I think some people need to get over the fact that SL isn't an English league.

Four French clubs in the SL? If they're good enough, why not? Lots of benefits IF they're good enough: increase French pool of talent, improves international RL, potential for bigger TV deal via French TV.

Don't see what the issue is, personally. Maybe not all at once. One at a time so the quality of the league doesn't go down.

Posted a similar idea a few years back, it was aimed at the Russians back then, groups of players billeted together training full time at SL clubs, contracted on DR with their training club and a Championship club, funded centrally

Smokey said it was a stupid idea, so obviously a good one if workable

We need more Frenchmen in other super league clubs. NZ have improved partly because there are so many kiwis in the NRL, if it was just the warriors I doubt NZ would be up to much.

I guess it's up to the French mainly to get the best elite league players in the shop window to convince super league clubs they are worth a shot. In the medium term another super league club would be helpful. It's up to the RFL to decide how far they are willing to go to help what is in reality a rival for silverware despite the disparity.

I think that the OP is right.
For the French to be a strong international force, there probably does need to be a larger number of Full Time Pro clubs.
However, I would suggest that there has to be an improvement in their domestic game, plus, if they were to take another 3 clubs
from the French league, what effect would this have on their national league.
There is no reason that, if there were more quality French players, room could be found for them to play in SL, so for me, this is the key
to them becoming stronger.
Also the disparity between the English and French does point to an improvement in the English game, especially when you look at the
English absentees.
There is of course the flip side of the coin and if there were 4 full time French SL clubs in a 14 team SL, this would have a detrimental effect on
the English game and we are trying to play catch up with Australia.

Sounds like a good idea to me.

Indeed.

What if four clubs made no tangible improvement to the French national side? Increase them to six? Eight? Reasonable questions to ask, given that they're probably worse now than prior to the elevation of les Catalans.

Jean,

All this debate presumes we are happy the the current structure of the game whereby a group of officials, sitting in a room at Red Hall and acting like God, decides who is chosen to play where.

No new, big hitting financial backers such as your "rich patrons who now support rugby union in France" will put their money at the mercy of such a system.

I agree that say four French teams in the top division would be great for Rugby League in Europe. But,the way to achieve it first involves re-structuring the game in the way I have previously outlined, including:-

1. Automatic one-up, one-down promotion and relegation betwen the leagues (Super League, Championship and Championship One)
2. No limits at all on spending by Clubs, including the scrapping of the Salary Cap.
3. All clubs to be managed as limited companies ("Societes Anonymes", in France).
4. Severe penalties if Clubs get into financial difficulties:-
- Insolvency event short of liquidation (eg 'Administration' in the UK) = 6 league points deduction
- Go bust (Liquidation) and related transfer the club's business to a new legal entity = relegation to the bottom league.
5. All clubs to prepare Audited Accounts to a 31 December year end & submit to the RFL by the following 30 June.
6. Limits on the number of players a club can register (50, with minimum 25 that qualify as "Under 21"icon_wink.gif
7. Minimum of 13 of the 17 players named for each match to be EU born or trained
8. TV (Sky etc) money to be paid into RFL HQ and distrubuted:-
55% to SL Clubs
25% to Championship clubs
12.5% to Championship 1 clubs
7.5% for central purposes (elite traning, youth development etc)
9. All grounds to have a Safety Certificate. Then mimimum standards that relate only to required facilities for away teams, officials, medical & media. No need to set unrealistically high capacity for specators. Club directors are well able to understand that the higher crowds they achieve the higher will be their revenue.

Once that is in place, the RFL can stand back and let the directors of the clubs get on with it.

Then your rich patrons at Avignon, Lyons or wherever can put teams together that can join Championship 1 and will be good enough to win promotion two years running and then they will be in Super League. That success will "build more success".

A clear, transparent route to the top that will attract their investment if they are so inclined.

That isnt really the case though is it.

But if we got to the stage where we could support 6-8 french sides then the logical conclusion would be a French conference of SL, but that is a long, long way away. 2-4 is a decent medium-to-long term aim.

Unlimited spending on salaries, for some reason taking away 45% of the SL’s biggest asset, and a return to relegation. What exactly would be be letting the SL chairmen get on with? Calling in the administrators? You have put forwad a good plan for intentionally damaging the game though, so that’s helpful;.

I'm sure you know that a good chunk of the Sky money is already distributed to clubs below Super League.

In conjunction with the proposed reduction of the numbers of teams in Super League, my proposal would lead to each Super League club receiving the same amount of cash as now.

1/16th goes to the championships clubs, 1/16 goes to the RFL. That’s 12.5%. It’s a pretty big jump form 12.5% to 45%
No, you are proposing 4 or 35% of the current SL clubs receive massively less tv cash and play in a lower league in front of lower crowds, with less visibility and as such less money, whilst the other 65% either play fewer games or play the same teams numerous times with differing home/away records.

Virtual terrace - rls version of the nuthouse

To expand on that, Why don't we take Catalans Sky money and divide it between the other English SL clubs. Then let the any French teams negotiate their own TV contracts. That we can have as many French teams in SL with diluting the funding across the the English based teams. Uk skysports tv customer fund the UK clubs and the same for the French! Just a thought!

For the same reason Leeds don’t sell their rights for what they are worth, and leave wakefield to sell their rights for what they are worth, we negotiate the rights as whole, not individually.

2 clubs plus decent scouting by English SL clubs of French Jnrs. There is only 1 NZ team in NRL.

I don’t think it is realistic to expect 15/16/17/18 year old kids to be moving to a different country, with a different language, for the fairly derisory wage our young players are paid.I don’t think it is realistic to expect 15/16/17/18 year old kids to be moving to a different country, with a different language, for the fairly derisory wage our young players are paid.

I think that NZ desperately needs a second team and they would have one if the ARL were not scared stiff that the Kiwis will win even more competitions if they had an increased talent pool. Given you are pro Perth then I am not sure you will agree with me



Having more French players in England similar to Kiwis in the NRL would help. You would hope Super League would have some sort of initiative for this in the future.

Back to France, 4 pro sides is not impossible in the long term but perhaps not the next decade or two. I would start off with getting it up to 2 with Toulouse. A club with great potential and would provide some great rivalry with Catalan. Anyway I am not sure who the third or fourth team would be, there are no candidates even near the correct standard at present.

In the end steel sharpens steel. If England want to compete against NZ/Aus then we need to have competitive games against our neighbours. So strengthening France and possibly Wales is a must if we wish to improve. This isn't going to happen with just Catalan.

You realistically need around 40-50 FT prof players in SL plus a decent standard 2nd tier to support a constant flow of new talent before either France or Wales is going to compete against the top 3. We are a long way away.

Not 15/16/17 yr olds perhaps, but nobody was suggesting that, 18/19/20 yr olds perhaps yes, if they are ambitious enough to want to be proffessional RL players

You will now tell us that by that age it is too late to make the grade

Because in most cases it is. Most players will make their debut at 18/19/20, Its ridiculous to expect that we would get a large amount of success if we are only introducing French players to a full time set-up at 18/19/20, they would be 2/3 years behind their cohort.

In a different league system, yes. In the current system no.

Why, because SLE is determined by the incumbants already in the league. When you say 3 more additional french teams in SLE, you are not just saying 3 in 3 out, because 3 out could be any one from a variety of clubs. So automatically before you get any further you can see up to 6 clubs voting against this just for self preservation. Then other SLE clubs need to be convinced of the financial benefit to them.

Take Wigan for example, they are fairly rich have no real need to keep lower teams, however ask them about the costs of travelling to France 4 times a year, (plus any playoffs or CC ties) rather than the 1 trip currently. Ask about the cost of losing away fans against the likes of say Widnes or Hull KR, where you are replacing what could be 1000's of travelling fans with less than a coach full. All that balanced against some possibility of SKY maybe upping their deal or another TV company maybe showing interest. It's too many maybe's for almost any club to be bothered voting for. UK based clubs bring certain financial clout, European clubs just bring certain financial costs with no certainty of any compensation.

If I had my prefered league system which would be divisional then you could easily add more French teams, as the only cost would be the reduction in % revenue from TV. If the proposed French clubs could counter this with some deal of their own, then you could have 4 French clubs tomorrow. Split the league into 2 divisions 8 in each, 2 french clubs in either division, job done. But that is as far aware as any other proposal there can be.

Why are you assuming three in has to also equal three out?

In fairness, 4 French SL clubs is over the other side of the horizon and can't possibly happen any time soon.
IMO this is where the sports governing body, with reference to the current professional clubs, should be taking the lead.
If we are to expand/ contract/ maintain the league, then is should be carried out in a clear structured manner, with the consensus of those involved.
As a sport, we seem to tinker with things quite regularly, ie nos of competing teams, new teams, play offs (and numbers within the play offs) and ok, if something
isnt working then dont persist for the sake of it but lets have some proper structure and work toward improving the game a a whole.
Dont just pander to the favoured few at the top of the tree but, look how to improve the sport as a whole, with open dialogue and clear goals/ targets.

It appears that there may well be a further French team in SL in the short/ medium term future and it also seems likely that as soon as one of the Welsh clubs
is strong enough, then they will be "promoted", but if this is the case, we should be brave enough to go public and find the best framework to allow these things to happen.

There will never be a consensus because clubs view on what constitutes the best route forward is based on self-interest not in the interests of the game. Even if there was a massive TV deal on the table from France and a real commitment to improve the game in France with 3 more clubs ready and willing to step up, with 3 new stadia, massive investment in youth development etc etc etc, and some clubs will vote against their admission because a strong French game, and strong French clubs would make other clubs relatively weaker.