Cumbrian Fanatic

You're just trying to make me jealous now. I have seen many of the great bands that came out of the punk era, but sadly not The Clash or Joe Strummer, by the time I appreciated how good they were it was too late. Its amazing how many of those bands cite Joe Strummer as an influence, for instance Jake Burns has mentioned Joe Strummer every time I have seen SLF and always performs a song that he wrote about him after his death.

I'm a great fan of The Clash and particularly Joe Strummer and that version is as good as anything I have heard him do

What, one like this one? http://www.totalrl.com/warrington-confirm-widdop-coup/ Written the day before the article that is the subject of this thread

I agree with you, especially the last sentence. I think there is far more good in the game than bad but we don't really seem to focus on that. Hopefully this season will see an upturn in attendances and we will start to get a bit more positivity in the game.

Didn't he play Gorgeous George in Snatch too?

Neither do I

Switched on the television this morning only to see an interview on Good Morning Britain with Tony Adams about becoming the RFL president, I switched on after it had started so didn't catch it all, but in addition to taking up the position they had him talking about a few other things including helping over 400 RL players at Sporting Chance - he said RL player welfare is second to none. They also got him talking about being a captain and leadership and he spoke about having a vision and a goal then getting a good team behind you and taking them forward with you, he was speaking about Sporting Chance and Arsenal but could have been making a pitch for becoming CEO of the RFL. Spoke very well and a good bit of publicity for the game

Yeah go one I'll take that wager how much do you want to put on?

That did cross my mind too

Even if Toulouse played Toronto on a Challenge cup weekend that still leaves an extra game to fit in when the winner plays Catalan with no free week available. More importantly why should Catalan be disadvantaged compared to all other SL teams, by having an extra game, when defending the trophy?

I agree 100%, if there is a way of fitting Toronto and Toulouse into the draw then it should be taken, I'm just not sure how this can be done this season at this stage. From next season include everyone with nobody paying a bond. Re-reading my post I can see I may not have been as clear as I could have been

The next move should be obvious, which means it probably won't happen. Quietly drop the demand for Catalan to pay the bond and include them in the draw, as mentioned above, because of the structure it's probably now too late to let Toronto and Toulouse in this season but they should be given assurances that it will not happen next season. Then quietly work with the clubs to help with ticket sales should one of the teams get to the final in the future, in fact the RFL should be working with all clubs on ticket sales anyhow. In reality there'll probably we some sort of fudged compromise where Catalan put up some kind of bond or guarantee a number for ticket sales, probably with no figure put, then both teams can claim their actions were justified.

You ever tried getting a pound off someone from Millom? you wouldn't be joking if you had to, they make Yorkshiremen look generous to a fault

It was the obvious choice especially after choosing the Siddal v Toronto game a couple of years ago, still I'm glad they chose it though they might change their mind when they see how they have to get to Millom.

Realistically you would need a ground of 65-70,000 to hold the Challenge cup final, that leaves London, Edinburgh, Cardiff and Manchester unless people want to dumb it down further and take it to stadiums of around 50,000 or less