Serious question but how do you know he could not be bothered to go?

Perhaps his mum went into hospital, his pet died, he cant afford, he had to work, he wasnt feeling well, he is barred from that stadium etc etc?

He basically admitted as such in a different thread!

As far as I'm aware they are a subsidiary of Harlequins RU club, certainly their stadium and other facilities are fully dependent on the RU club. Now let's not kid ourselves here that organisations core product is RU, and it is RU's interests that will come first. The moment the RL side doesn't offer the RU club whatever it is they get from it they will drop them like a brick and they will be gone IMHO. Most RL clubs are at risk also but not from their parent company, rather just the standard rough trading conditions all clubs face. Hence they are not stand alone company/club who only interest is RL. I cannot think of one "heartland club" that is the same. Perhaps Leeds, but they are such strong performers and so viable I see no issue.

I don't understand the second part of the question.

However my small issue with your post was that you said and maybe you didn't mean it that way - "I don't know how people can reasonably be against either London...". - I don't understand
why it's unreasonable to question their validity.

OK, to simplify - if it was a 2 horse race between us and Quins, who do you think deserves to get the franchise most when they are judged against the RFL's criteria?

Semantics.

I don't think I have yet to read on here (or anywhere else) a 'reasonable' argument as to why the London club (or Catalans too) shouldn't be in the league - specifically when they are compared to us.

Pushed for time right now on the other points raised ref stand alone/parent clubs/companies etc, but will reply later in the day.

Its a bit like the mirror opposite of the situation down at Headingley, many rhino fans will tell you they are plowing their hard earned into the tykes.
I don't know how true it is, as i can't see the logic in it, but clearly the people running the show can, so maybe the Harlequins are getting more out of it than just shared facilities.

Certainly any argument against catalan, would be on fairly thin ice, they have worked for all the reasons that London haven't. They have a RL tradition and a passion for the game and they turn up in good numbers. For me the London experiment, has been an abject failure because it could not stand alone without support, because it does not have adequate support, in plain business terms the customer base does not support the business.
The london Argument has always been, "ooh its so difficult to get to the games, and it takes so long, blah, blah, blah" then the simple truth is the team is in the wrong place, it should be somewhere, where the fans can access it more easily (like along the M62 for example), is like building a stadium on the top of Mt Everest, and then complaining only a couple of sherpas turn up on match day!!
I would have said exactly the same about us if we had not been purchased by AG, if no one wants to run the business because it isn't going to be "successful" for whatever reason then you have no business.

I have not got enough facts to make that decision, has anyone outside the panel that judge these things. My argument isn't based on what I consider flawed criteria it's based on whether they are more viable than us. I don't think they are. I'll have a go though using the criteria - see below.

In order for the Championship club’s application to proceed to assessment by the RFL, they had to meet the Championship club minimum criteria. These minimum criteria are:

a. Club has reached a Championship Final or won the Northern Rail Cup in 2009 or 2010.
b. Club has a stadium with an operational capacity of 10,000.
c. Club has turnover of at least £1,000,000 in financial year ending 2009 or 2010.
d. Club has an average attendance of at least 2500 in 2009 or 2010.
Provided at least one applicant meets the minimum criteria, a Championship club will be awarded a Super League licence for a three-year period commencing at the start of the 2012 season.

The last two are criteria to get into SL, Harlequins I suspect are struggling to hit these and they are already in SL. We are not.

How are the applications assessed?

Clubs are assessed on criteria in 5 key areas:

a. Commercial, Marketing, Media and Community.
b. Facilities.
c. Finance.
d. Governance and Business Management.
e. Playing Strength and Player Performance Strategy.

The only one of the above we IMO don't have a good chance of beating Harlequins at a guess and it can only be a guess is facilities.

So if there isn't some form of protection available to Harlequins why are so many so sure we will go down. I'm not trying to plug a conspiracy theory, I'm just very curious. If we were to say win the CCup and still go down I'd be even more curious, wouldn't you.

But the RFL do not want us

We only think that, we won't know officially for another couple of months!!!

Which isn't true.

Hope so

It is, ask Dickie Mint

I agree - but you would have to wonder where we are losing out if indeed we are as so many seem to think. I get the feeling that either people like Martyn Sadler either know something or are being very presumptive. As far as I can see we are not out of it according to criteria.

Please don't confuse me with someone what gives a toss, but if it helps at all read his posts.



Well according to the every day postings on here, he is self employed and employs others, he was on £40k per annum 2 years ago, presumably it has risen since then, why should he be barred from a ground we do not frequent, I don't personally eat that muck from kfc so I can't comment on his health, due to his reluctance to stick his hand in his pocket for any causes on here, I doubt he would goto the expence of a pet, unless it was some preditory animal, and as for his mother being ill I was under the impression thats according to the majority on here anyway, that he never had any parents

hope that answers your serious question.

How do you know? And will you still think the same if/when we are no longer in SL, and teams with far worse applications are kept?

We are just going to have to wait until to July to find out for definite but to me it looks like we are heading for a spell in the championship.

Unless he has spent all his money on parking fines again

I don't think they are a 'subsidiary' of the rugby union club - from what I can gather they are an independat organisation who work in partnership with the RU side and are 100% independantly owned. Fair enough they are reliant on the union side for their facilities - but is this much different from any one of the clubs who share a football ground?

For what its worth, I think they have probably messed up with the tie in with the rugby union side - think they would have been better off trying to convert non rugby fans rather than tap into the posh city boys, but I dont know enough about the local area to know where best for them, but I do think they are worht their slot in the league. They have made mistakes in the past and look to have made some bad decisions (just some other sides, us included) - but to single them out over any other club isn't fair I don't think.

OK, bare with me here - going through this a bit at a time....

You really don't think Quins turn over £1m in a year? A quick glance at SL Stats website shows they had 44,000 punters through the gate last year - so if everybody paid on average £10/ticket then they are nearly half way to the £1m turnover plus on top of that you have other revenue from sponsorship, corporate, food and drink and thats not to mention the money from Sky.

The average attendance (based on the SL Stats site) is about 3,300 if I worked it out correctly - so whilst still poor it is more than you guessed at.

a. Commercial, marketing, media and community - impossible to say either way.
b. Facilities - a given they are miles ahead as things stand, its a nice ground with a great bar.
c. Finances - are you kidding?
d. Governance and business management - are you kidding?
e. Playing strength and player performance strategy - Dunno, depends how you judge, both sides improving with the overseas contingent reducing, we have the advantage on field recently you would have to say but they have produced a couple of internationals and also got some kids in the England U16s squad I seem to recall? (could be wrong)

So based on the 5 published criteria in my opinion we are well behind London.

No what I'm saying is that if they were not in SL and applied they wouldn't get in as I don't think they would average attendances anywhere near 2,500. I think we would.

Thus I don't think they would hit the one million turnover mark. I think we would, just.

You could argue that we should as we are in the heartland and London are not. However as I say after 30 years I'd like to know when that is no longer a valid excuse?

So by my reckoning if they left SL they would never get back in. Where as we with a new ground might, we will certainly make the criteria. That for me does not offer much validation for RL in London.

In what way, where is your evidence I just don't get your desire to prove your own club wrong without a fight. Are you on a mission. As I said and unlike you I'm not claiming I'm right I'm just asking fair and REASONABLE questions, what do you find so wrong with that. I'm sorry but I don't consider London a sacred cow, I also have no probs with Widnes replacing us IF we are the weakest club - like many I not convinced we are. I think London is, I'm a positive thinker, I'm a heretic burn me.

So for your benefit and without semantics let's try again.

A. Did you not fancy that one
B. A given as I said.
C. No, why are their finances better, I'm not kidding are you. Now that going into admin doesn't count on the criteria we are probably the only debt free club in the comp. Do you really think they are.
D. Same as above, we are either a new club or we are not - you can't have it both ways. In which case we can have done nothing wrong.
E. The best time to judge that is at the end of the season, but then RL in contrast to all other sports doesn't work like that. You're only as good as your last game in most sports, except in RL where it's your last season/seasons or how many bars and toilets you have.

It does, thank you

It would have been a shame if Catalans had been relegated in their first 2 seasons for finishing bottom. They've certainly added to the competition since then (as well as providing an excellent holiday venue for rugby league fans, but that's just by the way).

Some projects take longer to mature than others. The first Welsh rugby league teams could have been a success, with the right kind of support at the time. Perhaps this one deserves a little longer?

Likewise London. No one can seriously suggest that this has been a stable club (in the sense of a single club) over the last 30 years, and should be judged on that basis? The Harlequins club faces obstacles that other clubs don't. I think it's good that they are in SL.

I love Trinity and think, given the present conditions at the club, that we deserve to be in SL too.

That's my opinion.