No Red Star, No Toulouse, but Toronto are in.....phew....Poor Bazza would have cacked himself!

Toulouse have again said "NON"......which beggars the question as to why they are even in the Championship.

Heard a rumour Toulouse are pulling out of the 1895 cup too.

They have, London aren't in either.

And all this hype about Toulouse being the next super league team

It's criminal that the RFL insists on these bonds in the first place. Catalans have apparently agreed to cover any shortfall as well.

The RFL can't just keep hoping for a combination of Leeds, Wigan, St Helens, Warrington and Hull FC to sell out the final. It's one of our showpiece events - the RFL still insists that it's a "blue ribboned" event - they should have no difficulty in selling it as long as they are smart and proactive about it.

What will happen if the Red Devils get to the challenge cup final? as that could be a seriously low crowd for the final who ever they play

It's fundamentally wrong that they should be included in the league structure and not have to compete in the cup competition(s).
As "we" fill our league's up with overseas sides, who dont compete in the full range of academy, reserve and cup fixtures, the competition overall suffers and whilst Toronto are the new kids on the block, seemingly with money to burn (and lots of it), have those at the top of the sport factored in the scenario whereby Toronto play Catalan in the cup final of GF, both of which are possibilities in the next few years (assuming that Toronto dont run out of cash).

I assume that putting The RFL, smart and proactive in the same sentence was a typo, especially without the word desperate being in there.

Don't worry those heroes running SLE will save the day.......

Anyone “turning down” playing in the CC should be kicked out of their respective leagues.

Take away the absurd bonds.

Its an absolute joke that cup competition expects certain sides to put up a bond to enter the tournament.

Its all very small time.

The whole issue for me is that the RFL seems to think that either:
a) It cannot sell what it maintains is a "blue ribboned" and "protected" event to a wider market.
b) It is the responsibility of the clubs to sell the CC Final.

If it's the former, it's frankly pathetic to place that burden on the clubs and if it's the latter, then the clubs should be reaping the financial rewards from it.

The RFL cannot sit back and keep hoping that at least one of the finalists is one of the three clubs that could possibly get close to selling a 20,000+ ticket allocation.

If you are going to insist on bonds, the only fair way to do this is to insist that every club, from Super League down to the lowest rungs of the BARLA ladder, fronts up the same bond. If not, stop placing the burden for the cup's finances on expansion clubs that are "unfortunate" enough to be successful.

If you are going to insist that every club has to front up the same sort of bond, fine.

If it's the £500k that Catalans were allegedly threatened with, we'd be looking at a field of about 3 clubs...