Irish/Scottish teams in the ESL

[Hello, I'm The Doctor]

Just a history question...

Have there ever been any attemps to bring Irish or Scottish teams into the ESL (the the comp preceding)?

And is there any prospect of new ones in the near future? (i just feel like, if Canada can field a team, surely Dublin or Edinburgh could bring one together too)

 

[East Coast Tiger]

No.

 

[jim_57]

Any new team would depend entirely on a money man/men aka the Toronto bid. 2 years ago a Dublin or Edinburgh team would have sounded a lot more likely than Canada. The key to me is taking internationals seriously to potentially get such people/companies interested.

 

[roughyedspud]

Im led to believe that off the back of the up coming 4 nations,scotland RL are going to look at getting somekind of scottish team into league one...whether its going to be branded as scotland "whatever" or edinburgh or aberdeen "whatever" has yet to be decided

 

[jim_57]

Good news if they can get it off the ground, would be glad if at least some gpod can come of Scotland in the 4 Nations.

 

[adamkungl]

Good news if true. Hopefully Ireland can do the same.

This kind of thing is the way forward for SL catching up to NRL $$ wise.

 

[deal.with.it]

Big travel from Aberdeen.
Would have thought glasgow or Edinburgh would be ideal. It needs to happen to help International RL.
How much funding does the RFL give League 1 teams? And what would be the expenditure of an average League 1 team - say Hemel.

 

[roughyedspud]

League 1 clubs only get £90,000...should really be triple that but the ESL clubs won't let the money trickle down

 

[nzwarriorskuz]

Im led to believe that off the back of the up coming 4 nations,scotland RL are going to look at getting somekind of scottish team into league one...whether its going to be branded as scotland "whatever" or edinburgh or aberdeen "whatever" has yet to be decided

Where did you hear about this spud? If so RLI might as well put a bid in as well. At least they have a much better domestic scene.. Predicting where a Scottish team may come from maybe the Borders or Glasgow..

 

[deal.with.it]

So they get £90k? Not much really.
What would be the operating costs i wonder.

 

[BODISGOD]

If a good chunk of travel costs were covered by any grant, it wouldn't be too hard to get a big sports University like UCD involved.

 

[PaulyTom]

Need a team to start in the lower leagues and make their way up.

Hopefully Toulouse and Leigh make their way up to the next level of league. This will inspire teams in lower leagues that it can be done and with the right funding very possible.

 

[Evil Homer]

Need a team to start in the lower leagues and make their way up.

Hopefully Toulouse and Leigh make their way up to the next level of league. This will inspire teams in lower leagues that it can be done and with the right funding very possible.

Hopefully Leigh do not get promoted, terrible club.

 

[langpark]

Hopefully Leigh do not get promoted, terrible club.

Can't be worse than that waste of space salford!

 

[Evil Homer]

Can't be worse than that waste of space salford!

Even grubbier club and unlike Leigh, Salford/Manchester is a market that could and should be developed. Leigh is a tiny, deprived suburb of Wigan that doesn't even have a train station.

 

[East Coast Tiger]

Manchester should be developed but Salford don't seem to be doing much in that regard.

At least Leigh might get a few more through the gates.

Worst case scenario would be Leigh coming up at the expense of Huddersfield or Rovers, which is possible.

 

[adamkungl]

Whats wrong with Leigh? Apart from adding nothing geographically.

I'm hoping London pull off a miracle but happy to see some movement for interests sake.

It's all about Toulouse next year

 

[jim_57]

At least it will give some hope for aspiring lower division teams if Leigh or London (long shot, but hopefully) get promoted. Hopefully Toulouse follow next year, but I'm not getting too excited just yet.

 

[Sydney Knight]

I remember Leigh being really shit when they were in SL in early 2000s

 

[Evil Homer]

Whats wrong with Leigh? Apart from adding nothing geographically.

Their owner is an idiot (moreso than Koukash), they have no reserves or youth development programs that I know of, there are at least 4 other SL clubs in the immediate vicinity, their crowds are relatively big for the Championship but are likely to be much lower than the SL average. They have decent facilities but that's about it, as a generalization their club and fans are pretty much the embodiment of the backwards, insular nature of British RL.

Manchester should be developed but Salford don't seem to be doing much in that regard.

At least Leigh might get a few more through the gates.

Worst case scenario would be Leigh coming up at the expense of Huddersfield or Rovers, which is possible.

The biggest problem for Salford is that it has become very difficult for anyone to get to their matches since they moved to the new stadium. It's literally in the middle of a wasteland with nothing anywhere near it, the car parking and access is poor and if you don't have a car then it's pretty much impossible to get to. Add to the fact that their ticket prices are the most expensive in the league and it ends up being a very long, frustrating and expensive journey to watch a pretty average team.