Which was ?

How things change ? , it seems to be a prerequisite now

Without a SD , its probably a good job they didn't

I know , mystic Meg me

It seems like your argument here is that Toulouse should stay in the French elite until they have (and I quote) their “Stadium , fans ,sponsorship and finance” in place.

Well good news, The RFL agree with you and have put in place a system where clubs can get there stadium, fans, sponsorship and finance in place in the lower leagues and move up when they are ready. They have called it ‘franchising’ or ‘Licensing’

to double check all that stuff , we dont want any financial meltdowns months after inspecting the figures





No seriously , Toulouse are the next , in fact only club in a position to get the next shot at SL , I'd give the nod to them right now and tell them to get ready

So you don’t want them to go through the successful process as Les Catalans.

But you do want them to be treated the same as Leigh, even though you admit that different clubs need to be treated in different ways?

But yes, they do seem to be among the front runners

Well I assume they already had a stadium , and it is only the stadium that is relevant to the 2 clubs being discussed , after that I assume they would go through the same process as the Catalans

So a no brainer really , although why they need an updated stadium when it was the RU stadium they were going to use , and it is easily up to SL standard right now , the other 2 they have already used in the Championship certainly are not

You must have been on the pop Nat, they've got seated stands along both touchlines and a small terrace in front of the clubhouse


Nowhere near 'SL standard' though.


Not in my experience. I've been to Toulouse three times and on each occasion have had to try and explain in pigeon French the actual existence of rugby league on several occasions when people have asked about our shirts etc with no rugby union game on.

Which stadium though Matt , the one we played at that 1 st year isn't Toulouse's home ground

And I also struggled to find anybody within half a mile of their home stadium who knew where it was , mention " Toulouse Olympic " and all you got was the gallic ' shrug '

You really dont give up on ths 2 leagues of 10 thing do you ?

But keep London in and assume for now that Les Cats will remain top 10 and dont forget the all new Bulls, we must give them a place.
If we need more Englis, Full time pro's in the game to aid our international team, why is there such a clamour to reduce full time pro teams, which is what would most likely happen in your 2 x 10 team divisions.

As we have a play off system to decide the Champions, wht not just expand the top flighrt as teams get up to standard.
There doesnt need to be a full home and away fixture programme as the play offs will give the top 8 teams chance to prove themselves at the end of the season.

Ok, each club would have a reduced share of Sky monies (unless we can negotiate a better package from Sky but, this is preferable to another cull , especially when there are protected teams within your Super 10.

If we change the structure at all. It should be to conferences, with the playoffs deciding the champions.

Either on the pop or never been.I was just about to say the same. 2 seated stands down the sides with terracing at the side of the smaller stand as well. The stands are in decent nick though not like some that we have visited this year in Champ 1 that are dropping to bits (e.g Worky).The little barbeque/ale area next to the club house is lovely though on a sunny day!!

East & West (we can fit London an Les Cats in somewhere) and then we have a potential basis for "County of Origin" games to help with International selection.This could improve attendances if there were more "local" games, providing that there wasn't too much apathy among the supporters.
There would be savings in trael costs for both the clubs and the supporters but, there would be an increase in "c" grade fixtures.

Fairly sure we played at the Ernest Argeles stadium in blagnac , and not the stadium Minimes, which is Toulouses home

Couldn't they use the union one? Looks a decent modern stadium and perfect size.

Yes they can use that stadium (Stade Ernest Wallon) , which holds 19,000, for the big games against the glamour clubs (Wigan, Warrington, St Helens, Leeds, Hull FC, Les Catalans and perhaps Bradford). For the other six or seven games the rugby league ground (Stade des Minimes) will be big enough.

Jean, have they used the Ernest Argeles for some Championship fixtures?

I'd like to see the RFL promote Halifax, Fev and Leigh in 2015 to make a 17 team SL, each week one team has a bye. Hopefully by then the RFL will of got an even better deal for both the tv and sponsorship rights. More cash allowing for more teams.

Plus you've got three teams there with good English coaches.

Promoting these 3 would inprove the competitiveness of the bottom half of SL which everyone seems to think is becoming stagnent and boring.

Then with the remaining CC and CC1 teams merge them in to one competition. And get both leagues on the tv.

**This is what I'd like to see but I know there is pretty much no way it's going to happen.**

Promoting those 3 would make it a 17 team league

Why would you want Championship RL on TV?

Ha, sorry! Bad math.

Well it's on tv now in it's current form. Would possibly increase it's exposure and if the RFL didn't give the rights away for free it would introduce revenue into the league. Lower league RU gets on there at the moment.

Do the Championship RU clubs get paid for the coverage ?

Not sure. Do they?

Just out of interest what would you like to see happen in 2015 regarding teams?

Either reinstatement of P and R

A 2 x 10 team re structure

A continuance of Licencing but with more work put into the Championships to build the clubs in them, and stricter rules for the SL clubs regarding finances

I can't see P&R ever returning, hence my suggestion of putting the 3 teams into SL.

I think splitting SL into 2 could potentially work. But would a tv broadcaster be interested in SL2?

I think this feeder team project that they have in place for the Championships will emasculate most of the teams and stifle any dreams they have of SL or promotion. They will become surrogates of their respective SL affilated organisations. I agree with MP that the best independent CC teams should be moved into a bigger SL, prefereably Conferences rather than two tiers. I would add Sheffield and maybe a Cumbrian club to the three, Leigh, Fev and Fax to make the SL almost a 20 team league so the two sections could be workable.

Whether or not it could be sold to a TV broadcaster is the 64,000 dollar question.

Fax, Leigh and Fev have all stated that they aren't going to partake in this idiotic feeder scheme.

What do you mean by Conferences? You mean NFL style?

This is how my suggestion would look:

Super League (17 teams):

Warrington
Wigan
St.Helens
Leeds
Bradford
Wakefield
Hull FC
Hull KR
Catalans
Castleford
London
Salford
Huddersfield
Widnes
Leigh
Halifax
Featherstone

Championship (17 team, not included teams that have been added recently):

Sheffield
Batley
Keighley
Dewsbury
Swinton
Hunslet
York
Doncaster
Barrow
Workington
Whitehaven
Rochdale Hornets
Oldham
London Skolars
Crusaders
South Wales
Gateshead

I think the biggest draw back with the 17 team SL is the fact you'd have a 32 weekly game fixture list. Adding play-off games (play-offs kept in it's current top 8 format) and Challenge Cup games into the mix it would mean some teams were hitting potentially 40ish games a season, which Jamie Peacock wouldn't be happy with!