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Moving forward. French teams in the U.K. leagues structure

Cumbrian Mackem

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Cumbrian Mackem

Cumbrian Mackem

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With both Catalan and Toulouse topping their respective leagues what does the next 10 years of French involvement in the U.K. structure look like?

Will we see a 3rd French team join? Is there an appetite from both governing bodies to make it happen?

If it was to happen I’d choose a big city like Lyon to be the 3rd French team and I’d mix it with the best current players in elite1 with 5-6 overseas players. Lyon are currently in elite2 so withdrawing them from that league won’t harm the elite1 competition in the same way Avignon or carcassonne would.

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Sports Prophet

Sports Prophet

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I would love to see the Elite 1 grow to rival Championship 1 and see the Championship grow to be a legitimate continental division below SL.

Champ 1 an entry for new Semi Pro UK/Ire clubs and Elite 1 would be a great breeding ground for Italian and Spanish entries and EU countries beyond, although I appreciate I am getting far too visionary for the sport’s wallet.

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Man of Kent

Man of Kent

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From what I've seen the other French clubs don't have nearly the same finance, infrastructure, youth development etc. as Catalans and Toulouse. The Lyon idea seems here-today-gone-tomorrow pins in the map stuff that doesn't work.

I'd rather see Elite 1 as a strong competition - the NSW Cup of France, feeding into Toulouse and Catalans - than to gut it by shoving the stronger (but not strong enough) clubs into the British game.   

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Cumbrian Mackem

Cumbrian Mackem

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21 minutes ago, Man of Kent said:

From what I've seen the other French clubs don't have nearly the same finance, infrastructure, youth development etc. as Catalans and Toulouse. The Lyon idea seems here-today-gone-tomorrow pins in the map stuff that doesn't work.

I'd rather see Elite 1 as a strong competition - the NSW Cup of France, feeding into Toulouse and Catalans - than to gut it by shoving the stronger (but not strong enough) clubs into the British game.   

You don’t think that Lyon playing in the championship or potentially super league one day is a better way of growing RL in that city compared to Lyon in playing elite2 or even elite1?

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Cumbrian Mackem

Cumbrian Mackem

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15 minutes ago, Sir Kevin Sinfield said:

Several more French teams playing in both Super League and the Championship would be ideal, with their reserve sides playing in Elite One as is the case with Catalans and Toulouse. 

True success story of expansion are the French teams.

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Eddie

Eddie

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38 minutes ago, Sports Prophet said:

I would love to see the Elite 1 grow to rival Championship 1 and see the Championship grow to be a legitimate continental division below SL.

Champ 1 an entry for new Semi Pro UK/Ire clubs and Elite 1 would be a great breeding ground for Italian and Spanish entries and EU countries beyond, although I appreciate I am getting far too visionary for the sport’s wallet.

Elite 1 is already as strong as the championship, they’ll all destroy west Wales for example and I expect Carcassonne etc would trouble or even beat the best league one teams. Ideally you’d have L1 and E1 both feeding into the championship. 

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Eddie

Eddie

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59 minutes ago, Cumbrian Mackem said:

With both Catalan and Toulouse topping their respective leagues what does the next 10 years of French involvement in the U.K. structure look like?

Will we see a 3rd French team join? Is there an appetite from both governing bodies to make it happen?

If it was to happen I’d choose a big city like Lyon to be the 3rd French team and I’d mix it with the best current players in elite1 with 5-6 overseas players. Lyon are currently in elite2 so withdrawing them from that league won’t harm the elite1 competition in the same way Avignon or carcassonne would.

Why Lyon? Who’s going to fund and play for this team? Where would they play? 

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Hela Wigmen

Hela Wigmen

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7 minutes ago, Cumbrian Mackem said:

Why not?

Because there aren’t any clubs who can move across, we haven’t yet got two strong, established top-flight French clubs, Covid and the continual problems that throws up, the infrastructure and finances of existing French clubs is not good enough to handle the move, there’s huge uncertainty around the lower leagues in the UK and uncertainty about long-term TV deals and central funding in the UK. Apart from that though, we’re good to go. 

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Cumbrian Mackem

Cumbrian Mackem

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9 minutes ago, Eddie said:

Why Lyon? Who’s going to fund and play for this team? Where would they play? 

Why Lyon? Because it’s a big city with a RL history.

Whos going to fund it? Try and look for investment.

who’s going to play for them? Players currently playing in elite1 mixed in with 5-6 overseas players.

where would they play?  Their current stadium.

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Hela Wigmen

Hela Wigmen

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18 minutes ago, Eddie said:

Why Lyon? Who’s going to fund and play for this team? Where would they play? 

Because it’s a big city with a (very) small Rugby League presence in Elite 2 and people want them to run before they can walk. That’s how you do Rugby League. See also, Toronto, Paris, Gateshead, Celtic Crusaders etc. 

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Cumbrian Mackem

Cumbrian Mackem

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3 minutes ago, Hela Wigmen said:

Because it’s a big city with a (very) small Rugby League presence in Elite 2 and people want them to run before they can walk. That’s how you do Rugby League. See also, Toronto, Paris, Gateshead, Celtic Crusaders etc. 

You could quite literally have said the same about Toulouse and look at them now.

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Eddie

Eddie

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16 minutes ago, Cumbrian Mackem said:

Why Lyon? Because it’s a big city with a RL history.

Whos going to fund it? Try and look for investment.

who’s going to play for them? Players currently playing in elite1 mixed in with 5-6 overseas players.

where would they play?  Their current stadium.

Who’s going to look for investment? Would lads from Aude with families and jobs want to move 100s of miles to play part time rugby league? Google their ground, it’s a dump, northern premier league standard at best. This is just dreamland stuff - for a team to profess it needs owners who want to do it, and I don’t know why any Elite club would want to currently, they’d be better off strengthening their own league. 

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Cumbrian Mackem

Cumbrian Mackem

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1 minute ago, Eddie said:

Who’s going to look for investment? Would lads from Aude with families and jobs want to move 100s of miles to play part time rugby league? Google their ground, it’s a dump, northern premier league standard at best. This is just dreamland stuff - for a team to profess it needs owners who want to do it, and I don’t know why any Elite club would want to currently, they’d be better off strengthening their own league. 

What’s a better sell for potential investors elite2 and elite1 or the championship and potentially super league?

Lyon could share a stadium with the rugby union side like Toulouse do or upgrade their current ground to championship standards.

Some players will move/travel to Lyon while others won’t like with Catalan and Toulouse now.

yes it’s dreamland stuff but you would have said that before Catalan and Toulouse entered the U.K. league structures.

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Eddie

Eddie

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1 minute ago, Cumbrian Mackem said:

And now top of the championship hurtling towards super league at breakneck speed.

With Fev doing the same, two teams and one promotion spot. I’d like to see them go up this year but it’s nowhere near guaranteed. 

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Cumbrian Mackem

Cumbrian Mackem

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Just now, Eddie said:

So were loads of Trieze teams. I bet 95% of people in Lyon don’t even know they have a RL team, in fact 5% knowing is a generous estimate. 

That’s because they play in elite2. How many people in Perpignan knew or cared about RL in that city before the dragons were born?

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