If the Aussies and New Zealanders don't come for the 2021 RLWC in Oct and Nov, and the tournament goes ahead without them, they obviously cannot go through to the QF and will not automatically qualify for the 2025 RLWC.

We might not face the Kangaroos or the Kiwis before the World Cup of 2025, meaning England could go eight years between playing Australia.

Rugby League; shooting itself in the foot for the last 125 plus years, but recently we've got very, very good at doing it to ourselves as a sport.

A RL World Cup without the Aussies and Kiwis is not a RL World cup, so stand down.

While I do agree it kills the competition I cannot argue against a little thing called sporting integrity.

When have the qualification criteria for the world cup been fixed, they vary from tournament to tournament. The RLIF would be fully justified in allowing automatic qualification for the world number 1 and 2 teams for a world cup.

If they don’t take part in 2021 they won’t be ranked 1&2 or ranked at all as they will not have played any games to be ranked by. Just goes to show what a mess the NRL clubs have made of our once proud sport.

It would be an amusing and well-deserved by-product of their self-serving behaviour. Playing qualifying rounds in the Oceanic groups would be a worthwhile thing, giving smaller countries a chance to play against them.

Still, it won't change what has been one of the most dispiriting events I've ever seen in RL. The NRL clubs suddenly pretending to care about Covid just so they could get their players back promptly for pre-season training - in the process destroying the finances of the game in every other country across the world and dragging their totally innocent womens and wheelchair teams down with them. It's a pretty disgusting story.

That's not how the rankings work, google it!

Make them qualify, and put them both in the same qualification group so one of of them misses out. They're more of a joke (in reality the NRL) than what we're faced with here in the UK. I'm a lifelong Fax fan, cast into the wilderness of the Championship for nearly 20 years, but still love the game and enjoy watching regardless of the odd (or perhaps many) unforced error.

We need youngsters coming through to play the game, and that's where the RFL need to be focusing their efforts. We had fantastic contests 20/30/40 years ago with semi-professional teams, but we seem obsessed with the need for error-free play in the game?

This.....and more of it please.