Aussies & Kiwis not coming in 2023...

[eal]

I always look forward to the bi-annual ten-year calendar of international fixtures.

[ghost crayfish]

Hopefully the Southern Hemisphere nations don't try to hog all the sellable nations. As appetising as a 4N with NZ, Australia, Tonga and Samoa might be, one of those nations needs to go to England. I'll be appalled if the administrators here keep all 4 for the tournament here. 

The sport is in a good spot that there are now 4 nations from this part of the world that can go to England and provide a strong test series, that should appeal to English fans. I hope it's Samoa - after the weekend, that's the easiest one to sell, surely.

[Mathius Hellwege]

13 hours ago, Damien said:

If Australia and NZ are committed to some sort of a Pacific Cup then there is no way that Tonga and Samoa won't also be part of that. I think PNG are most likely to get shafted, as in not invited, and will instead get the option to tour England.

Fiji won OC 2019, group B

so Samoa is free to come

 

(if they do not win the WC and are to precious for the losers in the NH)

[Eddie]

1 hour ago, UTK said:

Don't think PNG are going to get shafted here, only a couple of months ago the NRL and the Australian Governments Pacific Sports Program partnered to get an additional $2.5 million AUD investment into elite RL in PNG. 

The Prime Minister himself publicly backed the 18th NRL team to be PNG, spoke of wanting to ensure the return of international matches to PNG after the PMXIII game was held in Australia this year and even provided a security guarantee to ensure the Hunters final match went ahead after another QCup team refused to travel to Port Moresby. There's far too much investment and political capital involved to snub PNG from playing in the top regional competition, even if they're only in the second tier like the 2019 iteration.

Lebanon is probably the odd team out of all the SH Nations when contemplating a Pacific Cup, after the strong performances in their group I wouldn't be surprised if they're the team with the touring option. Especially as the MEA Cup isn't a long competition and they're already qualified for 2025 anyway.

I can’t see England v Lebanon being much of a draw if that was the case. 

[Sports Prophet]

41 minutes ago, ghost crayfish said:

Hopefully the Southern Hemisphere nations don't try to hog all the sellable nations. As appetising as a 4N with NZ, Australia, Tonga and Samoa might be, one of those nations needs to go to England. I'll be appalled if the administrators here keep all 4 for the tournament here. 

The sport is in a good spot that there are now 4 nations from this part of the world that can go to England and provide a strong test series, that should appeal to English fans. I hope it's Samoa - after the weekend, that's the easiest one to sell, surely.

You can expect the NRL to do whatever suits themselves.

I would expect the English will get an invite and the English should definitely be putting their hand up for any proposed event because I don’t expect any sellable opponents to be travelling to England next year.

[Sports Prophet]

17 minutes ago, Eddie said:

I can’t see England v Lebanon being much of a draw if that was the case. 

Especially when most of the current squad won’t be playing.

[UTK]

16 minutes ago, Eddie said:

I can’t see England v Lebanon being much of a draw if that was the case. 

I tend to agree, it's more of a spitball with the main point being that I can't see PNG being excluded from the Oceanic Cup format while Lebanon likely won't be apart of that competition and therefore have to time to tour the NH (with Lebanon this could easily include the home nations + France).

[UTK]

12 hours ago, Farmduck said:

Why would AUS and NZ go north in 2023? Isn't it the turn of the Southern Hemisphere to have post-season games?

This is true but it's also a mentality that we need to get away from, we can't afford to be basing our WC Cycle around events that rotate hemispheres - every nations priority needs to be playing in front of their owns fans in their own region so that we have consistent content to sell the broadcasters of each region every year. 

We needed to take turns with the 4N because we only had 3 top Nations, but we were left with a situation where Nations would only play 1-2 games a year in their region (or at all in the case of smaller pacific nations) when that competition rotated to the alternate hemisphere. We wonder why the International game won't grow while halving the International games in a region each cycle based on WC/4N rotation. That circumstance is no longer appropriate as we need each of the SH Nations competing against each other for a minimum of 4 games every year, those that don't make a prospective 4/6N can't be left in the wilderness with 1 game per season as they would've previously. 

England are therefore in a difficult position because we also need them playing the bigger SH Nations but with our limited calendar being even further limited by the NRL taking away the mid-season Internationals those SH Nations priority will be playing each other post-season. To be honest I don't think there's an ideal solution to this, perhaps creating a more dedicated window for England/European Internationals to occur mid-season which would allow touring to occur post-season - the problem with that solution is resistance from SL and their clubs as the club season will have to be altered and shortened. 

[The Future is League]

1 hour ago, Eddie said:

I can’t see England v Lebanon being much of a draw if that was the case. 

In my opinion a tri nations here should involve England, France, and either, PNG, Tonga or Samoa, and let France play their games in France

[Big Picture]

2 hours ago, UTK said:

This is true but it's also a mentality that we need to get away from, we can't afford to be basing our WC Cycle around events that rotate hemispheres - every nations priority needs to be playing in front of their owns fans in their own region so that we have consistent content to sell the broadcasters of each region every year. 

We needed to take turns with the 4N because we only had 3 top Nations, but we were left with a situation where Nations would only play 1-2 games a year in their region (or at all in the case of smaller pacific nations) when that competition rotated to the alternate hemisphere. We wonder why the International game won't grow while halving the International games in a region each cycle based on WC/4N rotation. That circumstance is no longer appropriate as we need each of the SH Nations competing against each other for a minimum of 4 games every year, those that don't make a prospective 4/6N can't be left in the wilderness with 1 game per season as they would've previously. 

England are therefore in a difficult position because we also need them playing the bigger SH Nations but with our limited calendar being even further limited by the NRL taking away the mid-season Internationals those SH Nations priority will be playing each other post-season. To be honest I don't think there's an ideal solution to this, perhaps creating a more dedicated window for England/European Internationals to occur mid-season which would allow touring to occur post-season - the problem with that solution is resistance from SL and their clubs as the club season will have to be altered and shortened. 

Shortening the season to enable more mid-season Internationals is part of the IMG proposals which the clubs already voted for.

[UTK]

1 hour ago, Big Picture said:

Shortening the season to enable more mid-season Internationals is part of the IMG proposals which the clubs already voted for.

Yes this appears to be the direction we're heading but to structure it properly you'd need most of the European Internationals to be held mid-season and tours to and from the SH to be exclusively post-season given the NRL have wiped their mid-season window. One weekend is all we've got so far but I guess we'll have to wait and see on the scope of IMG's intentions here.

[Tommygilf]

Oz and NZ not coming back the year after a world cup is to be expected, if not desirable. England could go down under, and I'm sure that is what the RFL initially thought to do, but the Aussies and Kiwis can say "nope we have a Oceania Cup next autumn". Going off previous years that will be a 6 team, two tiered division format.

This has left England scrambling. We don't necessarily fit into an Oceania Cup without a return of the 4 nations, an add on tour risks 2019 all over again, so what do the RFL do?

As it stands, England aren't playing a test match at all next year. A mid season match is likely to be the CNAS as anyone else. Whilst the Samoa result should have broadened the RFLs view of international opposition worthy of England, it may have only done that for the Pacific island nations.

There's also a European cup next year, supposedly, which England as the Knights are expected to take part in. That does officially wipe out France, Wales and Ireland from England's senior options (if they don't play the full team in that competition). 

[gingerjon]

And so England's campaigns end in the men's and women's tournament without anyone knowing who England will be playing next, or when and where that might be.

I'm guessing the same is true of the PDRL side. I'm guessing it will also be true of the wheelchair side.

It's not good enough.

[St Reatham]

12 minutes ago, gingerjon said:

And so England's campaigns end in the men's and women's tournament without anyone knowing who England will be playing next, or when and where that might be.

I'm guessing the same is true of the PDRL side. I'm guessing it will also be true of the wheelchair side.

It's not good enough.

It’s so depressing.

[Live after death]

12 hours ago, Gomersall said:

You really believe the Aussies won’t ever come here for a series?

Not in the foreseeable future. When was the last time England played Scotland in Association football, it used to be every year. But England don’t need it. Australia New Zealand don’t need England. If England gad won this world cup the Aussies would be clambering for a test series for revenge. 

[Gomersall]

1 minute ago, Live after death said:

Not in the foreseeable future. When was the last time England played Scotland in Association football, it used to be every year. But England don’t need it. Australia New Zealand don’t need England. If England gad won this world cup the Aussies would be clambering for a test series for revenge. 

If the money is right they’ll come, don’t worry about that. England don’t play Scotland at football because England think they are too good for them it’s because it’s not worth all the related hassle that comes with it. We don’t play the RoI very often either. I wonder why that is?

[RP London]

21 minutes ago, Gomersall said:

If the money is right they’ll come, don’t worry about that. England don’t play Scotland at football because England think they are too good for them it’s because it’s not worth all the related hassle that comes with it. We don’t play the RoI very often either. I wonder why that is?

Thats not really true though.. while there were issues with crowds etc now its because there are a lot less "friendlies" due to an international calendar that has meaningful games all over the place with the league of nations and qualifiers. 

[Jughead]

After a home World Cup, I’d rather we followed up on that with home games in 2023 and then went away in 2024 before a relatively near 2025 World Cup. 

[Gomersall]

1 hour ago, RP London said:

Thats not really true though.. while there were issues with crowds etc now its because there are a lot less "friendlies" due to an international calendar that has meaningful games all over the place with the league of nations and qualifiers. 

Agree but the initial canning of the HN was because it wasn’t worth the hassle and bad press the England v Scotland game generated. Less friendly matches (numerically not harmony wise) and more meaningful games just confirmed it. It wasn’t because England felt Scotland weren’t worth playing.

[pahars]

3 hours ago, gingerjon said:

And so England's campaigns end in the men's and women's tournament without anyone knowing who England will be playing next, or when and where that might be.

I'm guessing the same is true of the PDRL side. I'm guessing it will also be true of the wheelchair side.

It's not good enough.

Considering the two best countries in the Wheelchair tournament are neighbours it would surely be fairly easy to announce a French tour in Summer 2023 (for example) this Friday at the GMEX and on the BBC. 
 

You can sort the exact details later just make it known that it is happening when it has peoples attention. 

[pahars]

3 hours ago, gingerjon said:

And so England's campaigns end in the men's and women's tournament without anyone knowing who England will be playing next, or when and where that might be.

I'm guessing the same is true of the PDRL side. I'm guessing it will also be true of the wheelchair side.

It's not good enough.

Considering the two best countries in the Wheelchair tournament are neighbours it would surely be fairly easy to announce a French tour in Summer 2023 (for example) this Friday at the GMEX and on the BBC. 
 

You can sort the exact details later just make it known that it is happening when it has peoples attention. 

[gingerjon]

2 minutes ago, pahars said:

Considering the two best countries in the Wheelchair tournament are neighbours it would surely be fairly easy to announce a French tour in Summer 2023 (for example) this Friday at the GMEX and on the BBC. 
 

You can sort the exact details later just make it known that it is happening when it has peoples attention. 

Must be able to find a suitable name for a cup competition they could play for in an annual challenge match.

[mrfranco]

3 hours ago, gingerjon said:

And so England's campaigns end in the men's and women's tournament without anyone knowing who England will be playing next, or when and where that might be.

I'm guessing the same is true of the PDRL side. I'm guessing it will also be true of the wheelchair side.

It's not good enough.

Don't worry, there's a 10-year plan being released very soon...

[gingerjon]

Just now, mrfranco said:

Don't worry, there's a 10-year plan being released very soon...

It's funny cos it's true.

[RP London]

54 minutes ago, Gomersall said:

Agree but the initial canning of the HN was because it wasn’t worth the hassle and bad press the England v Scotland game generated. Less friendly matches (numerically not harmony wise) and more meaningful games just confirmed it. It wasn’t because England felt Scotland weren’t worth playing.

Yes, fair enough I see what you mean.