Euro XIIIs

[Hammerless Nail]

3 minutes ago, gingerjon said:

I DEMAND DETAILS NOW. I DO NOT CARE HOW TRUE THESE DETAILS ARE.

Warrington, seeing a chance to finally get their hands on a league trophy.

[Impartial Observer]

4 minutes ago, Hammerless Nail said:

Warrington, seeing a chance to finally get their hands on a league trophy.

This is a cup comp though or it was yesterday 

[Eddie]

32 minutes ago, Impartial Observer said:

This is a cup comp though or it was yesterday 

They’d take that, European Champions sounds better than Super League Champions, and it’s not like they’ll ever win a GF anyway. 

[del capo]

The application form for the comp asks applicants if they want to play home or away. In a Cup Competition ?

What if they all want an all expenses  paid for trip away?

In Barla's early years there was a joke that the Cup draws were made out of Tom Keaveney's car boot - with Oldroyd  assisting on the car park.

Pragmatic maybe .

Are the Euro organising committee taking a leaf out his book or can we expect a touch more transparency  on this and other aspects when the business end of this competition becomes more widely public ?

[Eddie]

8 minutes ago, del capo said:

The application form for the comp asks applicants if they want to play home or away. In a Cup Competition ?

What if they all want an all expenses  paid for trip away?

In Barla's early years there was a joke that the Cup draws were made out of Tom Keaveney's car boot - with Oldroyd  assisting on the car park.

Pragmatic maybe .

Are the Euro organising committee taking a leaf out his book or can we expect a touch more transparency  on this and other aspects when the business end of this competition becomes more widely public ?

Who are you asking that question to?

[langpark]

More hype with no substance!  "a professional team applied", but, oh - you guessed it!  I cannot tell you which one, nor provide a shred of evidence.

A former Miss Universe pageant winner just asked me to go out on a date, but I cannot disclose her name to you!  (I wonder why?)

Pretty poor reporting I must say.

[Lowdesert]

1 hour ago, Tommygilf said:

Apparently its a "development competition" now, which is good clarification I suppose.

 

Bit of a knee jerk reaction from Danny.

[del capo]

20 minutes ago, Eddie said:

Who are you asking that question to?

Any one on this forum Eddie.

Remind me who started this thread.

Oh yes . You.

Seriously struggling with your credentials  and motivation now Eddie ( and Scotchy 1 ) but my  profuse apologies if  I am  getting the wrong impression. Not prepared to put my CV on here  as that essentially is what  anonymous  forums  are for - lively debate is why we visit  and input.-  but will more than match most as being one of the longest tooths in the game at admin and club  level.....

Might help if ANYONE from Euro X111  came on here  to advise us all rather than just hiding behind social  media  techno activity ( one of Dean Buchan's strengths I am led to believe ) A lot of sting might then be taken away.

On the other hand  one of the most active threads in the last few years , so may well be part of the policy.......

 

[Tommygilf]

43 minutes ago, Lowdesert said:

Bit of a knee jerk reaction from Danny.

Its in a longer thread but I agree.

 

[langpark]

19 minutes ago, del capo said:

Not prepared to put my CV on here  as that essentially is what  anonymous  forums  are for - lively debate is why we visit  and input.-  but will more than match most as being one of the longest tooths in the game at admin and club  level.....

Haven't you been paying attention?  Yanto's years of running RL in Netherlands are irrelevant and Maurice Watkins in under-qualified!  Please try and keep up! 

[Tommygilf]

Lignano Sharks is a team I think vaguely exists?

[langpark]

10 minutes ago, Tommygilf said:

Lignano Sharks is a team I think vaguely exists?

They played 2 BSL games at home, forfeited their away game, then I think just fizzled out after that.

[yanto]

6 minutes ago, Tommygilf said:

Lignano Sharks is a team I think vaguely exists?

More confused. 

Draft City to be used to identify players to be drafted to clubs to improve the teams is in Italy were the game is virtually no existent. 

But I suppose players can travel from all over Europe to take part.

 

[17 stone giant]

North Brussels Gorillas. 

[Eddie]

51 minutes ago, del capo said:

Any one on this forum Eddie.

Remind me who started this thread.

Oh yes . You.

Seriously struggling with your credentials  and motivation now Eddie ( and Scotchy 1 ) but my  profuse apologies if  I am  getting the wrong impression. Not prepared to put my CV on here  as that essentially is what  anonymous  forums  are for - lively debate is why we visit  and input.-  but will more than match most as being one of the longest tooths in the game at admin and club  level.....

Might help if ANYONE from Euro X111  came on here  to advise us all rather than just hiding behind social  media  techno activity ( one of Dean Buchan's strengths I am led to believe ) A lot of sting might then be taken away.

On the other hand  one of the most active threads in the last few years , so may well be part of the policy.......

 

My point is, if you want to know why not ask the organisers instead of asking open questions on an Internet forum to people who aren’t involved. 
 

It’s been great having Welsh Magpie and Anadolu offer their thoughts but if you want to ask Buchan directly why not do so, or invite him on here to answer our questions?

Not sure what you mean by my motivation or credentials. All along I’ve just said it seems like a great idea and am enjoying the ride, I have as many questions as you but just don’t see why you think the organisers should be revealing so many details when it’s their business not ours, what business tells their customers how they’re funded or what their detailed business plan is. As I’ve said all along if it works then great, and if it doesn’t then it’s a shame but at least they have tried to do something big for RL on the continent, which as far as I can make out nobody else has done. 

[Tommygilf]

16 minutes ago, yanto said:

More confused. 

Draft City to be used to identify players to be drafted to clubs to improve the teams is in Italy were the game is virtually no existent. 

But I suppose players can travel from all over Europe to take part.

 

I have to agree these draft locations seem a bit aimless.

Surely for an amateur development competition your draft should aim to improve the comp? In that context Brisbane makes sense, but Atlanta, Birmingham and Lignano don't. If you were going to be as ambitious enough to include Brisbane you'd think the logical next places would be perhaps Leeds, Manchester or even Perpignan in terms of places of relatively equal strength to offer to a draft. 

Again this competition proffers more questions from its logic than answers. 

[Tommygilf]

6 minutes ago, Eddie said:

My point is, if you want to know why not ask the organisers instead of asking open questions on an Internet forum to people who aren’t involved. 
 

It’s been great having Welsh Magpie and Anadolu offer their thoughts but if you want to ask Buchan directly why not do so, or invite him on here to answer our questions?

Not sure what you mean by my motivation or credentials. All along I’ve just said it seems like a great idea and am enjoying the ride, I have as many questions as you but just don’t see why you think the organisers should be revealing so many details when it’s their business not ours, what business tells their customers how they’re funded or what their detailed business plan is. As I’ve said all along if it works then great, and if it doesn’t then it’s a shame but at least they have tried to do something big for RL on the continent, which as far as I can make out nobody else has done. 

Tbf people have asked on twitter where the EuroXIIIs account and Buchan (I assume the same person) have been either cagey, defensive or negative to anyone asking questions or being anything but happy clapping the competition. 

For something brand new and presumably wanting to put its best foot forward this comp is rubbing a hell of a lot of people up the wrong way.

[stevevalerugby]

who are these draft players going to be and how is this going to improve teams taking part.  i cant see how playing 1 game perhaps is going to develop these teams.

[Number 16]

1 hour ago, langpark said:

A former Miss Universe pageant winner just asked me to go out on a date, but I cannot disclose her name to you!  (I wonder why?)

Aah, so you're who the wife was on the phone to? 

[Eddie]

23 minutes ago, Tommygilf said:

Tbf people have asked on twitter where the EuroXIIIs account and Buchan (I assume the same person) have been either cagey, defensive or negative to anyone asking questions or being anything but happy clapping the competition. 

For something brand new and presumably wanting to put its best foot forward this comp is rubbing a hell of a lot of people up the wrong way.

Agreed entirely. I just don’t understand why so many people are getting vexed about it, it’s not like anyone is getting forced to participate and if you don’t like it then don’t watch, it’s as simple as that?

[Eddie]

31 minutes ago, Tommygilf said:

I have to agree these draft locations seem a bit aimless.

Surely for an amateur development competition your draft should aim to improve the comp? In that context Brisbane makes sense, but Atlanta, Birmingham and Lignano don't. If you were going to be as ambitious enough to include Brisbane you'd think the logical next places would be perhaps Leeds, Manchester or even Perpignan in terms of places of relatively equal strength to offer to a draft. 

Again this competition proffers more questions from its logic than answers. 

I thought they were clear that there were two aims;

1, to improve the comp

2, to give players with potential from places where there is no meaningful comp a chance to play in one. 
 

To me it looks like two of the venues are 1 and the others are 2. 
 

Surely if for example a load of Americans who are superb athletes want to get involved via the Atlanta draft that’s good for the game? 

[Tommygilf]

One thing I have learned looking at the official twitter accounts and press releases is that this comp aims to be "a development league".

This is in contrast to the RLEF's proposed European club competition which was supposed to be aiming for at least semi-professional and presumably include clubs based on ability/qualifying criteria. Presumably countries with significant non Super League centred activities but still decent standards of rugby such as France, Serbia, Russia, Greece, Ireland, Wales etc would be the RLEF's initial targets to bring together in this league. Theoretically these two concepts don't clash. 

Buchan has said that he sees the RLEF's vision as at least 5 to 10 years away. EuroXIIIs seems like it is his way of "#growingthegame", by running a development league. I don't know what he means by "development" in all honesty. At some points it seems like its for newly established teams to sit above national leagues, ie. Dublin, Budapest, Anadolu, Valencia, and draw in the best of that leagues talent to perform on a higher stage. At others, development means bringing pre-existing European club sides into a pan-European competition, ie, Rotterdam, Rhondda, Mad Squirrels. I don't even know what to make of Birmingham - look on the Coventry Bears twitter for some "interesting" correspondence on that front.

[langpark]

10 minutes ago, Eddie said:

I thought they were clear that there were two aims;

1, to improve the comp

2, to give players with potential from places where there is no meaningful comp a chance to play in one. 

Two very opposite aims right there.

[langpark]

11 minutes ago, Tommygilf said:

Buchan has said that he sees the RLEF's vision as at least 5 to 10 years away. EuroXIIIs seems like it is his way of "#growingthegame", by running a development league. I don't know what he means by "development" in all honesty.

I don't think he does either. But he sure loves a good buzzword and "development" is one of his most overused ones.

[Tommygilf]

3 minutes ago, Eddie said:

Agreed entirely. I just don’t understand why so many people are getting vexed about it, it’s not like anyone is getting forced to participate and if you don’t like it then don’t watch, it’s as simple as that?

I think as you can see on here and on other social media there's a lot of scepticism and doubt over this competition, largely from people interested in expansion such as the Coventry Bears chief. That their concerns are met with terse replies and the local rugby community doesn't seem convinced (the best example of that is Birmingham but as yanto on here has shown for the Netherlands), seems to be rubbing some people up the wrong way. There's an element of "who on earth are you?" to all this - which I think would be significantly lessened if this had the legitimacy of RLEF backing. One of the main pre-existing Birmingham clubs for example, when asked why they didn't apply, stated they didn't even know the competition existed. 

 

9 minutes ago, Eddie said:

I thought they were clear that there were two aims;

1, to improve the comp

2, to give players with potential from places where there is no meaningful comp a chance to play in one. 
 

To me it looks like two of the venues are 1 and the others are 2. 
 

Surely if for example a load of Americans who are superb athletes want to get involved via the Atlanta draft that’s good for the game? 

That seems awfully ambitious for a development league that is a cup for the year of the draft anyway. As the poster from Anadolu said this is a case of knockout rugby next year which would mean at best any Americans would get only maybe 80 mins of game time? I can see the point for a league but not a cup comp. 

There's also the problem with a two tier draft system that they'd have to impose a certain number of draft picks from the weaker areas, otherwise everyone is just going to pick from Brisbane and then the UK. Again the two different aims adds a bit more confusion to this competitions aims.