Here’s an idea. Why not be a Model citizen and not get a criminal record instead of blaming it on Toronto

Regards

King James

Toronto have one of the worse disciplinary records in the game, they must sort out there 'own back yard" first. Warrington showed the correct MODEL in there cup game whilst Toronto were out of control and ignored the wrath of the referee.

A "Model Citizen" is someone who obeys the law, is good to their community(s) and sets a good example for other citizens. not only citizens of a city or country.



How many RL players would genuinely fit that mould?

But it's not Toronto is it! It's the airline, presuming they won't get through immigration in Canada. As it will cost the airline in order to get them back to the UK.

No, it’s the Canadian government and their rules on entry into the country.

I don’t understand why the RFL doesn’t register all players no matter the division to apply for a Canadian visa. They don’t expire for 5 years apparently or so a Toronto fan said on Twitter and surely once you have it, it’s better than not. For one, if you play Toronto you can get across and if you don’t it makes you more of an attractive buy if you have a visa and can play against them. There would be no short term faffing then either.

Brexit won't change anything. I'd expect the UK will model it's self like Norway & Switzerland.

Russia adjusted their entry rules for the World Cup, a valid match ticket can be used instead of a Visa.

It would be far easier to change the name of Leigh to Toronto its just a sham anyway, by my last visit to there web site they have only one canadian player in the Toronto squad and quite a lot of players are ex Leigh anyway.
No problem with visas here all you need is a morrisons royalty card.

Do Toronto have any form of representatives going into schools, like clubs do over here? Do they have any form of a community department? What about amateur clubs? What about properly growing the game instead of plopping them into established divisions and giving them special dispensations?

Correct: Quinn Ngwati, who just turned 19, and who is likely to play after TWP secure the Championship.

We're not hung up on where players come from. Local examples:

Toronto Blue Jays, established 41 years ago: Regular season roster of 25 players, two Canadian.
Toronto Raptors: Regular season roster, zero Canadians.
Toronto FC: Regular season roster of 29 players, nine Canadians of whom seven are "homegrown" from TFC's own academy. It's taken TFC 13 seasons to build these homegrown players.
Toronto Maple Leafs: can't be bothered to look, for the sake of argument let's say about half of them are Canadian.

Rugby is an emerging sport here - for Wolfpack to compete at a high level, we can't do it on homegrown players. Instead of bashing the Wolfpack for not having Canadians, why not view it as a great opportunity for English, Australian, NZ, Tongan and Samoan players to raise the game among Canadians?

Wolfpack are doing a lot of outreach to a wide range of audiences - corporate, sports, kids - as they are trying to build support, sponsorship and to get local recognition to build a fan base. There have been a few visits and coaching events with schools, but the structure of this season means they only overlap the school year for one month (June), as school ends here at the end of June.

Just a few examples: They had two little kid rugby teams playing during half-time last week, it was a hoot. This Saturday, kids under 12 get in free and before the game, there is an open training session for women's rugby league.

Wolfpack also co-sponsored a day-long tag rugby event a couple of weeks ago, teams were all corporate types, looked like a lot of fun and appeals to the sort of people who might cough up some sponsorship.

In the past month, team members have been very visible around Toronto, showing up at events and generally being good ambassadors for the sport.

Growing the game is going to take time. Having a team at the top level is one way to grow interest in the sport among the youngsters coming up - it doesn't have to be either/or. Right now, Wolfpack is focused on trying to get into Super League, if they can pull that off then let's see where they go next.



Eh?

In my opinion they should have done it in a complete different way instead of tacking Toronto onto the championship/super league.

It should have been a combined effort from the RFL/NRL/South Sea Islands to create a 6 team comp in Canada with an even distribution of overseas players 10 per team the rest being the best of what Canadian players available.

That would be a 10 match comp with the top 3 teams coming over for 3 weeks to compete in a mini comp with the top 3 of the championship. That way you would have around 7 or 8 local players playing every week on a steeper learning curve.

At the moment Toronto are getting quite a lot of players near there sell by date which in turn means a large turnover of players, stability is required so the local fans can become associate identity with there team.

Feel free to come on over here and have a go.



Wolfpack went from League 1 to Championship in one season and have a reasonable chance to reach Super League after two. That's a huge step up for skill level and talent. We were not surprised by player turnover going into the 2018 season (although we were disappointed to lose some fan favourites) and fans fully expect more changes if we reach SL in 2019 - it's necessary to be competitive.

Craig Hall will be here on Saturday, he'll get a warm welcome.

He's not in the 19 man squad though.

No he won't, not in the 19 to travel !

My perspective is Toronto get into super league and I travel 3400 miles for our away game, when I get there I find my team are playing against a lot of ex Leigh and ex Salford players with a couple of Aussies thrown in and only get to see 1 or 2 Canadians playing the game.
How long would that situation transform into home grown talent with one team in isolation..........20+ years maybe.

That is very disappointing. He was well liked here, and not just for his ability to kick the ball onto the trams on King Street.

It's a good question and depends what route Wolfpack take and how the sport in general evolves across the country.

Locally, it took Toronto FC six years. Club was founded in 2005 and set up the academy in 2008 under the leadership of that fine bloke Danny Dichio. TFC signed its first academy graduate in 2011 and now there are seven homegrown in the squad. It's a good model.

Hey, we like those ex-Leigh players. We call them "Wolfpack" now.

You don’t have the Salary Cap to match the wages. The whole point of expansion is to develop. If you don’t do that,you simply don’t expand.

That’s the failings within the current game which has been exploited and abused. The game survives on youth, without it you have no game. All the money in the world may buy you a squad but it won’t develop the sport.

Whilst I agree with the centimente behind your post.

Toronto are a slightly special case. In that they were never going to do anything with regards youth straight away. Given that it's a totally new enterprise.
Now if in 5 years it's still the same situation and have only 1 or 2 canadian players in there squad. Then we can complain about it.

https://barrowrlfc.com/2018/06/statemen ... -the-club/

https://barrowrlfc.com/2018/06/statemen ... -the-club/

Blimey ! Another Cumbrian club struggling to 'make ends meet'.
"Barrowvians" never heard their fans callled that before, I like it !

That statement answers a few of the critics questions regarding Barrow not having a full team to put out , the RFL will ignore the position they are in at the expense of others.

This bit is confusing, how does them needing a cash boost equate to avoiding breaking the salary cap?
Also not surprised to read further down that the club offered two year deals to many players - some with increased wages if promotion was obtained.
This was always going to happen as soon as this league structure was voted in, as a Bradford fan I know this only too well.