What would your plan for Wales, Ireland and Scotland be?

[londonrlfan]

6 minutes ago, RugbyLeagueGeek said:

By 'they' who do you mean? There are so few people on the ground in these nations facilitating development work, that there isn't much they can actually achieve without the help/resources/finance of the RFL. If the RFL don't seriously invest in the development of these nations, then they're not going to be able to build a whole lot, even in a decade. Unfortunately, I think we both know that the RFL aren't going to be prioritising any investment in this area, mainly because they don't have a pot to piddle in and the lion's share of their annual income goes to the SL clubs.

Ireland and Scotland, who else?

[Odsal Outlaw]

1 hour ago, Gomersall said:

I appreciate the sentiment but people overrate Serbia. They were recently hammered at home by a French A team and then lost to the Netherlands. They would be in group C or even Group D if we want to give them competitive matches IMO.

Doesn’t have to be Serbia, but the point stands on tiered competition with top side playing England. At least then there is a clear pathway.

[RugbyLeagueGeek]

4 minutes ago, londonrlfan said:

Ireland and Scotland, who else?

But who do you think is actually on the ground doing development work in these nations? How many full-time staff do they have? My guess is very, very few. If any. People often state that the Irish Rugby League and Scottish Rugby League should be doing lots of development work, but they haven't got any people or money to do it.

[londonrlfan]

5 minutes ago, RugbyLeagueGeek said:

But who do you think is actually on the ground doing development work in these nations? How many full-time staff do they have? My guess is very, very few. If any. People often state that the Irish Rugby League and Scottish Rugby League should be doing lots of development work, but they haven't got any people or money to do it.

If you read Damien's posts, Ireland have no interest in developing the sport and just want to pick heritage players. So why should they get money that the RFL don't have?

[RugbyLeagueGeek]

1 minute ago, londonrlfan said:

If you read Damien's posts, Ireland have no interest in developing the sport and just want to pick heritage players. So why should they get money that the RFL don't have?

It shouldn't be 'they' - that's the point. It should be the RFL doing the work. It's part of the RFL's constitution.

[Big Picture]

23 minutes ago, RugbyLeagueGeek said:

It shouldn't be 'they' - that's the point. It should be the RFL doing the work. It's part of the RFL's constitution.

The RFL has no money for that, did you miss that in all the other threads about the state of the game in Britain?

[EggFace]

Get the once famous Welsh and Scootish teams who are not in URC like Pontypool, Meath, Hawick etc to cross codes to the Championship and League 1 as they are playing in Limbo atm.

[Damien]

11 minutes ago, EggFace said:

Get the once famous Welsh and Scootish teams who are not in URC like Pontypool, Meath, Hawick etc to cross codes to the Championship and League 1 as they are playing in Limbo atm

And how is league 1 any less in limbo?

[RugbyLeagueGeek]

39 minutes ago, Big Picture said:

The RFL has no money for that, did you miss that in all the other threads about the state of the game in Britain?

Have you missed all of the posts I've written where I've acknowledged that?

[Griff]

1 hour ago, EggFace said:

Get the once famous Welsh and Scootish teams who are not in URC like Pontypool, Meath, Hawick etc to cross codes to the Championship and League 1 as they are playing in Limbo atm.

Meath?

[GeordieSaint]

Typically this topic becomes a Bring Back GB focus. That’s really not going to address the issue. 

[EggFace]

55 minutes ago, Griff said:

Meath?

Yes Neath I meant Meath are GAA

[EggFace]

2 hours ago, Damien said:

And how is league 1 any less in limbo?

It's the bottom of the paid game pyramid the welsh premiership has no were else to go as do the Super 6 and then Scottish Premiership.

[damp squib]

5 hours ago, Damien said:

They have none. Their entire plan revolves around using heritage players and having 50/50 training sessions/trials split between Ireland and England with English coaches. Essentially 2 separate groups of players but much more favoured towards English players. And by training sessions/trials I'm talking about maybe 6 all year in Ireland.

I pretty much disagreed with everything I was told. I said all those sessions should be in Ireland. That picking heritage players, that already have chances to play for England, will only see Irish lads stop going to 'trials', which is what happened. The Irish lads were every bit as good as the English lads, including some of those on scholarships, but simply need training and experience.

I said that even if there aren't clubs at u16s and u19s level that those sessions should be much more regular and build to games even between those players. I also asked for much more activity between April - August when there is no RU. Coaches also need to be Irish based too because English based coaches, who don't even come to Ireland half the time for 'trials', does nothing to develop the game. Lads were literally picked for squads based on them playing amateur RL in England and thats it.

Pretty much everything that should happen didnt/doesn't and there are no plans to change that. There's heaps more but you get the gist.

Out of interest wast the person you spoke to Irish?

From the outside it has always seemed to me that RLI is almost entirely run by people from the north of England with a few token Irish without any real power.

[Damien]

2 minutes ago, damp squib said:

Out of interest wast the person you spoke to Irish?

From the outside it has always seemed to me that RLI is almost entirely run by people from the north of England with a few token Irish without any real power.

It is run by people based in Ireland and in theory they have the power. They are just all too willing to take the easy option and seem in awe of the English who make things much easier for them. What is good for Irish diaspora in England who want to connect with their roots is usually in direct conflict with what will grow the game in Ireland.

[headtackle]

Rugby League should have the equivalent of Football's nations league

Mini groups of 3 or 4 teams in tiers so that the cream rises to the top and each team has realistic and competitive fixtures.

 

 

[GeordieSaint]

24 minutes ago, Damien said:

It is run by people based in Ireland and in theory they have the power. They are just all too willing to take the easy option and seem in awe of the English who make things much easier for them. What is good for Irish diaspora in England who want to connect with their roots is usually in direct conflict with what will grow the game in Ireland.

Out of interest, how strong do you think the Irish diaspora links back to the old country actually are? Being a St Helens lad, I obviously have links and an Irish name. Never felt emotional tide though - much stronger to north of the border and the other side of the family. Always felt it was stronger in Liverpool, and potentially Manchester than some of the surrounding places. 

[damp squib]

30 minutes ago, Damien said:

It is run by people based in Ireland and in theory they have the power. They are just all too willing to take the easy option and seem in awe of the English who make things much easier for them. What is good for Irish diaspora in England who want to connect with their roots is usually in direct conflict with what will grow the game in Ireland.

That's interesting. I remember a few years ago Richard Egan (I think) announced a new policy that guaranteed a significant minimum quota of domestic players in international squads. Liam Finn (I think) and a few other heritage players and staff publicly criticized the policy and it was immediately dropped and never mentioned again. It convinced me that the Ireland based staff were token figureheads and that the the Ireland national team was being run from England for the benefit of heritage players and staff.

I completely agree that this situation is actively harmful to the development of rugby league both in Ireland and elsewhere, as we potentially take tournament places away from countries where genuine development is happening.

I feel no connection to the Irish national team in rugby league and haven't for years.

[yanto]

4 hours ago, Odsal Outlaw said:

Doesn’t have to be Serbia, but the point stands on tiered competition with top side playing England. At least then there is a clear pathway.

 There is / was a CLEAR PATHWAY and if any of the minnows are/ were good enough they had the chance to step up to the next level. 

Up until 2018 there was a European A ,B and C which included Wales, Ireland, Scotland and France, and initially Russia in the top tier.

As I pointed out once before it started in 2005 when Netherlands Serbia and the short lived Georgia  came onto the scene. Georgia won the qualifying group to advance to play with the big boys in two groups of three with the two winners playing off in the final.

France beat Wales.

2009 Italy and Lebanon came in as France seemed to not enter only to come back a year later (2010) when European A was France Ireland Scotland and Wales.

2012 was a strange one with only Ireland and Scotland in European A ...maybe Wales and France dropped out to prepare for the 2013 World Cup ?

2014,2015 and 2018 had the four usual suspects.

While all this was going on European B (2007 till present day) and European C (from 2008) and eventually European D (2021) were developing .

 

I know covid had an affect but it just seems like the Welsh, Irish, French and Scots (or the RLEF ) have made little effort since 2018 to get European A back up and running. Again this may have had something to do with the now cancelled world cup and the proposed qualification process... I dont know.

For people to now suggest for a "tiered structure" its been in place since 2005 but has become a bit hit and miss at European A.

Check out the link on the RLEF website for full details.

https://europeanrugbyleague.com/competitions/98

 

 

[Damien]

4 minutes ago, damp squib said:

That's interesting. I remember a few years ago Richard Egan (I think) announced a new policy that guaranteed a significant minimum quota of domestic players in international squads. Liam Finn (I think) and a few other heritage players and staff publicly criticized the policy and it was immediately dropped and never mentioned again. It convinced me that the Ireland based staff were token figureheads and that the the Ireland national team was being run from England for the benefit of heritage players and staff.

I completely agree that this situation is actively harmful to the development of rugby league both in Ireland and elsewhere, as we potentially take tournament places away from countries where genuine development is happening.

I feel no connection to the Irish national team in rugby league and haven't for years.

I was more talking about junior level. I suspect you are right that at the professional level the professional players and coach have all the clout. Of course the RLI officials probably quite like mixing with the major players of RL at World Cups etc too.

For people in Ireland the Irish team is just completely disconnected. It means nothing.

[damp squib]

20 minutes ago, GeordieSaint said:

Out of interest, how strong do you think the Irish diaspora links back to the old country actually are? Being a St Helens lad, I obviously have links and an Irish name. Never felt emotional tide though - much stronger to north of the border and the other side of the family. Always felt it was stronger in Liverpool, and potentially Manchester than some of the surrounding places. 

Each individual will be different but in my experience the connections are far weaker than they were a generation ago. It wasn't uncommon for people to be born and live there whole lives in England and yet identify exclusively as Irish e.g. Jack Grealish's dad. That's far less common with the younger generation e.g. Jack Grealish.

IMO the end of the troubles made being Irish in England a much less unpleasant experience which made it easier for people of Irish descent to fully accept an English identity. There's also very little Irish emigration to the north of England any more so maintain the connection. It also means the heritage player pool will run dry pretty soon I imagine 

[Odsal Outlaw]

47 minutes ago, yanto said:

 There is / was a CLEAR PATHWAY and if any of the minnows are/ were good enough they had the chance to step up to the next level. 

Up until 2018 there was a European A ,B and C which included Wales, Ireland, Scotland and France, and initially Russia in the top tier.

As I pointed out once before it started in 2005 when Netherlands Serbia and the short lived Georgia  came onto the scene. Georgia won the qualifying group to advance to play with the big boys in two groups of three with the two winners playing off in the final.

France beat Wales.

2009 Italy and Lebanon came in as France seemed to not enter only to come back a year later (2010) when European A was France Ireland Scotland and Wales.

2012 was a strange one with only Ireland and Scotland in European A ...maybe Wales and France dropped out to prepare for the 2013 World Cup ?

2014,2015 and 2018 had the four usual suspects.

While all this was going on European B (2007 till present day) and European C (from 2008) and eventually European D (2021) were developing .

 

I know covid had an affect but it just seems like the Welsh, Irish, French and Scots (or the RLEF ) have made little effort since 2018 to get European A back up and running. Again this may have had something to do with the now cancelled world cup and the proposed qualification process... I dont know.

For people to now suggest for a "tiered structure" its been in place since 2005 but has become a bit hit and miss at European A.

Check out the link on the RLEF website for full details.

https://europeanrugbyleague.com/competitions/98

 

 

Fully aware of all those comps which were great but as we stand here today there is no consistent structured tiered competition, regardless of what’s gone before. So I think fine to propose it as a route forward. 

[WelshpoolMarauder]

6 hours ago, RugbyLeagueGeek said:

But who do you think is actually on the ground doing development work in these nations? How many full-time staff do they have? My guess is very, very few. If any. People often state that the Irish Rugby League and Scottish Rugby League should be doing lots of development work, but they haven't got any people or money to do it.

How many full time staff do the Netherlands have? I doubt it's many, if any, yet they seem to be developing.

It's not all about people being paid to develop the game, you need people with passion willing to give their own time to do things first. 

The name that springs to mind for me in Wales is Ian Golden, who lives and breathes the game and has done an incredible amount for rugby league in Wales. What a difference another dozen like him could make.

[The Hallucinating Goose]

2 hours ago, headtackle said:

Rugby League should have the equivalent of Football's nations league

Mini groups of 3 or 4 teams in tiers so that the cream rises to the top and each team has realistic and competitive fixtures.

 

 

This exact thing was going to take place in 2020 but was cancelled due to Covid, and then again this year a kind of tiered competition was going to take place but was postponed due to France pulling out of hosting the next world cup and this tournament acting as a qualifier for that world cup. 

[RugbyLeagueGeek]

29 minutes ago, WelshpoolMarauder said:

How many full time staff do the Netherlands have? I doubt it's many, if any, yet they seem to be developing.

And they're doing a great job. But with the best will in the world, their national side probably won't beat an NCL team.