
England

On the fringes of competitiveness are France, Papua-New Guinea, and Wales.

They could be improved to competitiveness within the next 10 years, if development is continued.

Would 6 competitive nations be enough to make international competition be taken seriously by the media , public and sponsors?

I doubt it. More likely 8 is the minimum number.

Who could be the best next development areas? IMO one should be a European nation (Italy? Spain?) and another a South Pacific nation (Fiji?)

But we must work hard to get to 6 within 10 years if we are to be able to progress further. And that involves more professional teams from each currently fringe nation. Both the NRL and SL must work to realise more professional clubs from each fringe nation.

I do not think England in the last 5 years would qualify for you criteria of getting within 20 points of a major nation 80% of the time against Australia.
I do not think France, Wales or PNG will be any more competitive in 10 years time than they are now.
The first priority should be to get England to be able to compete and win against Australia on a regular basis, the fact that has not happened in four decades is more important than a pipe dream about Wales or PNG.

Depends who you're asking. The Australians don't appear to 'need' any competitive nations for their sport to thrive domestically.

We're in a different position of course, where our international profile, or lack thereof, hinders media interest.

I think we need to be realistic, but also open-minded as to the best way to proceed. I would love to see us develop meaningful and extensive international club competition as a first step to ultimately improving nation vs nation competitions ( that is: improved standards, increased desire to see nation vs nation, and increased media interest in the background due to the coverage already of big club games). Don't get me wrong, that's not easy either, and won't happen if the NRL don't like it, but to me, it feels a lot more natural to seek media profile by getting our big clubs to play their big clubs, than by trying to pretend Scotland is a genuine international-level rugby league team. Big international club games can also attract neutrals ( and media commentary ) from inside and outside the heartlands, even if just as viewers. I'd want to watch any game where one of our top four or five were playing their's. And, with the exception of Saints ( obviously ) I'd become a fan of the UK club for the night.

I don't know how good the top PNG (and other fringe nations) sides are, but if we can bring them into a "Champions League" too, then great. Provided they're not going to get smashed by 100 points or more, the odd 'development' team is fine. In fact, if we're going to be open-minded, let those countries submit a national team to the "Champions League" for the development years.

I'm sick of hearing the "travel" objection. Its no big deal - if you've two overseas teams in a group of four, you play both your overseas away games in one 10 day trip. Sorted.

And when was the last time Scotland, Italy or Argentina beat one of the big southern hemisphere RU sides?

Last 5 games v Aus have been...

8-30
20-36
14-34
16-46
16-26

Think we're slowly getting there, as for other nations France would benefit from another SL club, but that would take a hell of a lot of time and investment.
PNG need an NRL team and I think they would really come on if they got that. The problem with that again is money, and logistics.
The 'big 3' cause problems by stealing prospects from other nations because of the one issue in the eligibility laws, they take players from the minnows that don't really improve what they have got and leave the minnows with a player of inferior ability.
Look at Michael McIlorum, improves Ireland a hell of a lot, not good enough for England, easily replaced by 3 or 4 others. There's a huge list of very similar players that don't improve any of the big 3 but would dramatically improve the smaller nations.

I think we have 3 competitive nations, but the others arn't as far behind as we all think. At a big tournament where every player wants to play, you need 20ish NRL or SL players, topped up with the best semi-pros. This is roughly how many eligible 1st team regulars each had at my last count for IRL:

Cook Islands: 13
Fiji: 8
France: 20
Ireland: 17
PNG: 7
Samoa: 24
Scotland: 15
Tonga: 15
USA: 4
Wales: 12

Add these nations best players that could represent them and we've got a cracking tournament.

PNG could be major with a little investment. It is money not people that is holding them back.
Samoa possibly the same but would need to stop the flow of players playing for Australia and New Zealand

From a RU point of view I would say they have 6 major teams and Ireland are only just in that group.
England
Ireland
France
Australia
New Zealand
South Africa

Outside that group are a lot who can make a game of it sometimes but in reality are not going to trouble the big teams in the world cup. Yes I know Wales caused a stir but it isn't regular and they certainly wouldn't now.

Rugby League has 3 with in my opinion PNG and Samoa capable of causing a stir.
We are not as big but that's just the way it is. Money will change it but we haven't got enough.

Cracking post pop tart.

To answer the op, as many as possible, although in the northern hemisphere there is only England, plus France (who are some way behind)
Then we have Aussie and NZ, plus the prospect of making anouther couple of teame in PNG and maybe Fiji, however, these additional teams will be packed with players that most of us consider Aussies or NZ players.
Whilst it may not be a popular view amongst the games traditionalists, the only way that the game will prosper in the long term, is to develop the international game and an additional French domestic team would be the logical next step.
After that it becomes uncomfortable for fans at the lower end of SL as there would need to be some sacrifice of heartland clubs to make way for say a couple of Welsh teams, plus expansion into Ireland/ Scotland.
It's one hell of a conundrum and making France stronger (and any other expansion areas in the northern hemisphere) would weaken the English game in the short term.
This would be the only realistic way of increasing the games profile and it would take a fair amount of determination plus investment, and i'm not sure that either of these is present at the moment.

Wales not causing a stir? They are the current 6nation holders and did it with a Grand Slam. I agree they are in a bit of a dip at the moment

Even Italy came into international RU with far more domestic interest and playing clubs than, say, Scotland or Ireland in RL ( Google it)

I don't think anybody has a fundamental problem with the likes of Scotland having a national team per-se; I'd be delighted to see them play an important part of the international game - it's just that, for me, I can't see where the current set up leads to real international growth.

People say "well you've got to start somewhere" - which is superficially true, but can anyone [ireally[/i visualize how Scotland goes from here to being a decent international force...[istrongly supported by the Scottish people[/i?

We all want a big international game - the argument is about how to get there. Personally ( and probably wrongly, I don't know ) I feel we can do more at international club level (and do it more easily, utilizing the existing fan base) and we should focus more effort on that. Is this pessimistic? I don't think so - let's not worry about what you're 'supposed' to look like as a sport ( or worse still, try to ape RU ) - but just look at what we have - great passionate club support ( and in this area I think we're much stronger than RU, at least in England) and build competitions around what people passionately want to see. I'd queue overnight for tickets to watch my club play the top NRL sides, but not to watch England play Scotland, nor France for that matter. It's not true that the media is only interested in big games between nations themselves. The Champions League proves that.

Eventually, the more attractive and exciting our domestic and international club competitions look, the more people in Scotland (say) might want a piece of the action - one day leading to an SL team north of the border and eventually a meaningful Scotland side. Paradoxically almost, I think the game looks too far ahead for growth, instead of trying to maximize everything we can possibly get from the game as-is - which in turn, I believe creates the wider growth that you wanted all along.

A thriving international game is a pipe dream and the attempts to stage internationals hinders RL more than it helps. The shambolic games staged over the closed season made the game look amateurish at best.

Creating Welsh sides and Scottish sides will do little for the club games and at best it will be a generation or more before any real head roads can be made.

The only way forward for RL is to make its club competitions better and maybe even expand the WCC to more clubs and try and create a 'champions league' type competition that the NRL clubs are bothered about.

The change in SOO eligibility is really going to help the PI sides from now on.

Unfortunately RL has no where to hide, you can't stay close with penalty kick after penalty kick like that other code. Hard to see anyone getting close in next decade. Png, France and Fiji are best hopes but without significant investment and clubs in SL/NRL then not much hope.

Ps a competitive ashes series with GB winning would be enough!

This.

It all down to how you define "competitive". Do you mean they could win the world cup or do you mean that they can play against an elite side and not get humiliated. Either way we are behind Union regardless of how you view it.

The main problem as usual is self-interest. The NRL could easily help have more competitive sides by allowing NRL clubs in PNG and Fiji for example. But they are very self-interested and have no interest in helping the international game.

The RFL do have better intentions but incompetent management has seen a number of teams fail in Wales that should have succeeded and as a result there are concerns about letting Toulouse in the league which hampers French improvement.

So to answer the initial question we need more than 2 "elite" clubs, 4 would do and 12 "competitive" clubs so we can have a sensible world cup.