Quote ="Catalancs"It's more of a civil war rather than the end of rugby league in the US. I think there's a similar situation in Italy, but I'm sure someone like Headhunter would know more about it than me.
The simple fact is that rugby league can't afford to have two or more rival governing bodies, especially nit in places like Italy and the US.'"
The situation in Italy is a bit different as the two governing bodies seem to be in different areas of the country, one in the North and one in the South. I don't know if there's any bad will between them any more, I think there was at the time of the split but players from both comps seemed to be selected for the national side last year, although those from the newer comp were listed as playing for clubs from the older comp? Or something like that. It does seem to be a bit similar to the USA situation in that the newer organization seem a lot more pro-active and transparent than the founders, they also appear to have far more clubs and a much better competition. Both sides seem to be making reasonable progress though so we can't complain really, as long as the founders in charge of the national team don't start abusing their power like Niu did. Thankfully Niu now seems to be coming to his senses and doing what's best for the game. It might be a positive if the AMNRL and USARL continue function seperately, as long as they aren't actively trying to damage each other and working towards the same goals it may mean the game can develop twice as fast. Either way it's great that Niu is talking.
To be honest, we'll probably see this sort of thing happening in a lot of countries as the sport grows. It's pretty unlikely that the people who introduce the sport to a country and also going to be the best people to properly run it long-term. Introducing a proper independent forward-thinking governing body is one of the most important steps to becoming a genuine nation that can compete rather than just a developing minnow, and if and when the two bodies reunite in USA and Italy the end result will be that the game is in a far, far stronger position in both of those places than it was before. All we need really is a competent RLIF to help manage the process. To be honest I think that maybe certain members of the RLIF need to follow Italy and the USA's lead, and then we'll really start to see some progress.
hope Austin or San Antonio can muster teams , fingers crossed.
