I'd stop now mate. You're fooling no one and you're talking rubbish.

Spongolium wrote:I've been a fan of the saints since I was born.

Nope. Not blind. Just wondered who the hell who you support? COmedy value is rising

You do realise that the crusaders have not been around forever right? You must know that they are a new team that were created on my doorstep. My alligence changed when a welsh team was created.

Ah good for you.

broster, comedy and wales don't really go hand in hand - Spongy is just a sad confused Welshman and I bet his real name is Daffyd

great first season but they need to build on it.

the proximity to the heartland clubs could make the long term difference to their survival over a club like south wales or quins with the extra away fans.

great ground too.

need to concentrate on season ticket sales as the long term future of the club

get 3000 of those and the club will be around a long time

To be honest, I'd be more bothered about Wakefield signing not even NRL standard forwards to keep young talent out. That's Wakefield having been formed in 1873, rather than the Crusaders a few years back.

Shock Horror.

3rd rate Aussie team finishing 8th in SL.

It just shows how far we are behind, in player development.

Just incase anyone is interested in the stats of the "mighty triupmph" of Crusaders for Wales this season, out of the 732 points scored by the crusaders, 52 of them were scored by UK born players yes thats right a whole 13 tries in 27 games, the last of which came on August the 13th, their one and only try from a UK player in that month.

Last season they scored 357 points. Just over 52 of them were scored by UK born players.

Noble might look like some sort of hero right now but the Wesh national team has definately taken a step backwards this season. All Noble has done is add an extra column to his CV achievments whilst the best of young Welsh talent who seemed to be improving towards the back end of the season have been swept under the carpet.

London finished 2nd in super league II with a team full of aussies, and look at them now with their thriving club

Is that the thriving club with No debts, the most british squad in superleague, an academy product on his way to the mighty Saint Helens, teams at every under age and academy level, did I mention no debts, 2 cockney England internationals before LMS was signed by Saint Helens (did I mention that?). The only box quins rl don't tick is on attendances....everything else is just fine and I would go as far as to say thriving. But to posters like you......it's all about attendance figures and too many aussies...

What gets me is that although Crusaders are packed with Australians, they will need time to develop "local" talent. London took 15 years....but this year we fielded an all GB team with 9 academy produced lads......Rome wasn't built in a day. "Other teams" in superleague, with 120+ years of history are signing Australian talent and yet Crusaders who are in their infancy are an easy target for some on here.

Congratulations Crusaders and your fans. Long may it continue

And how did that come about? Oh yes, but London Broncos had the odd debt or 2... quote from the BBC "The club went into liquidation with debts of around £3m."

The club owed 2 people.
The Inland Revenue and David Hughes. David Hughes offered to swallow his debt if the IR let the Broncos pay back the 1.5 million over a period of time. The IR refused, the club folded and the rest is history.......
fail to see you bringing this up has any relevance to the thoery that Harlequins Rugby League are not a thriving club. They have no debts...at all. No overdraft, no loans...just a very patient chairman.
Are you saying it's not fair that a business was allowed to fold, reinvent itself and not have to pay what it owed? If so, I would suggest you take that up with the Inland Revenue....they were offered payment but declined and the other SL chairmen who voted for the broncos to stay. I am sure they had their reasons (1.2 million of them)icon_wink.gif

They dont have time to develop. The franchise decision is made next year, every team has had the same time to meet that deadline, the same three year period. It doesnt matter if you joined the RFL 115 years ago or last night, if you dont have the development and players in place then you shouldnt get the franchise.

Celtic crusaders were not ready for a franchise, crusaders were then given one outside the rules. They havnt got their own players now and Welsh rugby players are not being developed in Super league, rather in the championship 1. They deserve criticism for this as do other clubs who rely on overseas players to lesser extent. Put Celtic back in the championship until they are ready, Catalans had enough domestic players when they were given entry to superleague, so should everyone else under this ridiculous system.

Most other teams in superleague have signed domestic players for next season but to my knowledge Crusaders haven't even tried. It looks like they have no intnetion to try and reduce the number of overseas players they have. They are allowed far more overseas players than heartland clubs and with everyone else having to reduce their overseas numbers by 1 next season it could be an even more unlevel playing field next season!

Well done. Hope you enjoy the experience.

2 of the cas players listed have over 150 appearances (huby and shenton)
Westerman has played more than a 100 games.
Owen who wasnt playing last night has made 72 appearances after missing most of the seasons through injury.
thompson has played 15 games this year after playing twice last year.
walker played 7 games this year (debut season)
arundel played 8 after one game before this season.
milner played 4 games this year after making his debut in the back end of the season.
Holmes played 4 games this season playing in castlefords strongest position in his debut season.
massey played 2 games but has missed most of the season through injury.
davies played 1 game but again missed a big chunk of the season through injury and was behind holmes in the pecking order.

so to summarise shenton, huby and owen played in every game they were fit to play in.
thomspon played in more than 50% of the games this season
arundel and walker played in about 25% of the games this season.
milner played in 3 of the 6 games since making his debut,
holmes played 4 games in a position we aready have snitch, jones, widders, westerman, davies, clayton and ferres to play in.

Dyer and hanbury arent welsh by the way.

As i said on another thread i have nothing against crusaders just adressing the points you have made in this post.

where do you want them to sign these welsh players from? you may not have noticed but there isnt a whole heap of them in SL

the welsh youth sides are doing fantastic though, plenty of potential there, but if they dont have a club where are they going to play?

To Spongolium!! i am a Wakefield supporter through thick and thin and was actually wanting Cas in the play offs! Yes CAS! There isnt a level playing field anymore in super league and until there is it will be the same corrupt bag of ***** it has been for years. Wake up and smell the coffee and just admit the team you support are a manufactured and paid for team created by Red Hall! you blinkered fool !!!!

Compare the two teams that played on saturday.

Castleford Tigers

McGoldrick - Born Australia
Dixon - Born England (Hull)
Shenton - Born England (Castleford)
Ferres - Born England (Castleford)
Wainwright - Born England (Leeds)
Widders - Born Australia
ChaseBorn - New Zealand
Sargent - Born Australia
Hudson - Born England (Leeds)
Higgins - Born England (Doncaster)
Jones - Born England (Wigan)
Snitch - Born England (Hull)
Westerman - Born England (Castleford)
Huby - Born England (Castleford)
Milner - Born England (Castleford)
Walker - Born England (Leeds?)
Arundel - Born England (Castleford)

Crusaders

Schifcofske- Born Australia
Dyer - Born Australia
Martin - Born Australia
Mellars - Born New Zealand
Youngquest - Born Australia
Sammut - Born Australia
Hanbury - Born Australia
O'Hara - Born Australia
Withers - Born Australia
Bryant - Born Australia
Hauraki - Born New Zealand
Chan - Born Australia
Lupton - Born England
Lee - Born England
James - Born England
Peek - Born Australia
Winternstein - Born Australia

Id just like to ask how anybody can honestly call this an achievment...

You could create a team from say Hartlepool, bring in 17 foreign players and when they get below mid table call it an amazing achievment





Noble has achieved, the whole club has not and will not until it produces its own players. with the background in rugby the country has it should be producing platers instead of importing every player it has.

The old give it time argument is a bit of a crappy cop out also, they have been playing rugby of all forms in wales as long as most SL clubs have existed.

What i can see here is Crusaders are a team full of 3rd rate aussies who finished 8th and Castleford are a team full of 3rd rate Englishman who finished 9th.What's the problem

you couldnt make this amount of crap up. Changing allegiance? Never heard anything like it.

I never said that they weren't a 'thriving' club. I was just putting straight the (perfectly legal) way said 'debt free' status was attained. Here's what the RFL had to say about it at the time...

"While London are undoubtedly relieved to have been saved, it cannot be allowed to mask the serious issue raised,"...

I expect the RFL to review its rules and make recommendations."

Perhaps we can learn something from other sports, particularly as regards the sanctions and penalties that may be available to ensure that defaulting clubs are not seen to have gained a competitive advantage."

Also, from the BBC...

"The Broncos had to rely on a narrow vote at Friday's emergency meeting of Super League clubs to allow them to play on"

So, whilst I wish the club every success going forward, I believe that one shouldn't make too much of their debt free status as I doubt many other clubs would've been treated with such leniency.

Have Crusaders broken any rules, any rules whatsoever?!

Christ, the impatience of the typical Rugby League fan is shocking, Crusaders have been in Wrexham for ONE SEASON, make the top 8 and are being slated for having too many Aussies and the like? Give it time!

At the end of the day, this will only help, excellent chance for the marketing to sell a top 8 RL team.

And so much for the great Wakey-Cas rivalry...

Not really, full time pro RL has not existed in Wales for a while, only at part time level in the RL Conference.

And you know the difference between the RLC and Super League.