I imagine prior to those competitions said countries had their own domestic leagues set up?

Hahahaha, what absolute nonsense. Please give some valid reasoning to support your ridiculous notions!
Even if RL was to have a modicum of success it would take at least 2 decades to get it to have a a two tier comp. Just because it [imight[/i become popular does not in any way mean that a governing/ruling body would be 'American', the International Federation is made up of various cohorts, the US would have its own ruling body and how they use advertising for the game would be up to them. For internationals/cross country games you have an agreed format.
You're so far off the mark that you've embarrassed yourself.

Ireland did (and still does) have a national championship as well as individual province comps.......as did Scotland and Wales. Not too sure of the overall strength of Union in Italy at Club level but the fact that they have over 1,000 clubs currently points to them having some pedigree. Argentina has a strong history of club comps.....but their senior players traditionally sought to join European clubs once the game turned openly professional. Other countries like Romania had some club comps, but again many of the Romanians sought employment in France once the Iron curtain fell.......even Japan has a rich history of Club Unon, so no....to answer the question, Union didn't "shoehorn" alien nations into their domestic comps like Toronto are being squeezed in at all costs now.
On the topic of 19,000 announced as the gate...that's 25% capacity, which begs the question as to why did they choose such a cavernous stadium? A couple of American guys I met when they were here for the URWC 2011 went to the game sporting their warriors shirts that I made them buy

and from the pics I've seen, the crowd were scattered around so much? The atmosphere (according to the 2 yanks) was "weird" and as much as they enjoyed it, they were stunned at the choice of venue......but they had a blast anyway!!

Look what they did to rugby in the 1800s, Gridiron anyone ?

BEST POSSIBLE NEW ZEALAND TEAM (barring injury):

[i=#0000FFRoger Tuivasa-Sheck

Dallin Watene-Zelesniak, =#0000FFDean Whare, Esan Masters, =#0040FFJordan Rapana,

Te Maire Martin
=#0000FF Shaun Johnson

Adam Blair
Kevin Proctor, Tohu Harris
=#0000FFJesse Bromwich, Isaac Luke, Martin Tapau[/i

Interchange:[i Jared Waerea-Hargreaves. Nelson Asofa-Solomona, Joseph Tapine, =#0040FFDanny Levi
[/i

Players missing on Saturday in Denver are in blue.

This proves that a majority of their top 17 were missing from the New Zealand team.
England will have to perform much better in October to get close to the top New Zealand team.

England were missing quality too, Hodgson, George BURGESS, Watkins & Walmsley would all strengthen them. Hardaker, Gale and Tomkins would possibly too.

Can I first of all thank you for your well scripted and reasoned argument.

Secondly, can I totally ignore what you think and continue with my own beliefs and opinions. Ta.

Hardaker and Tomkins are unlikely to both make the team.

Those above mentioned English players are nowhere near as significant for England as the nine missing New Zealand players I have identified are for New Zealand.

Isaaka?

No. Isaaka is not in the class of either the Polish Maori Dallin Watene-Zelesniak or Jordan Rapana, who are each among the five top wingers in the world.

You might be right, but if they were injured or just didn't want to play then that is not exactly England's fault - England can only play the team that turns up!

Perhaps NZ's missing will miraculously recover for the end of season tests, but NZ didn't exactly set the world alight in the World Cup! Perhaps they all prefer a winter in Hull/Liverpool/Leeds rather than a summer trip to Denver...

Personally I thought England dealt better with the conditions and put in a decent performance. Connor was excellent, as was Whitehead. I'd like to have seen Clark as an option for 9 rather than watching Bateman play 9 (back row and centre...the only thing missing was singing the national anthems though he couldn't have been much worse!).

To get 19k was a good effort though the size of the stadium didn't do RL any favours.

If we had gone to a 10-15k stadium it would have looked full but that would have prevented more people seeing the game.

Gauging market interest for a new product is notoriously difficult. You can't sell tickets then pick a venue to match.

You could spend 10s of 1000s doing market research and still be no more accurate on the potential audience, may as well spend that on the costs of a bigger stadium and gauge real market interest.

Next time they know to try for say a 30k audience. But if the cost of stadium hire is the same why limit your potential to get more people in.

I think he’s going to be a superstar name in the next few years, looks brilliant to me

If you can add Dean Whare and Dan Levi you can addsonny bill and Stacey Jones.

Danny Levi lol, Dean Whare ??? They are absolute rubbish. Daryl Clark is 10 times the player Levi is. You’re clutching at straws champ.

Exactly, Levi’s in reserve grade now. Slade Griffin has kept him out of both Newcastle and New Zealand sides.

And Whare, while a solid nrl player (Penrith love him) has slipped well down the pecking order behind Masters and Hiku.

Proctor and Jesse Bromwich are both suspended by the Kiwis. Whare and Levi aren't world beaters as above.

What has weakened them, and will continue to do so, is the continued commitment of the Samoan and Tongan players to their countries of origin. Taumalolo alone is a huge loss for any side.

I see Bellamy is bleating about the timing etc. The answer of course is for England-NZ to play in Aus.

Surprise surprise a few injured players return for the Warriors game against the sharks this morning, all looking refreshed.

[urlhttps://www.stuff.co.nz/sport/league/105098869/kiwis-forward-raymond-faitalamariner-suffers-seasonending-injury-from-denver-test[/url
Increasingly looking like no NRL players will be released for any more USA Eng v Kiwi games.....

I’d rather watch England v Tonga anyway.
Tonga will be more of a challenge than the Kiwis.

They will, it’s not up to the clubs.

Yeah Harris was fine.

How did Foran get on?

He's going to sit back for the rest of the season and count his 1.1 million dollars. I can't believe what some players are earning.

You can’t believe that a player can be injured and not fit to play then recover in a week. So I’m not surprised.

I'm not sure how you you get to your conclusions can I see your workings please?