nadera78

If you didn't know the IRL criteria then you should have said so when joining the thread.

Well, they clearly are because Scotland doesn't have a domestic competition - 3 scratch teams playing each other when they can find enough players to make a side does not count.

Gareth Kear, Wales RL's former CEO and father of Elliot, was recently very critical of the current Wales staff for not organising any fixtures for the men's team this year, and he's 100% correct. If they think they can go 2 years without playing any games and still have any realistic chance of winning the qualifiers then they're being very silly. And it's a shame, because the only realistic options for developing local rivals for England are Wales and France and one of them is taking themselves out of the running. Ireland, I don't know too much about their domestic situation but a few years back they wanted to adjust their selection policy only for the English players and staff to throw a strop and the RLI backtracked. Scotland is a ridiculous situation tbh. I don't think they've met the Full Members criteria for about 10 years now and everyone just ignores it and allows them to play in competitions ahead of countries that do meet the criteria. We should forget them, in terms of big events, until the SRL can show they've turned things around.

Sky making the decision not to show live sport they own the rights to. Again. And they wonder why people are leaving.

Anyone wondering about London's score might do well to ask themselves why the club still hasn't responded to this announcement, and yet London Skolars - who no longer play in the professional ranks - have managed to put out something.

Great player. Never rated him as a coach or director of rugby tbh.

Sponsoring the England RL team - that only plays 3 or 4 games pa, confined to small stadia in one region of the country, and (BBC match coverage excluded) with limited media coverage - is a very, very niche proposition. What's the return on it? It has to be very limited.

I wouldn't be surprised if the England team is based at UCLAN - some teams were for the RLWC, they have a strong sports business department and I think a strong RL team - and the RFL are getting it free in return for a sponsors patch.

I understand all the reasons for accepting a team in Port Moresby (and I would buy a replica shirt tomorrow!) but it's not without huge risk. How long will the Australian government fund this team? Is that funding set in stone? Are we expecting the PNG economy to grow enough that it will be able to support an NRL team once government funding stop (IIRC something like 80% of PNGers are subsistence farmers)? What about the inevitable backlash from other politicians (and sports) with vested interests and the resulting pressure to cease funding it? How many Australian/NZ players are going to want to base themselves out of POM (we're always told players don't want to move to Canberra)? Or are we expecting this team to solely consist of locals, in which case the first few years are going to be painful on the field (it's likely to be painful anyway tbh)? And then, looking at the alternative options, is there a plan in place to get Perth and NZ2 into the NRL? Because both of those place would be tremendous additions - footprint, player development, TV and commercial revenue . Or are we just going to ignore them again? If it was me, I'd saying: Perth or NZ2 in 2025, the other of those in 2027 and POM in 2030. And working with the Australian gov't to put in the funding now so that the player pathways in PNG (which are still pretty ad hoc) are developed so that by the time POM enters the NRL there are enough PNGers capable of playing in the NRL so that at least the question over players is removed from the equation.

Some of us have been warning about the situation in Serbia for years now. The sport has stood back and left them to it, and now it looks like we've let another opportunity to really assist a developing nation slip through our fingers. You can see the potential for something similar happening with Greece too, given the RLWC nonsense.

I don't see how anyone can spin this as a good deal for RL. If people don't now realise the corner the game has backed itself into over the past decade they never will.

Despite the handwringing on here the truth is most RL fans couldn't give a monkey's about clubs outside the heartlands. In fact, many of them actively dislike these clubs. In the end, you get what you want.

I was going to laugh at this, but it's unfortunately true

I saw the Canadian RL tweeting about this yesterday, pleased to at least have some clarity on the issue. Must say I'd be surprised if they can find a way to meet the criteria in the next 6 months, seeing as their season is now over. Same goes for everyone else, I suppose. Scotland have no business whatsoever being a Full Member and shouldn't be allowed to take part, but the IRL has shown no desire to deal with that issue for a long time now. And contrast that with Greece almost certainly being unable to take part - despite there being vastly more RL being played in that country. Such a great way to destroy 10 years of hard work that led to them playing in 2021.

What good things do they do?

1994. That was my first Broncos game. 27 years later I finally walked away. If I'm an "anti Broncos troll", like you say, then there are thousands of us out there. All of whom at one point considered that club to be an important part of their lives, none of whom now have anything to do with it. But sure, crack on and tell us about all the good things London Broncos are doing.

Could you provide a list of these 'good things' they're doing?

It's a game against England Community Lions U18s, I believe.

Historically, it was true to say that the PNG players were a shorter, stockier build. That would most likely be because of diet (IIRC even just a few years ago 90% of PNGers were substance farmers) and isolation. As those things have changed so would their physical characteristics, we see that the world over as people's diets and living conditions change.

They must have played at, and upset, every club in London by now. Does that bring about a Netflix reboot with a return to Craven Cottage?

Perhaps, and this is based on nothing more than 30 years experience, there is no plan?

Who would that be?

That said, Serbia have just scored a nice try. Chip over the top, then a miss out pass.

1. I've never seen a French team play in red and white hooped shirts and black shorts before. Feels weird. 2. Serbian RL hasn't progressed for a good few years now. The game just hasn't done enough (or anything?) to help them. We're our own worst enemy.

What if they played the game at Wimbledon?