Damien

Is this the new, new, new, new strategy to replace the new, new, new strategy? If it doesn't have at least a 10 year plan I'll be disappointed. They always provide a real framework for the game to follow.

The best way for the NRL to have appeal in new markets for its product to sell is to help the sport of Rugby League become more popular in those markets. One off games in isolation in places where RL is unknown is never going to have a flood of people subscribing to watch the NRL.

PNG often have one. I can never really think of England, Australia or NZ really doing them.

Or he realised once he did it he was at danger of being sin binned... It's pretty easy to not pull hair on a Rugby field and it certainly is when you are tackling from behind like that.

He may have apologised but he definitely did it on purpose and should have been penalised.

DAZN do certainly worry about costs and have actively moved to a more sustainable model to cut costs and move towards profitability. They are not just wasting money on sports that are minor players in a market and do not drive subscriptions. The Saudi PIF has pulled the plug on LIV golf, which is preparing to file for chapter 11 bankruptcy, as well as other loss making investments. DAZN in the UK is a niche offering with minimal footprint. It holds none of the premium UK TV rights to enable it to become a player in the UK. It's no more than a niche app people primarily use for one off Boxing events.

Absolutely, creating clusters of clubs to reduce travel has to be the way forward in terms of both cost and appeal to players.

Yeah I have no doubt the RFL make a right mess of it. As I said there seems zero strategy for a good decade or so since Lewis left. We just seem to go round and round in circles until people quit the game disheartened.

That is usually because of a lack of local options though isn't it? Unfortunately we have seemingly still never come up with a half decent strategy, or had one at all since Richard Lewis left, to develop the game nationwide so that these things can be made easier.

Well they seem to have done their bit anyway:

They do seem to have a weird obsession with the scrum and grown men pushing and hugging each other. Maybe its that.

The completely irrational anti RL hostility on social media from South Africans, about a sport they claim they don't know or is irrelevant there, is really, really weird.

So not the next logical expansion then Anyhow the wider point remains.

I mean before the expansion it was doing rather well for what it was and has far more of a presence in Japan than the NRL will ever likely have. You can ignore the lessons of that if you wish.