Catalans & Toulouse trying to withdraw players from International duty?

[Magic Superbeetle]

2 hours ago, Saint Toppy said:

Some of those Saints players were never going to play anyway, Knowles is suspended so can't play, Walmsley has been out injured since the end of March and was never expected back until sometime in May anyway, Makinson & Percival both got injured at HKR and missed this weekends game and Lomax got a shoulder injury in the 1st half against Wire. The only 2 i'm surprised that have pulled out are Lees & Dodd as neither appeared to have picked up injuries.

Dodd has been playing with a groin injury for most of the year, which is why the likes of Bennison and Lussick were goal kicking against Warrington ahead of him

[kiggy]

6 hours ago, Chronicler of Chiswick said:

Same here, even though I've bought my ticket - probably won't even watch it on TV.

I assume this is on Sky? So no French coverage at all?

[moorside roughyed]

2 hours ago, Harry Stottle said:

I live 10 miles from the HJ but no way would I have bought tickets prior for this game.

The French have previous in doing this for games v England, they did it at Leigh twice it renders the games as a complete waste of time.

Unfortunately my son didn't know that. He was just buying something for his dad. If it does turn out that they field a weakened team it's absolutely pathetic. No wonder the games in the state it is.

Edited April 24 by moorside roughyed

[RL Sutton Coldfield]

So glad I paid for my match and train ticket to go and see this 

Edited April 24 by RL Sutton Coldfield

[redjonn]

1 hour ago, Jughead said:

All goes back to the argument that there’s too many league fixtures. It’s self-interest on the part of clubs and it’s understandable, if not morally the right thing to do. A 27 game season after a short pre-season is ludicrous, really. Thankfully, IMG can see this. 

Was it a short pre-season for most of the players... Plus those that where involved in World Cup started their club pre-seasons later for sure but then for most of the selected players for this you could include the World Cup as part of club pre-season if the clubs conditioning staff planned appropriate training regimes for the returners.

If we didn't have a international week-end we would be playing a normal SL round. So they would then be playing anyway if not injured or suspended.

Having said that I do have sympathy for Catalan and so not surprised they would want to restrict the number of their players.  Plus I can not fathom why in the planning it wasn't planned to be in France and so help Catalan not having the travel aspect. In addition it would help for the next world cup in french for the England players to be based their for this game.

 

[Jughead]

29 minutes ago, redjonn said:

Was it a short pre-season for most of the players... Plus those that where involved in World Cup started their club pre-seasons later for sure but then for most of the selected players for this you could include the World Cup as part of club pre-season if the clubs conditioning staff planned appropriate training regimes for the returners.

If we didn't have a international week-end we would be playing a normal SL round. So they would then be playing anyway if not injured or suspended.

Having said that I do have sympathy for Catalan and so not surprised they would want to restrict the number of their players.  Plus I can not fathom why in the planning it wasn't planned to be in France and so help Catalan not having the travel aspect. In addition it would help for the next world cup in french for the England players to be based their for this game.

 

It’s been widely reported that the French selected contingent at the World Cup for Catalans had a short turnaround. Also, if they don’t play this weekend, they’ll be sat on the beach at Collioure, they won’t be playing at Belle Vue. It’s also not about whether we have an international weekend, that’s a different discussion. 
 

[ATLANTISMAN]

The only midseason match v France works if it is played in France otherwise has to be after the SL season is over.

Simple as that.

 

Paul

[yipyee]

19 hours ago, moorside roughyed said:

Why don't they seem to have this problem in Union? The more I think about the more I'm annoyed by it.

In union the players are on central contracts AND the money the national team generates flows down to club level. 

 

[Jim from Oz]

22 hours ago, ATLANTISMAN said:

Sadly i can see this happening alongside 2025 either being pulled or reduced (As the NRL want) to an 8 team comp.

 

Depressing if true but do you have a source for this?? Thanks 

[Jughead]

1 hour ago, ATLANTISMAN said:

The only midseason match v France works if it is played in France otherwise has to be after the SL season is over.

Simple as that.

 

Paul

Yes, the French don’t want to go to Warrington and wouldn’t have bailed from a game at Catalans. 

[StandOffHalf]

Sad that Lees and Dodd appear to have pulled out. 

I think Dodd will be Williams' partner in the halves long-term and I was hoping to see him build that partnership. Lees is an all-action dynamo who is 100 miles an hour. I don't like his recklessness but his energy is super impressive.

I was hoping to see both in action this coming weekend.

[StandOffHalf]

Staggering that this game isn't in Toulouse or Perpignan.

[Jughead]

3 minutes ago, StandOffHalf said:

Staggering that this game isn't in Toulouse or Perpignan.

It’s really not. Following a World Cup that wasn’t completely plain sailing, England games drew approx. 100,000 in Sheffield, Newcastle and London and to continue the momentum generated, needed home games in 2023 to follow up that kind of success. Ideally, they’d have been known during the World Cup and ideally this game wouldn’t have been at Warrington but England playing games in England six months after a World Cup is the right thing to do. 

[Balmainboy]

Do we have any confirmation on French players pulling out? Or just media speculation so far? 

[StandOffHalf]

3 hours ago, Jughead said:

It’s really not. Following a World Cup that wasn’t completely plain sailing, England games drew approx. 100,000 in Sheffield, Newcastle and London and to continue the momentum generated, needed home games in 2023 to follow up that kind of success. Ideally, they’d have been known during the World Cup and ideally this game wouldn’t have been at Warrington but England playing games in England six months after a World Cup is the right thing to do. 

Playing one game in Warrington isn't going to entice casual fans.

[Jughead]

Just now, StandOffHalf said:

Playing one game in Warrington isn't going to entice casual fans.

“ideally this game wouldn’t have been at Warrington…”

[Madrileño]

On 23/04/2023 at 23:18, Monkeymagic22 said:

Toulouse haven’t had a game for a couple of weeks so how come they are claiming that their players need a rest?.

Their squad is tiny though. Everyone is having to do big minutes this season. 

[Spidey]

17 hours ago, Magic Superbeetle said:

Dodd has been playing with a groin injury for most of the year, which is why the likes of Bennison and Lussick were goal kicking against Warrington ahead of him

Playing injured players isn’t a good look for Saints. Player welfare and all that 

[UTK]

https://www.ffr13.fr/xiii-de-france-le-groupe-pour-langleterre/?fbclid=IwAR1ogOqlSh4WvzHyafGgA3TAfKK935RGXcHftMQXcDss-4N8oLsg5XfoioY

CHAN Tiaki (Dragons Catalans)
COZZA Mathieu (Featherstone Rovers)
DEZARIA Jordan (Dragons Catalans)
FRANCO Romain  (Saint-Estève XIII Catalan)
GOUDEMAND Mickael (Dragons Catalans)
JOUFFRET Louis (Halifax Panthers)
JULLIEN Benjamin (Pia XIII)
JUSSAUME Mathieu (Toulouse Olympique XIII)
LAGUERRE Matthieu (Dragons Catalans)
LANGI Samisoni (Wakefield Trinity)
MARCON Paul (Toulouse Olympique XIII)
MARION Anthony (Toulouse Olympique XIII)
MOURGUE Arthur (Dragons Catalans)
ROMANO Arthur (Dragons Catalans)
ROUGÉ César (Dragons Catalans)
SANGARÉ Justin (Leeds Rhinos)
SCIMONE Bastien (Dragons Catalans)
TISON Ugo (Dragons Catalans)
VAILHEN Florian (Pia XIII)
ZENON Tanguy (Dragons Catalans)

[UTK]

[Mathius Hellwege]

great squad

[Saint Toppy]

17 hours ago, redjonn said:

 

Having said that I do have sympathy for Catalan and so not surprised they would want to restrict the number of their players.  

Lets face it when everyone is fit at Catalans they only have probably 3 French players who would be in their starting 13 anyway with Laguerre, Bousquet & Garcia and then maybe 2 or 3 more on the bench

[The Phantom Horseman]

Looking at that French squad, some of our French experts will be able to put me right on this but it looks like 7 of the 20 are specialist wingers or centres. A lot of fringe players in that squad.

[Archie Gordon]

Well, we have something akin to a PM's XIII game rather than a Test match. Should have been marketed as such. 

[gingerjon]

1 hour ago, Archie Gordon said:

Well, we have something akin to a PM's XIII game rather than a Test match. Should have been marketed as such. 

To be fair, that does set the right tone for our tilt at the European Championship in the Autumn.