Chamey

It's not a council's responsibility to build stadiums. SLE clubs are private enterprises and should be funded as such. It'd be nice to see someone at SLE tell them that they have 5 years to have their stadiums up to scratch (media facilities, seats, covered areas, hospitality etc). If they're not ready by then then they'll be automatically relegated. Lets be honest, top tier competitions can afford a few towns, which give competitions charm, but SLE has Cas (40k), Wake (90k), St Helens (100k), Wigan (100k), 4/12 around/under 100k. That's too many small markets. Is there any wonder why SLE may not get the TV deal it deserves? For contrast: Prem Football: Burnley (73k), Watford (97k) 2/20. Prem RU: Bath (90k), Worcester (101k), 1.5/12. UK Ice Hockey: Kirkcaldy (50k), Guildford (78k) 2/11. UK Netball: Hatfield (40k), Loughbrough (60k), Bath (90k), 3/10. And if they do get relegated, they've got no-one but themselves to blame, and their punishment will be watching all the little Cas/Wakey boys and girls in future years ask for Leeds/Bradford kits for Christmas, all because they couldn't get their house in order.

To be fair, while we all know that TWP crowds will likely be double the size, if not more of Arrows crowds, there is more to it than just the top line pro team attendances. Participation and youth engagement is hugely important for expanded sports, and TWP has not made significant inroads (yet!).

First team not to defend their title?

This is a new low. First foreign side to win it, resulting in a big media boost for the game, and what do you do? Effectively kick them out.

That's because it's traditionally had next to no amateur RU, and I don't think that it has changed recently either.

Just from this year we have Salford, Keighley, Barrow, and Whitehaven all facing the serious possibility of folding. Yup, If Toronto make SL, the 1/11th portion of SL tv rights will be shared between the other 10, not given to the 11th best English club, and so on if more foreign clubs join SL. It's very hard to run an academy on Champ money, so there is a 1 for 1 on foreign & English club substitution (the exception being if SL is expanded to 14).

That’s a pretty decent summary, the massively dominant club switched to Union because the money man was annoyed at the group running RLrussia. Then RU7s became an Olympic sport, and (local) government decision makers decided to fund 7s over any other form, and additionally RURussia said that to enter teams in RU7s competitions you also need to participate in RUXVs (but not be exclusively RU). Hence the rest of the leading teams (who were originally RU clubs) switched and RLRussia sunk within the stretch of a few months, to the point where it was no longer fulfilling Government requirements, and was derecognised as an NGB.

It's got to be England/GB's 47* year run of getting to every RLWC SF, but never winning a WC? 59* if you exclude 1972 due to the fact that the final was a draw. Just 27 total points away from winning 5 more RLWCs. Or Fiji coming 3rd and not getting into a final 3 times in a row.

To be fair it'd be nice to see some evidence either way. The impression I had was that RL was significantly more popular among NZers of Tongan heritage than in Tonga itself.

Yeah, I'm a semi-regular attendee for Reading, and occasionally LI at Madjeski, and the atmosphere when it's below 50% is absolutely dire, seeing as RBA is another identikit out of town stadium I imagine that it's much the same. Yeah, Wilby's comments on MCU didn't make much sense, if he's aiming for 5,000, why not start out at a 7,000 seater? Even Gaelic park would have been an okay starting point, it's cheap, and you can pump ticket prices up a bit. Looking at MCU on google maps though, the seat alignment doesn't seem to make for the best rugby spectator angles. Did you hear about the SNY/RUNY deal? What's your view on that, will it help with getting eyeballs on the team/credibility?

I don't actually disagree with Parksider. The media has built up a big 'NA will save us' narrative, which is unlikely. Rimmer/Wood/Whoever is in charge is on thin ice, and couldn't afford the PR hit of publicly rejecting them. Which would be fine if the RLNY bid was Toronto-esque, but it isn't. The plan is to play in a massive stadium, which is hard to reach, that Red Bull have not been able to get anywhere near consistently at capacity despite millions upon millions spent over two decades in a more popular sport, costs will be much greater, and the stadium will be far less convenient for the 'have a beer with your mates and maybe catch some rugby' crowd that Toronto thrives off (not a criticism btw, in this day and age they're an essential audience). Add in the fact that NY is a much more crowded media market and you've not got a recipe for success. Lastly, instead of a billionaire running and backing the entire thing, you have a PE teacher from Huddersfield. Similarities with the Toronto bid (which in itself is not yet proven to be successful - we'll have to wait until airline sponsorship goes up for renewal), are almost non-existent bar the fact that the team is based on the other side of the Atlantic. This bid is more like someone trying to launch a Pro RL team in Reading's Madjeski stadium (hard to reach, big travel costs (coach), basically completely foreign sport, even local teams can't get good attendances), but on stupidity steroids.

It’s 12 live games (26hrs) of a national sport per year, it’s not comparable to the BBC taking on SL. However notably sky did increase their bid, despite losing exclusivity. ITV however could be interested, for they have 4 channels, can but the best matches on 1&2, the rest on 3&4. Might have to give some concessions, like 2 minute breaks on 20&60 minutes.

The wording in the GAISF constitution is about being recognised by the national olympic body, or ministry of sports, so a surprisingly high bar, and I imagine that more than a few federations have been told 'but we already recognise XYU as the administrators of rugby'. Also, don't forget that Wales and Scotland are full members, so that knocks the number of olympic countries down by two. Plus it looks like RLIreland has lost recognition, it won it in 2011, but is definitely not listed on the members page of the Irish sport council. So that's 19. Jamica's profile here implies that they aren't recognised: https://www.rlef.eu.com/teams/9 Even France isn't listed here: http://espritbleu.franceolympique.com/espritbleu/actus/3003-sports.html, despite artistic roller skating being members! Maybe I'm going wrong somewhere? I'd be interested in seeing list of countries that do recognise RL, so we can try and work put what's stopping the others.

Well we clearly weren’t talking about internationals, given that they’re already televised. ‘Domestic rugby league on the channel is declining with all audiences for live games below the timeslot average’ was the full quote. If the CC (traditionally one of the biggest competitions in the U.K.) is performing below average then it’s not surprising that they’re not jumping for Batley vs Dewsbury.

Did you miss the Beeb’s comment that ‘all live RL underperforms slot average’? Not everything is a conspiracy. So the next question is why RL underperforms, and that is the billion quid question.