Who predicted otherwise?

I think you'll find that that was one of the aims of franchising – to allow clubs to have time to develop in the top flight.



'Cos Catalans have been an unmitigated disaster, eh?

Toulouse are coming in instead

Celtic is still a better choice than Widnes.

Duggan is unlikely to have been illegal until the visa rules changed late last year.

Its either accidental arrogance or deliberate fraud.

I hope the RFL treat the club as they would any other club in the circumstances. Remove their points, impose a heavy fine and this surely should be taken into account when franchises are reviewed.

Despite being a Leigh fan, I believe that Widnes should replace them. They were robbed last time.

(Leigh should replace Salford

)

But not to allow them to cheat, Leigh had 2 players turned down beause of these issues.

The whole situation is just a joke.

tbh, this embarrassing situation is what the RFL deserves in my opinion. Celtic were never (and never will be) a solid RL club with the desired infrastructure a SL team needs.

It will always be Aussie after Aussie after Aussie.

There are teams in tier 2 that can quite easily adapt to what SL needs.

I feel real sorry for their fans. They have been led down the garden path by Richard Lewis and the CC from day one.

I hope they survive!

Therefore he would not have been deported. I am guess he left and came back as his first visa expired.

Get real, bringing in a completely unprepared club to the top flight of a competition in order to attempt to fast-track interest where there is practically none is a joke.

I personally can't wait for further misguided expansion and terrible travelling support. The future's looking bright...

They still have two years left yet. Let's just hope they can bounce back from this.

I really hope they do.

"The problems were caused by the tightening of regulations by the British consulate in Canberra."

MMMM...Might this just be a paperwork issue?
Seriously, it isn't like they've glassed their girlfriends or taken loads of class a and been accused of inpropriety is it. I reckon they will all get back on appeal. (unless they can find poles who will do it cheaper)

They have brought the game into disrepute--see how the RFU (and I hate them) have dealt with a team that has done that.

Ground move, deported players--what else?? As another Widnes fan on our site has said:

"the thing that angers me most is that these players were in the national league last year and enabled them to reach the grand final, irrelevant due to the franchises anyway, but i some how feel they'd of never even got close without these players"

I think that is very true. Van Dyck-- a stand out player, Duggan--great attacking full back at that level.

I can accept why we were not given a franchise--but I will never accept, and these revelations today make it even worse, the fact that Crusaders were a far better option than Widnes or any other NL1 club.

Leigh a better one than Wakey or Salford

London
Paris
Nottingham
South Wales
Gateshead
Celtic Crusaders

Etc

Very few people predicted they would be a disaster. Celtic was a bit more of an obvious choice.

It does beg the question who is actually at fault here. Surely, immigration cleared them in the first place after a delay whilst they investigated further, so either they are incompetent, or someone has deliberately misled them and they've now caught them out somehow.

I'm actually hoping it turns out to be immigration that cocked up having been provided with the correct information and Celtic and the players are cleared of wrongdoing. Still can't play, but at least noone in RL was being dishonest.

If it turns out to either be the players or (even worse) Celtic that have deliberately misled the immigration folk, then RL is in a pretty dark place right now and the RFL is in an almost impossible situation, because if they don't act, then they will be accused of bias, because people will say that if it had been, say Wakey, then the book would have been thrown at them.

This is just really bad and no-one is going to come out of this looking good. If Celtic have knowingly misled immigration, then they should be relegated. If they haven't and fell victim to a scam by the players, or immigration incompetence, then the RFL should do everything they can to help them out and I would fully support that, whatever my club allegience may be.

Toulouse it is then

What happens to the completed fixtures so far??

As they were using players who should not have been in the country--are the results null and void??

Catalan is hardly an example of the RFL expansion programme.

They'd had a top flight French team in Perpignan for many, many years unlike Paris, Gatesehead, Bridgend, Nottingham.

Yes the Dragons are a positive example but not a definitive one.

Hmm..i do feel sorry for the Celtic fans, especially after having gone through the whole Celtic Warriors thing and now this. WRU are probably laughing.

Expansion in a Rugby League area--I would have settled for that instead of Celtic when the franchises were announced.

Why mate? Your team would offer a lot more IMO - large city, huge tourist attractions, no competition (e.g. no league football team), large student population, traditional RL side, good fanbase.

Yeah that's a plan, Celtic + Quins out (sorry Gutterfax

), Widnes + York in.

They were legal last year. They had to leave and come back in the close season - remember them being late back at the start? That's where the problem has arisen. I am guessing they travelled before being given clearance.

No - the players were registered with the RFL so there will be problem with games played.