I've been thinking about this over the day and thought I'd put it out.

With the multi millions of £££ to be made in European RU, could it be that IL's ambition (within the next ten years) is to create "Wigan Warriors Rugby Club"? A squad of 50-60 rugby players (homegrown, Welsh and other RU area products) skilled in both RL and RU which will enable him to create a Wigan based RU team to play at the DW?

Wigan RL will always generate 14-17k average crowds and I doubt the RU team anywhere near that to start with (certainly not from the locals), but they could be looking to pull in fans from Lancs, Bolton, Manchester....just like Sale currently are.

Could he been interested in setting up a "Leeds Rugby" style establishment over here in Wigan?
It could take many years for such a RU team to be propelled into the Guinness Premiership / European competitions but the income from such would be huge.

Probably way off, but stranger things and all that................

Highly doubt it. I've heard he is planning world domination though...

I understand he recently purchased an underwater volcano from which to base all future operations. And a fluffy white cat.

Nah

From a business point of view, it is a brilliant concept for a business man in my opinion.

for some strange reason he wants to be in bed with Rugby Union!!

As long as we can still play in our Cherry and White hoops shirts, lol

There is just not enough interest in RU locally to support an RU team.

We have been here before when DW bought Orrell and it just didn't get the support. Sale don't either and they are much nearer larger population areas.

It might appeal to the RFU to have Wigan as the equivalent of Leeds in the North West but I don't think it would appeal to the local sporting public because at the end of the day RU as a product is very poor.

It would be a huge risk when you consider Sarries have been loss making for years so as a business prospect it is a poor one.

IL is doing well getting Wigan running at a profit and there is still plenty of room for further improvement so he should stick with that and not be distracted.

Neither Union nor League clubs in the UK, with one or two exceptions, are doing well financially.
A hybrid game would attract big bucks, initially at least.
As an old mentor of mine said, where there's money, there's sh-t.

A hybrid game would be very succesful, but only if every single team and governing body bought into the idea and the attacking side of the game was RL based.

Quote: MattyB " With the multi millions of £££ to be made in European RU, could it be that IL's ambition (within the next ten years) is to create "Wigan Warriors Rugby Club"? '" The rich clubs in rugby union are rich because they have rich owners, the European competition is not a cash cow with multi millions of pounds on offer like the Champions League in football. Most English rugby union clubs are struggling. The RFU makes good money through internationals and all the corporate sponsorship that comes along with that but not that much trickles down to the club game. See this article (from last year) www.thisislondon.co.uk/standard- ... -crisis.do A Wigan RU franchise would need a wealthy backer who is willing to pour money in and not get it all back, like Nigel Wray has done with Saracens.

Quote: MattyB " With the multi millions of £££ to be made in European RU, could it be that IL's ambition (within the next ten years) is to create "Wigan Warriors Rugby Club"? '" The rich clubs in rugby union are rich because they have rich owners, the European competition is not a cash cow with multi millions of pounds on offer like the Champions League in football. Most English rugby union clubs are struggling. The RFU makes good money through internationals and all the corporate sponsorship that comes along with that but not that much trickles down to the club game. See this article (from last year) www.thisislondon.co.uk/standard- ... -crisis.do A Wigan RU franchise would need a wealthy backer who is willing to pour money in and not get it all back, like Nigel Wray has done with Saracens.

Was it only me who learnt from the RU world cup what a crap concept Union is. You'd have to pay me a lot of money to watch a union game live, it lacks excitement, unless you consider that knocking the ball between the sticks half a dozen times each is excitement.

But I don't think RU is about "excitement" ........... I liken rugby to cricket ........... RU is the Test match; a battle of tactics and strategy, it's sometimes slow and boring, but it can be enthralling ........... RL is the T20; stripped down to basics, leaving all the highlight reel stuff, the big hits, the tries, the end to end nature of the 6 tackle rule.

That is being very generous towards RU. The reason the world cup was boring was not because it is the nature of the game but because the teams chose to play it that way adopting a safety first mentality and the rules allow this to happen.

If you watch games like the Super 15 there seems to be an agreement not to adopt these kind of tactics to try and create a more exciting and expansive game. What RU has failed to do is adapt its rules to the increased fitness of players and tactical awareness of coaches (much learned from RL particularly defence) so whenever a crucial game occurs it is highly likely to be extremely boring to watch. It's got nothing to do with it being some sort of subtle chess like game but simply the result of trying to play a risk free game giving nothing away and the rules allow it.

But the success or otherwise of a sporting tournament doesn't depend on the quality of the play.

In football for instance, the real turning point in English footballing history that turned football from a popular sport associated with working class men and hooligans, to a huge multimillion pound business that led to the Premier League, major TV deals etc, was the 1990 World Cup, football exploded after that.

But that was actually the most boring world cup ever, there were hardly any goals scored. England struggled through the group stages only scoring 2 goals.