Same here! I actually preferred the 'Exiles' concept, home-grown v imports was a far better idea for me, each side had something to prove at least. And the exiles had nice kits!

Yeah i liked the Exiles as well

How about England v England Knights?

This could aid selection for the Ashes series and could be a full blooded battle as existing England players would have to play their best to stop the younger and fringe England players from taking their spots. The younger/fringe players would be out to bust a gut to show Wane what they can do against the more experience/current England players, and ultimately everyone will gain some experience of playing in a hopefully intense (kind of) international match.

i'd be very up for this, possibles versus probables, only issue is you've got clubs releasing twice the amount of players for say, against france.

I was in favour of the revamp of the Roses concept that David Waite tried to push as a vehicle for selection for the GB team. In the first year it was well promoted and the clubs seemed to take it seriously. I remember going to the 2001 game at Headingley, Lancs won and there was some interest in seeing how Neil Turley would get on as he was breaking all those records in the championship with Leigh, and had been called up for Lancs.

The next year though the interest had massively fallen off. You could see the concept wouldn't last. Whilst you get people in Yorkshire who regard their county as the entire civilised universe, nobody in Lancashire really has a "Lancashire" identity, certainly not in the rugby league parts which are largely Greater Manchester or plastic scouse. So nobody really cares about Lancashire. The towns which would identify more with a Lancashire identity like Blackburn and Preston don't play RL.