Damien

Isn't that pretty much what you'd expect though? Winning their fair share against similar teams is nothing to be sniffed at and let's not forget PNG very often don't even have as many top flight players as some of those teams you mention. It's still a big shock for them to lose like that at home though.

We are talking about a 4 Nations. There is nothing stopping these bowl matches and more happening beneath that as now. I am sure PNG could host a bowl type 4 nations as now with the same government funding. The Oceanic Cup was much more analogous to these Pacific Championships than any 4 Nations so not sure why you've put it there. Some of those 4 nations you cite based on average attendances also don't tell the full story. They were very profitable with big blue chip sponsors like Gillette. If an average attendance was all that mattered we wouldn't have had Australia v NZ at Warrington, the Stoop or Loftus Road and they could have just been in Australia or NZ. The NRL are never slow to say these Pacific international matches ordinarily lose money. They have cut the World Cup from 16 teams to 10 due to cost. I don't believe that matches now being underwritten by government money is going to make them more profitable than what a 4 Nations could be. I also don't believe that this funding couldn't be sought anyway.

What criteria would you like to see that would ensure Leeds, Wigan and Saints weren't the top 3.

It would have to be pretty bizarre criteria for the 3 biggest and most successful clubs of the last decade and more not to be the top three.

Improved TV ratings on last week:

I do also wonder how different things could have been if it wasn't for Covid. In 2020 we had a really exciting Ashes tour planned for Bolton, Leeds (Elland Road) and London (Tottenham). That's a pretty perfect mix that could have reinvigorated the whole international game both in terms of perception and finance. It was a real attempt to get back to those glory days and showed ambition. Then following on from that what could have been a great RLWC2021 which could have provided a huge financial windfall for the IRL. A once in a lifetime event has set the international back immensely in almost every way.

And I would have agreed with you for Australia. To be fair the following year in 2004 we did go to the City of Manchester for the same game and got 38,572. No one will convince me that we wouldn't have got that in 2003 either. Saying that I would be happy with Wigan being used for Tonga along with Leeds (and I would push for Elland Road as a big venue but would also accept Headingley) and London. That's a good mix of spread and risk while still using decent sized stadiums.

Looking back to 2003 for a different thread really illustrates how the lack of international games is a really recent phenomena. In 2003 the Kangaroos played 8 games (6 full tests v GB, NZ, Wales and also 2 non test matches v a France X111 and England A. This is way after the full tour itinerary days with no club games played. 2004 we had 8 full tests including against the USA and France. Pretty much up to the 2017 World Cup Australia then regularly play a very healthy number of games, such as 6 in 2016. In almost every year 5 or 6 games was very much typical. We can undoutedly do so much better than now with the number of games that are played and don't let the revisionist nonsense of NRL administrators kid you otherwise.

Everything is about complete control. Play in our tournaments and SOO and get this big carrot. We can then pretend we are doing something for the international game while getting $7 million government funding that covers it all and selling the TV rights. Play for your country outside of that and your on your own. Oh and we won't let you even do that mid season any more because it was all getting a little too popular and we want you to play SOO instead. Also we want really want to win the World Cup so here's an even bigger carrot for being an Aussie in that.

I can see the pros and cons of a 4 nations. I wouldn't have one every year but I do feel it probably has a place in the World Cup cycle. I don't really get the outgrown argument though. The Tri Nations/4 Nations was easily the most profitable tournament v outlay over the last couple of decades and delivered the most bang for its buck. They can also easily be achieved by teams playing matches in their own hemispheres first.

Even if the person had interpreted it incorrectly and it is per World Cup it's still substantially more than other nations and would still cost the Kangaroos circa $1 million dollars. The core points are the same. As we have seen with previous CBA's these big agreements do have a knack of being detrimental to the international game.

I also completely fail to see why any NRL bid needs the Bears to be successful and they will only hinder and cause issues with any club. For me any bid should have a core location strong enough to host 90% of their games or it seems a little pointless as an expansion candidate. In this case the only place that could do that is North Sydney/Central Coast which just means another Sydney/NSW club and there are far more beneficial expansion options than that. Moana Pacifika in Super RU was less ambitious than this and has still failed with low sub 5k crowds because, while it tries to appeal to Tonga, Samoa and NZ, it ends up appealing to no one. The obvious comparisons are there. When this inevitably doesn't work those those handul of games at the North Sydney Oval will only increase by stealth, which is probably the real plan.

This was mentioned a while ago and I found it as laughable then as now. Such a team, trying to appeal to several countries, will never work. Like Cook Islands and its population of 15k hosting NRL games? Really? I think a club playing in Fiji, Tonga and Samoa shouldn't be the core part of the bid of any prospective NRL club. The NRL is more than capable of having any match played in those countries anyway. NZ should be covered by a NZ2 team, or games taken there by existing NRL clubs as happens anyway. PNG ditto if they don't get their own team.

We didn't steel or borrow Tonga. We asked them to tour and they accepted.

You could similarly go to the year before against NZ. All thise trivial, little details also add up. Everything about these test series was done better and there was a real build up and sense of anticipation. They were treated as bigger events even when they werent at bigger stadiums and I never, ever felt they were done on the cheap, as RL events now feel like. Even the safe stadium choices in Wigan, Huddersfield and Hull were better than now. Looking back I do think that, like the Grand Final, night matches add something too. Even before the first matches were played these teams also played 3 warm up games which all added to the build up and news pieces around them.

Remember the argument that the reduction from 16 to 10 teams was needed due to cost..... $40k a game is also a nice way to also ensure that it makes it damn difficult for players not to choose Australia over Tonga, Samoa, NZ et al when it comes to a World Cup. Australia once again stacking everything in their favour and doing its best to strangle the international game:

I think back 20 years to nights like this at Wigan when the atmosphere was electric against the Aussies in a sellout. Yes it maybe against Australia but everything about it as an event seems a world away now. I refuse to believe that we shouldn't be aiming for the same again against Tonga at these sorts of grounds:

Yeah it's probably been repeated on here hundreds of times on many threads over the years.

Yeah, I'm not sure why you'd ever choose Sheffield over Leeds for an international to be honest.

No, the first 3 years of the Premier League had 22 teams, just the same as the old Division 1. It was then cut to 20 due to fixture congestion caused by the expansion of the Champions League and more international games. I think this was pushed somewhat by UEFA too.

This has always been a pet hate of mine. 90% of it is on field coaching and simply shouldn't be allowed.

I've not seen anyone suggest any more than 1 international in London. Almost every suggestion has been following the London, North West and West Yorkshire formula. 3 internationals within 60 miles of each other is the very opposite of having internationals easily accessible for all across the country.

Maybe if we had just 1 match in West Yorkshire we may have? Maybe at Elland Road one big West Yorkshire match may have pushed 30k or at the very least a sellout at Headingley (which hopefully we'll get anyway). I know Huddersfield fans will be all touchy about this but I do also question the logic of playing in a town where the team barely averaged 5k last year and where even its fans on here say its not a RL town, that there's little interest and that RL can't grow. When your poor marketing and unambitious choices dont appeal to many and you are left selling to locals that is a struggle when even they aren't interested. If we are having 1 match in West Yorkshire, which we should, then it has to be in Leeds. At least there we have 13k RL fans watching RL on a regular basis and RL is a major part of the city, plus it's a major city to visit and stay in and would result in vastly more corporate income.

I don't think you needed to include the word tad to be honest. Just incompetent would have sufficed.

I don't actually know the penalties but they need to be strict enough to strongly discourage clubs from contemplating. With the 3k and 7.5k thresholds you'd imagine there are only a handful of teams on the margins of either, probably a couple of SL clubs around the 7.5k one and maybe 4 Championship clubs at the most (and probably only 2 of which that are in contention for the top 12) for the 3k one. It would make sense to me to look at this draft run and identify the handful of clubs where these issues may apply and then scrutinise accordingly.