Big Picture

You don't quite get it though. While current RL followers might see that as cheapening the jersey, a bigger concern is that outsiders who tune in could well see it as confirmation that RL is just a small time regional sport with limited appeal as they've heard or been told it is. As for getting a southern hemisphere nation up to the UK at the end of the season most years, the track record suggests that only Australia and New Zealand are big enough draw cards to attract good crowds.

If casual viewers tune in anticipating the sort of crowd a soccer or RU match between the same countries, what will they think of seeing small crowds like that?

Unless I'm mistaken back in the day when Union converts played RL in some numbers the high profile converts were among the best paid players at their clubs from day 1. Maybe someone like Grubrats would know more about that though.

Increasing the number of ad breaks in a match by stopping the clock in dead ball situation as they were reportedly considering doing is another way to increase the value of their TV rights.

Do you have any evidence to back that opinion up?

It's more accurate to say that RL clubs exist at many universities, but unless I'm mistaken it isn't a university-funded varsity sport in any of them. I wouldn't be so quick to say that there's no growth in the local leagues. The Melbourne Rugby League entry in Wikipedia shows that 14 of the 17 clubs were founded since the Storm were admitted into the NRL and something like half of its defunct clubs started after then too. Even if we assume that the defunct clubs whose foundation year isn't listed started before the advent of the Storm, that still means that the Melbourne RL has basically doubled in size since the Storm came on the scene and stimulated local growth in the sport. If instead some or all of those also came after the Storm's arrival on the scene that would mean that the local league has more than doubled in since during that time.

It would require a new built-for-purpose league such as I have mentioned in previous posts which uses new markets like Toronto and New York as the means to succeed in other markets such as London.

For that to happen though, RL first needs something to market and it doesn't have that now. This product can not be marketed successfully via the small time traditional clubs because their presence at the top just reinforces the negative stereotypes about the game believed by most of the minority among the British public who even know that two versions of rugby exist. A better vehicle with which to market the game is needed first and in view of those negative stereotypes that might need the game to be rebranded too. You are right that it can't be done within the sport's present structure in the UK. That doesn't mean that it can't be done at all though.

The KHL and the major North American leagues all manage different time zones without issue. The latter all cover three time zones and the former spans ten . Those leagues have shared priorities though.

Ice hockey is probably the best example. Back in the 50s it had very little presence in the US beyond the northeast and midwest.

It doesn't sound like what they submitted is realistic at all, maybe it won't be viable even with the same central distribution as the other SL clubs get.

Tony Collins puts the Wolfpack into historical perspective on this week's Rugby Reloaded podcast, O Canada - lessons of rugby league expansion.

A North American league wouldn't be distinctive enough to draw the crowds and TV audiences needed for a new league's success to a sport which hardly anyone over here knows about, the transatlantic element is needed for that. That said I agree with you that the likes of Toronto don't mix well with the small time outfits which make up the so-called "Super League" and that a new league is needed for them to play in. It just needs to be a transatlantic league, not just a North American league. Can that perceived elite status survive Canadians discovering just how small time the "Super League" is though? Likely not for too long.

The New York bid being headed by a guy from Huddersfield, likely most posters don't see it as serious prospect to happen.

1993 wasn't the start of metric, just the start of the lines all being 10 metres apart with numbers. RL went metric down under before then as can be seen in match videos from the late 1980s and early 1990s.