Big Picture

Yes it is zero, maybe even negative. @Martyn Sadlerdid Matt Ellis pay anything when he took over Wakefield two years ago, did he just pay nothing, or did Michael Carter have to right off debts to get someone to take the club off his hands? Note that the latter case would mean the club's value was less than zero. I note that this TotalRL report on Mike Danson's takeover of Wigan from Ian Lenagan doesn't mention any price paid at all either, so it's quite possible he paid nothing. That would make Wigan's value zero when he took it off Lenagan's hands.

I meant capital value, i.e. the value which someone would consider it worth paying to buy in, not revenue. And realistically that value is zero. Regarding revenue though, 7 million € is nowhere near Catalans' total budget. Their budget for 2020 was reported to be between 11 and 12 million € and it's surely gone up since then.

The trouble is that an SL membership isn't really worth a fee for a new entrant. In North America those fees grant the new entrant full membership with equal treatment and plenty of support from the league in setting up the new franchise. Realistically SL can't provide any of that to a new entrant.

MLS is based on the franchised North American business model though, that's what's behind the spectacular increase in its franchise fee over time.

Unfortunately that wouldn't work either. First, those 6-8 current clubs you have in mind aren't strong at all, they're very weak. That's why their reaction to IMG not having a magic solution to their chronic financial problems was to panic and rebel. And second, as a big fish in a small pond the NRL isn't nearly strong or rich enough to change things materially.

He backed that up personally by selling an advertising company in Toronto which he owned and using that money to fund his full time involvement in RL. Naturally he talked big, he was trying to make that investment profitable like investment in pro sports franchises is in North America. Considering that he spent all the money he got from selling his advertising company in Toronto on his RL ventures for no return that probably shouldn't surprise any of us.

I think you mean no other sport there, not "no other major sport". This small time BS we're seeing now proves that RL is not a major sport in the UK, it can barely even be called a minor sport there. And realistically there's nothing the NRL is capable of doing to change that.

I can guarantee you they haven't, otherwise they'd never bother with any current clubs for the simple reason that they're all much too small and because they're in the wrong sort of places to grow they'll always be much tOo small.

No, I wouldn't. As @gingerjonpoints out above the game needs new fans and they need to outnumber the current fans, because as Sky stated at time of previous contract negotiations the game's TV audience is stagnant. And there's no evidence that the clubs listed in the outline given by Martyn Sadler above can possibly achieve that.

I thought of that option, and the men's tournament could conceivably tap into the big Caribbean diaspora in Toronto for Jamaica's matches. How well that work in autumn as opposed to July when the Caribana festival is on every year is something I don't know though. Chances are that the women will be having to pay their own ways for their tournament.

Where would it be viable though? France? England? French matches in France and the rest in England? Not an easy question to answer is it?

October 2007 for me, I had to look it up.

Just whom do you think would ever be fooled by such a rebranding anyway?

They were wrong to complain though. It was a World Cup with prices which weren't even as high as Premier League prices.

And as you and I both know but apparently @Dave Tdoesn't, the team's 40 metre zone extends 40 metres out from their goal line, not 35, 36 or some other number. Therefore the only way to handle shorter than normal fields like the one in Las Vegas which is consistent with the rules of the game is the way the NRL has done, by treating the field as if it was a full 100 metres long and adjusting all of the lines, the distance for the defensive line, etc. accordingly. The RFL is the odd one out among RL governing bodies here, and their approach has clearly been rejected by the Aussies and rightly so.