West Wales Raiders - laughing stock

[Hopping Mad]

1 hour ago, Phil W said:

Firstly, I hope West Wales get themselves sorted.  

Secondly, and I'll probably get shot down for this. But how about opening up promotion and relegation from League One to The Conference Premier? Is there an appetite for this?

If expansion clubs have a promotion pathway it allows them to go in at a more competitive level and build a fan base etc and work their way through the league's. I know it would need regional leagues feeding into the conference's. But surely that journey gives time.

Over the years, I watched a lot of the National Conference League. NCL clubs really do seem happy where they are. Yes, they enjoy the occasional opportunity, through the Challenge Cup, to play semi-pro opposition, but none appear to have any ambition to 'win promotion' to League One.

This talk of variable quality in the third tier brings to mind a remark made by author Paul Wilson. In his book about Wigan, he said this of the late 70s/early 80s Second Division: "It is fair to say a majority of its clubs were only there because there was no third or fourth division to fall into."

[DEANO]

11 hours ago, Angelic Cynic said:

But York got lucky solely by geography of being close enough to the heartlands and utilising dual registration to spark their promotion - expansion clubs,like West Wales Raiders,are too far away.

 

[DEANO]

Euerika. You’ve finally realised why it has never worked or will outside the heartlands. Unfortunate but true

[Jughead]

They have a matchday announcer but still no coach. 

[Hello]

31 minutes ago, DEANO said:

Euerika. You’ve finally realised why it has never worked or will outside the heartlands. Unfortunate but true

Would you say that Toronto getting 10000 crowds for matches in the championship (God knows what attendance they could have achieved in super League at home if covid had permitted)was a "eurika" moment for how it will never work outside the the heartlands? Get a grip

[DEANO]

The Toronto experiment failed as fun as it was. COVID was just an excuse. Fact is there were huge debts with non payment of players and suppliers

[Angelic Cynic]

3 minutes ago, DEANO said:

The Toronto experiment failed as fun as it was. COVID was just an excuse. Fact is there were huge debts with non payment of players and suppliers

Bradford Bulls owed players and suppliers yet Super League apparently want them back - mainly for their fanbase during the glory years.

[Jughead]

Just now, Angelic Cynic said:

Bradford Bulls owed players and suppliers yet Super League apparently want them back - mainly for their fanbase during the glory years.

Who said Super League “wants” them back?

[Smudger06]

48 minutes ago, DEANO said:

Euerika. You’ve finally realised why it has never worked or will outside the heartlands. Unfortunate but true

Never say never but genuine commitment, true dedication and incredibly long term vision are required. 

[Smudger06]

21 minutes ago, Jughead said:

They have a matchday announcer but still no coach. 

Priorities......

[Phil W]

51 minutes ago, DEANO said:

Euerika. You’ve finally realised why it has never worked or will outside the heartlands. Unfortunate but true

It can work and will work. As has been said below commitment dedication and long term vision and there will be ups and downs along the way. I really don't get the anti-expansionists in rugby league. I want to see traditional and expansion clubs thrive as it's good for the game. 

[Eddie]

57 minutes ago, DEANO said:

Euerika. You’ve finally realised why it has never worked or will outside the heartlands. Unfortunate but true

What about Cumbria? That wasn’t an original heartland. 

[Smudger06]

To build something credible and sustainable a long way from a source of players you'd want to start something similar to what Coventry Bears implemented regarding a 4 team Junior League then 10 years later you'd want something like Newcastle have with a half decent league of 8 to 10 clubs with teams of all age grades and open age....then you could but in a League 1 Club, to do so you'd want to draw up a solid legal document for long term usage agreement of a sports field, said field to have space to build your own small simple terrace down the side lines of both sides of pitch to get 1.5k capacity and a non see through fence built.......then you want to get a good long term lease on a pub within spitting distance to the sports field and convert it into a Club house, say no more than 5 minutes walk from pitch......you are good to go.....

[DEANO]

16 minutes ago, Angelic Cynic said:

Bradford Bulls owed players and suppliers yet Super League apparently want them back - mainly for their fanbase during the glory years.

Wouldn’t surprise me

[RLNew]

41 minutes ago, Jughead said:

They have a matchday announcer but still no coach. 

They will be announcing a coach soon with no experience in the pro game, pretty much like their last one. This is despite experienced coaches interested in the role. They will 100% never learn. They won’t win a game, that’s my opinion of course.

[Smudger06]

4 minutes ago, RLNew said:

They will be announcing a coach soon with no experience in the pro game, pretty much like their last one. This is despite experienced coaches interested in the role. They will 100% never learn. They won’t win a game, that’s my opinion of course.

The matchday announcer may announce the head coach at half time. 

[Jughead]

3 minutes ago, RLNew said:

They will be announcing a coach soon with no experience in the pro game, pretty much like their last one. This is despite experienced coaches interested in the role. They will 100% never learn. They won’t win a game, that’s my opinion of course.

Saints appointed an inexperienced head coach in Justin Holbrook and that turned out okay. While for every Holbrook, there’s a Keiron Cunningham but I don’t necessarily think West Wales appointing an inexperienced coach is a bad thing. There could be any number of reasons behind that but it’s certainly not looking good for them. 

[Jughead]

Just now, Smudger06 said:

The matchday announcer may announce the head coach at half time. 

As well as prop, waterboy, physio and club secretary? Some shift from the lad. 

[SamDrew]

33 minutes ago, Eddie said:

What about Cumbria? That wasn’t an original heartland. 

Or Australia? Or Papua New Guinea?

Nah, too far away.

[Hopping Mad]

49 minutes ago, Eddie said:

What about Cumbria? That wasn’t an original heartland. 

That's not quite true. Post-1895, most 'rugby' clubs in Cumberland and Westmorland switched to the Northern Union - it just took until the Forties for a professional club to emerge.

Edited January 27, 2022 by Hopping Mad

[DEANO]

35 minutes ago, Jughead said:

As well as prop, waterboy, physio and club secretary? Some shift from the lad. 

You forgot to mention a doctor 

[wiganermike]

38 minutes ago, RLNew said:

They will be announcing a coach soon with no experience in the pro game, pretty much like their last one. This is despite experienced coaches interested in the role. They will 100% never learn. They won’t win a game, that’s my opinion of course.

They are going to have a weak squad again certainly but the likelihood is that WWR, Cornwall and Skolars will all be of similar strength so at least those three clubs should be competitive with each other, even though they are likely to take some hammerings from the other League 1 clubs. It is likely to be a very long season for each of those three clubs but they should each have 4 games (against the other two minnows) that they have a chance of winning this year.

[welshmagpie]

9 hours ago, RLNew said:

They will be announcing a coach soon with no experience in the pro game, pretty much like their last one. This is despite experienced coaches interested in the role. They will 100% never learn. They won’t win a game, that’s my opinion of course.

As mentioned here. Terms agreed with a rather ‘unproven’ coach who isn’t local to the area. We will see how that goes 

[Eddie]

On the Championship and L1 preview show, Robert Hicks said that WWR had a good season last year. I know he should be putting a slight positive spin on things but that is just ridiculous. 

[Hello]

11 hours ago, DEANO said:

The Toronto experiment failed as fun as it was. COVID was just an excuse. Fact is there were huge debts with non payment of players and suppliers

Such huge debts that they were asking to be able to pay MORE wages. Anyway, it is normal for big sporting clubs to have debts - look at the huge debts of Barcelona, a massive club.  And none of this is the point anyway, the fact is that a new team was set up very successfully a couple of thousand miles away and after just three years already had crowds in the Championship that embarassed most of your ideal lock-off-the-heartlands-from-civilisation world where your dream is non-expansion and steady overall decline of the sport. Others, including myself, welcomed those many thousands of new Toronto fans to the sport. And to say covid hasn't had an impact, blimey where do you start......