What now for the French national team?

[EastLondonMike]

Plenty of people on here, including myself, have said for many years that these games against France should be played in France, with a genuine strategy built across at least 10 years or so. Yesterdays game was always about what benefits England.

All RL fans recognise the French are not at the same level as England, and that should be taken into account when trying to help them improve, which will ultimately benefit England and SL. Play two tests in France. Every year. Schedule Catalan and Toulouse games at times that allows the national team to prepare better, and prepare them far enough in advance that allows the French coaching set up to plan properly and build. 

[The Masked Poster]

I remember being at Headingley in around 2007(?) which I think was GB then. Julien Rinaldi (sp) scored to give France the lead and I remember thinking that, at last, France were making some progress. Not just because they scored but they were playing well (against a strong GB side) and it looked like the fixture was going to become a regular thing. GB ended up fairly comfortable winners but it was a decent game with a decent crowd. 

And yet....groundhog Day. 

[Davo5]

14 hours ago, THE RED ROOSTER said:

There will never be any improvement in the French national side until at least a dozen players are in the NRL.  Super League just doers not cut it.

And yet a side with 17 Superleague based players just flogged them.

[Davo5]

The French have been a lot more competitive at junior levels,maybe a scheme to encourage/incentivise Superleague clubs to take these young French players into their academies might be an option.

[JM2010]

9 hours ago, Pulga said:

How about a regular series against Wales?

Closer competition I'd think and would help Wales.

That’s a good idea. Those are the next best 2 after England and could build up a good rivalry. The winner could play England at the end of the season before any test series they might be involved in.

 I think Wales might actually be a better option to build up than France. If more clubs put pathways in place like Salford are doing then we could see quite a few Welsh players progressing into SL. Add heritage players and Wales could have a decent side.

There seems to be a good sized growing junior game in Wales at the moment 

 

[gingerjon]

9 hours ago, Pulga said:

How about a regular series against Wales?

Closer competition I'd think and would help Wales.

There's the European Championship coming up in the Autumn.

[Jughead]

If France want to be better and do better, it’s on them, nobody else. We don’t go trying to find ways for Wests Tigers or Wakefield to win their domestic competitions and there’s no need to be doing so for a nation that’s been poorly governed for much of the modern era. 

[barnyia]

Money is needed, either a pro league in France or elite 1 mixed with championship and league 1. 

The work done in France is amazing saying how many actual RL teams and players there are, 

They can compete with England at u17s and maybe come close at u19s, saying there's only 14 under 17 teams in the whole of France and less u19s teams it's pretty impressive work by the clubs. 

[barnyia]

A french union player playing 5th or 6th division union earns more than an elite 1 player, so getting scraps from union teams will never happen unless there's money. 

[Sports Prophet]

33 minutes ago, Jughead said:

If France want to be better and do better, it’s on them, nobody else. We don’t go trying to find ways for Wests Tigers or Wakefield to win their domestic competitions and there’s no need to be doing so for a nation that’s been poorly governed for much of the modern era. 

That is one way of looking at it.

The other way of looking at it is how essential having competitive neighbouring opponent/s is to the overall growth of the British game. For that reason, the RFL need to do so much more.

[Jughead]

Just now, Sports Prophet said:

That is one way of looking at it.

The other way of looking at it is how essential having competitive neighbouring opponent/s is to the overall growth of the British game. For that reason, the RFL need to do so much more.

The RFL need to, just like the French Federation, look in-house at their own garden before watering someone else’s. 

[Damien]

For France to improve it needs a strategy to grow the game in France. Playing more often may yield slight improvements but it isnt going to dramatically improve the fortunes of the national team. They simply do not have enough elite players to pick from for that. Its a lack of players and clubs that hold France back not games.

France need more full-time professional players to pick from and more full time clubs, as well as more players and clubs feeding into this. At a strategic level the game needs to work to achieve this. Obviously another French team in SL helps towards achieving this in the short term, and is a quick win, but a wider goal has to be to build up the game in France domestically. For me the RFL and SL does have a role to play here and it shouldn't be seen as simply doing France a favour. It should be mutually beneficial and there are huge benefits for the game in England in having a strong France.

Without more full time players and clubs there will be no great improvements in internationals. For me discussions around whether France play more often, play Wales, play England, play in a European Championship etc is all redundant unless a real strategic decision is  made to build RL in France up. Then we can make real progress with internationals.

Edited April 30, 2023 by Damien

[Tommygilf]

3 minutes ago, Damien said:

For France to improve it needs a strategy to grow the game in France. Playing more often may yield slight improvements but it isnt going to dramatically improve the fortunes of the national team. They simply do not have enough elite players to pick from for that. Its a lack of players and clubs that hold France back not games.

France need more full-time professional players to pick from and more full time clubs, as well as more players and clubs feeding into this. At a strategic level the game needs to work to achieve this. Obviously another French team in SL helps towards achieving this in the short term, and is a quick win, but a wider goal has to be to build up the game in France domestically. For me the RFL and SL does have a role to play here and it shouldn't be seen as simply doing France a favour. It should be mutually beneficial and there are huge benefits for the game in England in having a strong France.

Without more full time players and clubs there will be no great improvements in internationals. For me discussions around whether France play more often, play Wales, play England, play in a European Championship etc is all redundant unless a real strategic decision is  made to build RL in France up. Then we can make real progress with internationals.

Absolutely. The number 1 thing that would improve French national team performances would be to have more professional players to choose from. At that, more in the NRL.

SL clubs should be incentivised with Cap dispensations for European national team players on their books (which at the moment basically means France and Wales). 

[Wellsy4HullFC]

For me, there are so many issues with this fixture.

Mainly, the outcome meant nothing to anyone. It was a friendly. It didn't attract the best players so it didn't attract the fans. 

Half-arsed efforts like this don't serve a purpose. In fact, it's a disservice to the international game and puts it in a negative light.

Yorkshire v Lancashire would have done more for our international prep than that (I'm not advocating it by the way, just saying it would have been better).

[Jughead]

4 minutes ago, Wellsy4HullFC said:

For me, there are so many issues with this fixture.

Mainly, the outcome meant nothing to anyone. It was a friendly. It didn't attract the best players so it didn't attract the fans. 

Half-arsed efforts like this don't serve a purpose. In fact, it's a disservice to the international game and puts it in a negative light.

Yorkshire v Lancashire would have done more for our international prep than that (I'm not advocating it by the way, just saying it would have been better).

What makes you think that Player A (I won’t use specifics as there’s loads of different circumstances to consider) would play for Yorkshire over England? You say that it doesn’t attract the best players, some of which who are Australia based anyway and wouldn’t be able to play for Yorkshire or England, but why would they choose to play in that game over an equally meaningless game against France?

[Gerrumonside ref]

25 minutes ago, Damien said:

For France to improve it needs a strategy to grow the game in France. Playing more often may yield slight improvements but it isnt going to dramatically improve the fortunes of the national team. They simply do not have enough elite players to pick from for that. Its a lack of players and clubs that hold France back not games.

France need more full-time professional players to pick from and more full time clubs, as well as more players and clubs feeding into this. At a strategic level the game needs to work to achieve this. Obviously another French team in SL helps towards achieving this in the short term, and is a quick win, but a wider goal has to be to build up the game in France domestically. For me the RFL and SL does have a role to play here and it shouldn't be seen as simply doing France a favour. It should be mutually beneficial and there are huge benefits for the game in England in having a strong France.

Without more full time players and clubs there will be no great improvements in internationals. For me discussions around whether France play more often, play Wales, play England, play in a European Championship etc is all redundant unless a real strategic decision is  made to build RL in France up. Then we can make real progress with internationals.

Totally agree.

[Gerrumonside ref]

21 minutes ago, Tommygilf said:

Absolutely. The number 1 thing that would improve French national team performances would be to have more professional players to choose from. At that, more in the NRL.

SL clubs should be incentivised with Cap dispensations for European national team players on their books (which at the moment basically means France and Wales). 

This sounds like a great idea.

[Guest]

26 minutes ago, Tommygilf said:

Absolutely. The number 1 thing that would improve French national team performances would be to have more professional players to choose from. At that, more in the NRL.

SL clubs should be incentivised with Cap dispensations for European national team players on their books (which at the moment basically means France and Wales). 

If French and Welsh players were good enough - they would already be in the system. I doubt they would cost the earth on the cap - so i don't see that as an issue.

Building more and deeper clubs in the South of France would likely serve better - and then if the pool of players is a better quality, the top end will find their way into Cats, TO, Champ or SL.

Much in the same way the PNG side in the Queensland Cup is now throwing out players for other leagues.

Edited April 30, 2023 by Leonard

[headtackle]

It looks like the clubs have little interest in mid season internationals, origin or exiles matches.  
 

I can’t see that this ever going to change so rather than fighting a losing battle the emphasis needs to be on end of season internationals 

The Word cup is our biggest international exposure and should be every 2 years rather than 4.  In between we need competitive games not walkovers like yesterday 

In intervening years go back to 3-4 nations games.  Operate it like the Nations cup in football with promotion and relegation between groups to help sort the pecking order

[Tommygilf]

3 minutes ago, Leonard said:

If French and Welsh players were good enough - they would already be in the system. I doubt they would cost the earth on the cap - so i don't see that as an issue.

Building more and deeper clubs in the South of France would likely serve better - and then if the pool of players is a better quality, the top end will find their way into Cats, TO, Champ or SL.

Much in the same way the PNG side in the Queensland Cup is now throwing out players for other leagues.

That isn't fair. Its cheaper for local (and I mean local) lads to be in academies and 1st team squads than French lads. They are almost incomparable.

[Gerrumonside ref]

3 minutes ago, Leonard said:

If French and Welsh players were good enough - they would already be in the system. I doubt they would cost the earth on the cap - so i don't see that as an issue.

Building more and deeper clubs in the South of France would likely serve better - and then if the pool of players is a better quality, the top end will find their way into Cats, TO, Champ or SL.

Much in the same way the PNG side in the Queensland Cup is now throwing out players for other leagues.

Is there a case for trying to create another Catalans style club (even through a merger) to compete in Super League or are we talking about partnering up financially with Elite 1?

[Davo5]

11 minutes ago, Leonard said:

If French and Welsh players were good enough - they would already be in the system. I doubt they would cost the earth on the cap - so i don't see that as an issue.

Building more and deeper clubs in the South of France would likely serve better - and then if the pool of players is a better quality, the top end will find their way into Cats, TO, Champ or SL.

Much in the same way the PNG side in the Queensland Cup is now throwing out players for other leagues.

How many English clubs spend time & resources identifying youngFrench & Welsh players,some of them don’t look outside their own area.

[Guest]

17 minutes ago, Gerrumonside ref said:

Is there a case for trying to create another Catalans style club (even through a merger) to compete in Super League or are we talking about partnering up financially with Elite 1?

That was TO.

But then the CL clubs did all they could to screw them over (not saying they would have stayed up anyway).

That would help - but clearly a viable domestic comp would be as/more beneficial long term.

[Chris22]

The answer looks to be participation. From what I can see, 75,000 people play rugby league in England and 7,500 do in France.

Even if Toulouse get promoted and stay in Super League, there is a lack of depth in the player pool which would mean that imports from England and Australia are relied upon in the short to medium term.

It's hard to see how France do improve without huge investment. England can play France regularly but without more people playing the sport in France, that gap will not shrink.

[Tommygilf]

47 minutes ago, Davo5 said:

How many English clubs spend time & resources identifying youngFrench & Welsh players,some of them don’t look outside their own area.

Exactly, which is what I mean by having cap incentives to do so.