I wish I was that young enough but no, it's my mum. I just asked her what she said to the FC Lottery collector when he called round touting for new business!

Seriously though she's 81 now bless her so she wasn't really sure what it meant when I asked her to pose for the picture!

Me too,suppose I must be a traditionalist. Am I right in saying Widnes were not considered because of their financial situation? ..whilst Crusaders financial situation is??
I feel for the Crusaders supporters,but its been a damp squib from day one.

Widnes for me, Crusaders, Cletic or whatever name thye are this week are never going to pull in the crowds the RFL was expecting/hoping for. Not only that but we already have 2 teams in the SL who bring next to nobody for away games a 3rd made it even harder for teams to turn a profit.

Yes i know away support does not bring in that much revenue but every bit helps.

Widnes would be much more stable than Celtic and bring in better crowds, but they don't fit the 'expansion' mould the RFL are so desperate for. I know it will never happen, but I would kick Celtic and Quins out and bring in Fax and Widnes.

It seems we're now expanding 30 miles from Widnes.

One small step for ......

Daft isnt it.

To further muddy the waters www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2009/de ... d-bridgend

To further muddy the waters www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2009/de ... d-bridgend

Having read through this thread I am going to put forward my point, not that many will agree. I am sad that they are in trouble. The spread to a country that has provided League with some of its greatest stars since the break away from Union was & in my view a logical step. To expect them to come into super league after only 3 years was a big ask. What should have happened is that the RFL should have said from day one that they were going to have a team in south Wales then the rest of the established clubs knew that only one of them would step up. The club should have been financed by the RFL & a legal binding contract signed with what ever ground they chose, having made that choice stuck with it for at least 10 years then sell the franchise to the higest bidder. It is my opinion that if we do not expand to the rest of the UK & France the game will be dead inside 10 years as we just dont attract the right audiance to generate the revenue from the advertising companies. The sooner we face up to the fact that we can not compete untill we offer a true national competition that attracts the viewers that the advertisers want the better. TV companies will pay more for one formula 1 race in this country than they will pay for the whole of the League seasaon.

There is a difference now in attitudes to expansionsim than to say when Fulham entered the RFL in 1981.
At that time I would imagine that most RL supporters were in favour of the new venture - they started off in the lowest league - and won promotion - though with a lot of ex-Widnes players , Reggie Bowden etc.

Now many supporters are against expansionism because they fear the new clubs will be fast tracked to the SL at the expense of their own club.
This is a genuine concern.

As has proved ,CC are struggling and many of the lower tier heartland clubs will think they were more deserving of a SL spot than the Welsh , and of course they may think preferential treatment will be given at the next round of licence applications.

As BevRed IMO rightly points out we do need to expand the game to broaden the appeal and increase sponsorship etc , but is a bit of a balancing act .

Get rid of the Crusaders, give Harlequins two years to sort themselves out with decent crowds and start supporting the traditional clubs once more. If the likes of Keighley and Fev etc became successful they'd get bigger crowds then those two duff teams put together.
Get rid of Richard Lewis too while you're at it...