I've seen many thoughts on the reason why Crusaders have failed and a lot of them relate to their fast tracking rather than coming through the Chamionship system.

Saying that I am sure that attendances would rise and expansion opportunities would be created by regionalising the Championship,

Super League away fans (other than a few clubs) rarely travel, unless its a local derby. I expect the same in the Championship. If the Championship was regionalised, then attendances would grow with more local derbys. There could be regional leagues (see NFL) with a national championship at the end. Of course there would be a Lancashire and Yorkshire league/s with possibilities for a development league in the Midlands.

RFL needs to slowly expand whilst at the same time providing heartland areas with encouragment, not try to crack huge areas like London/Wales/France all at once.

I know some people might say it's a backward step, but the greatest game needs to grow, fed up being relegated to BBC2

Celtic Crusaders we destined to fail from the moment they were given a SL licence. By calling themselves the 'Cardiff Dragons' or similar and being located within the country's capital city they would have stood a better chance with Marketing / pulling the punters in. Obviously the club would have needed to have been better funded than the Crusaders, the writing was on the wall when they moved to Wrexham, which is a shame cause it's a great away day especially with that pub connected to the ground.

I like the idea of regionalisation in principle and can see many benefits to it. But can you expand on how you believe such a plan would help to create expansion opportunities?

Welsh RL should have linked with the Cardiff Blues in a Quins style link to stand a better chance of getting somewhere.

Getting a successful RL club up and running in south Wales is a bit like getting a branch of the Klu Klux Klan operating in Brixton.

I've been a fan of regionalisation as an expansion policy to.

It would seam fairly straightforward. But requires some planning by the RFL. They need to know where they want the game to expand, rather than just waiting for some died hard to try and expand it one club at a time.

The advantage of a regional system is that any expansion region will compete against each other so not exposing them straight away to the full strength of the league system. But also that expansion league will get equal proportions in the playoffs at the end of the season giving them decent exposure to traditional championship sides.

You could have an east and west division along with a southern divison or expansion division. How you divided the teams up could be decided on a 3 yearly basis, to keep the divisions level in numbers.

Get your facts right before blaming it on "fast tracking". They spent 2006 and 2007 in National League 2, finished top in 2007, got promoted to National League 1, and then finished 2nd in National League 1 in 2008. Then got a super league licence in 2009.

Where's the "fast tracking" in that?

i think the problem with sl, is that we are trying to expand to fast,
we need to get the game huge and sustainable in the "hotbeds" that we currently have, expand all over the lancs and yorkshire, with cumbria etc, once its got a stable and steady foothold up here, where we know it works, and we are good at getting crowds in, then lets start expanding to whales and london,
(im taking catalan out of this cos they have done everything correctly and it is really working in down there)

2006-2009 - 3 years, not fast track??? Those are the facts,

Get a Midlands team in!

So you think they should have been [irefused [/ipromotion even though they came top of the league? Is finishing top not good enough?

Is finishing 2nd in NL1 not good enough for selection to SL?

well if finishing top isnt then how can 2nd be

Could it not be that they brought in all these aussies/nz in on big contracts they couldnt afford

The hotbeds have had 100+ years to get themselves "huge and sustainable", and failed, for the most part. Give somewhere else a chance (and a proper chance, not like the Crusaders balls-up).

they havent tho, cos our funds and the rfl focus have been diverted elsewhere to get these tin pot organisations like crusaders and quins up and running and keeping them, need to exand in the hotbeds, create a better atmosphere in them, one of moving forard, and progress,