We need to play the WCC and the WCS two weeks after the Australian Grand Final --third weekend in October -- alternating in Australia or Britain, and have the inter-national contests start a week later (which is roughly when they start at the moment).

To make the preparation time roughly equal we will need to have the Super League Grand Final on the same weekend as the NRL Grand Final.

Playing SL GF at 2.30 pm on a Saturday, first Saturday in October, at Old Trafford it can be telecast live at 11.30 pm on Saturday night in Australia, thereby making it a prelude to the NRL Grand Final and heightening anticipation of the upcoming WCC and WCS..

Trying to hold it two weeks after the respective GF's has so many logistical problems it's unbelievable people suggest it.

You gotta wonder how we managed to play an international tournament 3weeks after the grand final without someones head exploding from these unbelievable logistical problems really.

Are the participants of the international tournament still undecided until 2 weeks beforehand?

Well the participants as in the players are yes, the participants as in the teams? Well they are undecided until a week before the final, we dont seem to struggle to organise that.

Is it really a logistical nightmare to book a stadium and block book a hotel for a certain date? it doesnt take two weeks to book a flight. Especially considering if we simply held it in the city/stadium where the 'away' nations first international was being played (only a week later) then a fair amount of the players would already be there anyway.

Oh great we'll just play it in the same city and stadium as the first international.

Be great when England vs Australia is booked for Wembley or ANZ Stadium and then Castleford and Melbourne win the Grand Finals.

Given RL's struggles to market and sell tickets we are now staying let's take this event and give just them a two week window to pull it off, especially after fans will have just splashed out on a GF.....yeah sure it'll be as successful.

One of the big arguments for doing it straight after is that it'd be the GF lineups. But would it really? Would we just see the Aussie team go back to 10+ years ago and see it as an inconvenience and leave out the several guys who will no doubt have knocks and need off season surgery? How patched up have Wigan and Leeds been in the last two GF's? Very patched up. You'd just start an argument that it isn't either teams strongest 17.

You sure about all that?

Isn't the prevailing ideology that everything prior to Super League and summer rugby was rubbish?

Wigan played Manly in 1987 in front of almost 37,000 fans just 10 days after the 1987 Aussie Grand Final had been played.

Widnes played Canberra in 1989 in front of over 30,000 fans just 10 days after the 1989 Aussie Grand Final.

Wigan played Penrith in 1991 in front of over 20,000 fans just 10 days after the 1991 Aussie Grand Final had been played.

How on earth did they manage to overcome such logistical nightmares back then?

So the logistics werent that hard really were they.

Whats next on ThePrinter's scatter gun?
Castleford may play Melbourne? Brilliant. That would be a good thing

RL fans are poor and can't afford tickets after splashing out on the charabanc to the tropical delights of Manchester? RL fans arent poor.

That the Aussies would no longer take it seriously because of the change in timing? What kind of idiot coach would rather rest players who have knocks and see it as more of an inconvenience to have it played when they have 0 games coming up as opposed to when they have an entire season of games coming up?

How much preparation did Wigan/Widnes have for these fixtures?

It wouldn't be resting them, it'd be not risking them. If an NRL's star player is carrying a knee issue do you think they're going to play him in the WCC and have him make it worst and face lengthy time out because of it?

I dont think if an NRL star is carrying a knee injury at risk of a lengthy time out would be risked in most games.

I do think it far more likely they would be played in a WCC prior to 0 clubs games as compared to a WCC prior to an entire season of games.

But a GF team is obviously going to have a lot of players carrying knocks and issues at the end of a long season. In February it won't be anywhere near that as players are fit and fresh.

Of course. Its well known that in terms of fitness and conditioning teams aim to peak prior to the season starting and not towards the end of the season.

Doesn't matter when they try to peak for, the teams will still have many more injuries and knocks in October than February.

You know thats when we play internationals right?

Yes and that's when several guys are always ruled out through injury and if they clubs had their way (which they would for a post season WCC) you'd more than likely see even more withdrawn.

The wigan-penrith crowd was fairly disappointing for a decider between the top teams of their respective hemispheres played at a time when both might have been expected to be at their peak, or certainly at a better level than they're at in today's WCC. Any reason for that? Novelty wearing thin?
I'm not saying the logistics of a game played then are impossible but I do wonder whether it would hold the interest of the average fan whenever it was played. Certainly the series of WCC games involving Leeds saw a fairly rapid drop off from the 38k-odd that were at the Bulldogs fixture. And recent fixtures involving different teams are little better.

And what, precisely, has the last weekend in February got going for it?

An extra 4 months of planning, marketing, promoting it, selling tickets. Do you honestly think the RFL and SL clubs can do the same job in just two weeks on the half chance that the lineups are the same as in the GF's?

Playing it the season after detracts immensely from what it is meant to represent.

Agree.

The main reason is that as a sport we shoehorn our International season into a single month at the end of the season. There just isn't the time to do it then as it stands.

The SL/NRL calendars would need lining up properly to have the GF's on the same weekend. In fact, the whole RL calendar needs lining up between the SL/NRL with dedicated International breaks (perhaps whilst Aus play Origin over 3 consecutive weekends).

Don't talk sense!

We should continue to play seasons that don't match up, making internationals and the like impractical or trivial due to understrength teams while also playing under different sets of rules to each other...

That maybe correct but still doesn't mean it's a smart idea to try hastily arranging the game in 2 weeks.

And how long do you get for the Grand Final ?

If the Venue is sorted, it shouldn't be a major hassle and depending what happens with the 4N, many players would probably be over here or in Aus anyway.
There maybe some disruption to the planning for the National team though.

As a Leeds fan you surely admit that, the Leeds team that played in the last WCS bore no resemblance to the triple winners of the season before and as such, the game was not Champions vs Champions and this rendered the game meaningless.
Ok it was a test of the "new" Leeds team vs their Aussie counterparts but, not the game that it should have been.
Also, the extended games were just space fillers, with no meaning whatsoever and if we're going to increase the number of clubs, it should be Champions vs Champions, Cup Winners vs Cup Winners etc and not just random games.
Of course, if one club won more than one title, there would need to be some kind of system for allowing the runners up to
play.
The concept becomes much harder to market if we dont have bonafide contenders.