It's 850 miles from Wigan to Perpignan, so that clearly works in his mind plus similar distances from Leeds to Avignon, and St.Helens to Toulouse.

Clearly he feels the future is air miles, and enormous travel costs, with those English clubs displaced by French clubs being required to retain their academies despite going part time so Northern English lads can get RL careers in the south of France.

Snowie mate, you have to grasp the future....

It's "Europe or bust"........

I'm personally "optomistic" about this......

Quote ="Donnyman"It's 850 miles from Wigan to Perpignan, so that clearly works in his mind plus similar distances from Leeds to Avignon, and St.Helens to Toulouse. Clearly he feels the future is air miles, and enormous travel costs, with those English clubs displaced by French clubs being required to retain their academies despite going part time so Northern English lads can get RL careers in the south of France. Snowie mate, you have to grasp the future.... It's "Europe or bust"........ I'm personally "optomistic" about this......'" I ain't in the RFL.In 2008 when this Licensing malarkey was underway,the RFL in- house solicitor was Rod Findlay. Suggest you take all 'upset ' to him.I ain't bothered.I care not one jot for Wigan,St Helens,Avignon or Toulouse.I do not have any control over any club.Travel costs.Promotion or the one solitary,American owned television channel that shows Super League games. Quote ="Donnyman" I don't know about that, you may be right, but there is a re-structure of SL coming up plus can a club really be promoted on a series of phoney wins, or if it's tight a phoney points difference? If the re-structure was to be 10 clubs in SL with Toulouse promoted that leaves the number of English clubs for SKY as eight. SKY required more than that under the old deal, maybe they won't mind only 8 English clubs 2022 if they are paying far less for Superleauge? '" Pray tell us where,and when,and how,Sky decided on the rugby league structure(s). How are there any phoney wins when the rules were agreed prior to the start of the season? On the subject of promotion - it seems a video and a written report suffices for a M62 club https://leighrl.co.uk/wp/v2/blog/2020/1 ... ague-2021/ Did Sky demand that? Perhaps the English Super League M62 club owners did...

Quote ="Donnyman"It's 850 miles from Wigan to Perpignan, so that clearly works in his mind plus similar distances from Leeds to Avignon, and St.Helens to Toulouse. Clearly he feels the future is air miles, and enormous travel costs, with those English clubs displaced by French clubs being required to retain their academies despite going part time so Northern English lads can get RL careers in the south of France. Snowie mate, you have to grasp the future.... It's "Europe or bust"........ I'm personally "optomistic" about this......'" I ain't in the RFL.In 2008 when this Licensing malarkey was underway,the RFL in- house solicitor was Rod Findlay. Suggest you take all 'upset ' to him.I ain't bothered.I care not one jot for Wigan,St Helens,Avignon or Toulouse.I do not have any control over any club.Travel costs.Promotion or the one solitary,American owned television channel that shows Super League games. Quote ="Donnyman" I don't know about that, you may be right, but there is a re-structure of SL coming up plus can a club really be promoted on a series of phoney wins, or if it's tight a phoney points difference? If the re-structure was to be 10 clubs in SL with Toulouse promoted that leaves the number of English clubs for SKY as eight. SKY required more than that under the old deal, maybe they won't mind only 8 English clubs 2022 if they are paying far less for Superleauge? '" Pray tell us where,and when,and how,Sky decided on the rugby league structure(s). How are there any phoney wins when the rules were agreed prior to the start of the season? On the subject of promotion - it seems a video and a written report suffices for a M62 club https://leighrl.co.uk/wp/v2/blog/2020/1 ... ague-2021/ Did Sky demand that? Perhaps the English Super League M62 club owners did...

Widnes and Fev aren’t refusing to travel. They aren’t allowed to under current COVID restrictions because they are part time. These two games have been postponed to be rescheduled when restrictions allow later in the year.

However if they run out of time to reschedule such fixtures as they rely on COVID travel restrictions being lifted - and there is pressure on time due to it being a World Cup year - they will be wiped which is why the league is being decided upon win percentage. There are likely to be a lot of postponed home games for Toulouse as most clubs in the championship are part time. Which is why it’s highly unlikely Toulouse will finish top and be anywhere near super league next year.

I did say this in another thread when all the super duper league “experts” were pontificating on who is likely to be promoted.

Are there no play offs at the end of this championship season, MBB?

There are and they are the same format as the super league. Meaning if you aren’t in the top two you’ve got to go unbeaten. Also, to qualify a club has to fulfil 70% of their fixtures ie.16 of 22. Toulouse are already potentially down to 20. There are another 8 home games they could lose for the same reason if COVID restrictions aren’t lifted to an extent that would allow part time clubs to travel between now and the end of the season. Plus for every home game they can’t take part in - it makes the need to win away games even greater to keep the win percentage up. It’s unfair but they’re knackered as far as a promotion push goes this year.

Interesting stuff. I take your point of the difficulties in respect of fulfilling fixtures. It's anyone's guess on how things will pan out in all the leagues, as were still in a period of great uncertainty with the pandemic. I can see it could benefit the away team by not playing in Toulouse, given that the French team are one of the better ones in their league.

Or to put it another way if they were to do it it would be a massive achievement. As potentially they have more must wins away from home than anyone else without knowing it yet because it’s all in the lap of the gods. If that makes sense?

I’d rather know I had those home games to go at than not know.

They could potentially play at a neutral ground in the UK. They are full time and that’s an option.

Well thanks very much for saying it again

Whoa steady, they are far more an Anglo-Aussie team.........Try the French Elite league, you will find real French teams there....

They could but they have to be fitted in somewhere. Say half of their remaining home games are postponed before travel restrictions are lifted that’s six games to fit in somewhere. Or they lose all of them and plan to re-arrange over here at a neutral venue that’s 10 games to re-arrange.

It would have been better nominating a neutral venue and playing there until travel restrictions are lifted.

If they win all (or most) of the games that they actually play, plus the odd 24 - 0 walkover, they wont need to play any postponed fixtures.
Also, there are only a couple of free weekends for them to fit postponed games in, therefore, it looks very unlikely that they will complete their full set of fixtures, which is the reason behind the "win percentage" to decide the league standings.

They will need to re-arrange if they haven't managed 16 matches in total or they won't qualify for the play offs - that's only four more postponed home matches after the two so far. They can't pick and choose which ones to re-arrange either and as you say there are only a couple of free weekends as the season can't run over because of the world cup.

If all their remaining home games went and they won every other match (they won't) they would need to re-arrange at least 4 home matches or they won't be in the play offs.

It has been said on 'The Full 80 Minutes' that John Kear (Bradford) & Mick Hogan (Newcastle) have stated their intent not to travel to France at this time !!!

I imagine that Newcastle are "big spenders", do Bradford fall into the same category ?

Not sure what “big spenders” means but the only full time clubs in the championship are Toulouse and London.

They are abiding by the current rules of the RFL. They could end up playing 3 games a week at a neutral ground. That’s been done before with CC back log of fixtures.

Yeah I know they are but how do you fit all that in?

I genuinely hope it doesn’t come to that but I can’t see anything other than Toulouse forfeiting a play off place or completing enough games but missing out on the top two on points percentage owing to playing more games away than at home. Either way it’s not a level playing field.

They will play 3 games a week. Once the rescheduling can no further be added to.

Why would they? Toulouse is their main competition for promotion to SL, if Toulouse don’t fulfil a minimum of 16 fixtures, then they won’t qualify for the playoffs. This is a stitch up to prevent a none uk team gaining promotion.

Steady yourself, as I'm not getting sucked into your repetitive arguments about teams outside of England, that have derailed enough threads already. For the removal of doubt "French Team" comment simply made on geographical location. Kindly make a sensible and relevant comment when replying to my post, rather than jump to a conclusion, because I typed the word "French".

Quote ="Donnyman"Whoa steady, they are far more an Anglo-Aussie team.........Try the French Elite league, you will find real French teams there....'" May need to go down to amateur level,the Conference community clubs leagues for sides containing all English,M62 players. Looks like those pesky French are providing for young French players https://youtu.be/gaJ9-4H2ZI8

Quote ="Donnyman"Whoa steady, they are far more an Anglo-Aussie team.........Try the French Elite league, you will find real French teams there....'" May need to go down to amateur level,the Conference community clubs leagues for sides containing all English,M62 players. Looks like those pesky French are providing for young French players https://youtu.be/gaJ9-4H2ZI8

Jesus wept

If they didn't play enough matches but had enough wins so the percentage would be high enough if the unplayed were lost would they not qualify. Thought I'd read that somewhere but could be spouting bull agaib

It’s like taking a horse to water.