I'm glad you concede I have taught you a bit about French rugby league.

I watched a bit of the 1954 French Championship Final last night: Bordeaux v Mille.

And a game featuring Lyon at Stade George Lyvet from 1955.

You know those two teams that never existed...

sonic hedgehog is looking worse as this continues

throw in the towel mate.

Nobody thinks that Oldham, Keighley, Fax, Whitehaven should be in Super League. They wouldn't be able to cope with the financial pressures.

Yet somehow you think that Crusaders ought to be even though it is obvious to everybody that won't be around much longer.

The only thing you taught me is that other forumites were right, you are worse than dally (and that's saying something).

You even think Barcelona won the French league. That's how clueless you are.

What are you talking about numbskull?

It wasn't that long ago you were begging me for a copy of the footage I mentioned on another forum.

Shame I told you to get stuffed...

Like Catalan Dragons?

Yes, a merger between two clubs that had played a lower level of RL for 50+ years.

Save your typing - it's like banging your head against a brick wall.

in front of a few hundred fans combined

lets not bother pretending that RL was a big part of the culture in perpignan (and the wider catalonia) before Les Catalans, it was barely a footnote on the sporting landscape

Where did you get that info from? Is there a web site with the details?

I think you are hallucinating again.

Northern Catalonia has many rugby league clubs not just the ones that merged to form UTC (and it was three clubs not two).

Once again Smokey you can't ignore facts!

Like the one that Perpignan has held regular internationals for the past 30 years getting decent crowds like 18,000 in the 60's. Also there is the one that UTC played Wigan in the challenge cup and got 8,000 despite this being at the same time as the local Union team playing.

There was no such form for Bridgend, the opposite if anything like only 3000 for the first match between Wales and Australia since the heroics of the 2000 World Cup.

Rubbish.

Rugby league has been one of the main sports of Perpignan since the 1930s.

It is ingrained in the local culture.

They have had crowds of up to 25,000 for club matches.

The constant belittling of French rugby league and its history on this website is generally very ordinary.

whats banging your head on a brick wall feel like?

explains many of your posts.

so peoples idea of a heartland is an area dominated by RU.

heck london now is a RL heartland too!

id say it was a real heartland from 1933 - 1939.

especially the latter years when a real dominance was emerging.

after that the heart was ripped from the game and the clubs lived a hand to mouth existence with the game basically on life support

if thats your idea of heartland, why not pick anywhere where RL was strong for 6 years and effectively died off after like manchester?

nobody can tell me beforehand they knew LC would work because they were in a heartland area. its a lie

i wasnt 100% confident theyd work out, especially after their poor first season

as is usual with the flatcapper bridage, i remember clearly reading rumours on internet forums of them not paying players on time and a large debt of 3 million pounds being run up.

after their first season they became much more stable as a club

even today the scum USAP still get higher crowds than LC do.

I don't think so.

Dally outed you.

back to the qquestion, what we have learnt is you can't put a top level RL side, needing a 3million quid budget, in an area with few fans and little corporate support, no matter how much you would like to see SL in the area.

The answer to the whole thread is simply put them in the right place.

It wasn't even the right place [iin Wales[/i.

Nor is Wrexham - sure to be known as Wreck-ham.

At the end of our first year we had failed to get a main shirt sponsor, our players were being paid in arrears and we'd come last in the league. If our first year had been in the current financial crisis there's a good possibility we'd have crumpled like the Crusaders have.

yet after this first year many people on here claim they knew it would work out as they are in the "heartlands".

yeah right

Sorry Belgian, just wanted to use this line to settle a different score.

Many are still trying to make out that flatcappers were just as against Catalans as they were about Celtic which is blatantly false. One of the arguments that they have recently used is that we were saying they were in financial trouble at the end of the first year etc. Just thought I'd use you as proof that rather than wanting them to fail they were actually in genuine trouble financially.