14 Team SL and Merged Championship?

[BODISGOD]

ST Helens Chairman

Listened yesterday eve, in fairness he clears up the papers point. He didn't provide any assurances on Sky.

 

[Gobsmacked]

Championship and League 1 clubs near Super 8s call as restructure looms https://share.google/WZlDyldzP59sLDO8X

 

[Pippen94]

The game in UK is near dead. Basically, NSW & Qld cup level. Without NRL has no future. Sometimes I think it's not worth saving.

 

[BODISGOD]

No it’s not. It gets good attendances week to week & good audiences on tv. They are getting squeezed by the dynamics of the broadcast market, don’t think because it’s happened to them that it might not happen to you.

 

[Pippen94]

No it’s not. It gets good attendances week to week & good audiences on tv. They are getting squeezed by the dynamics of the broadcast market, don’t think because it’s happened to them that it might not happen to you.

They've always been more worried about smaller towns than growing game.

 

[Taking The Two]

Our biggest issue, as it has been for as long as I can remember, is leadership. Turkeys won’t vote for Christmas and that’s basically our motto here. If the club chairmen can keep their seat at the big table, that’s all that matters and threat of an NRL buyout has panicked a load of chairmen into voting through expanding the league quickly and keeping control of the decision making of the sport here.

 

[BODISGOD]

They've always been more worried about smaller towns than growing game.

You could literally say the same thing about historic Sydney clubs. The NRL as it stands arguably has one club outside of heartland areas. Super League has had more incursions - London, Toronto and Paris.

Super League was actually far bolder at the outset and the SL War in Australia arguably put their approach back as well.

The country that always had the resources and interest put International league on the back burner for years as well. What was it, 29 years between Australia properly hosting a World Cup? Some outlook.

I'm not going to suggest for a second that English RL didn't historically make mistakes but they have still been more outward looking since the Super League era. The strength of Australia RL is the core markets and core tv contract, you just happen to not have an elephant in the form of the English Premier League eating up the subscription revenue. Again, don't be so quick to judge, broadcast markets can change as the Super League will tell you.

 

[Pippen94]

You could literally say the same thing about historic Sydney clubs. The NRL as it stands arguably has one club outside of heartland areas. Super League has had more incursions - London, Toronto and Paris.

Super League was actually far bolder at the outset and the SL War in Australia arguably put their approach back as well.

The country that always had the resources and interest put International league on the back burner for years as well. What was it, 29 years between Australia properly hosting a World Cup? Some outlook.

I'm not going to suggest for a second that English RL didn't historically make mistakes but they have still been more outward looking since the Super League era. The strength of Australia RL is the core markets and core tv contract, you just happen to not have an elephant in the form of the English Premier League eating up the subscription revenue. Again, don't be so quick to judge, broadcast markets can change as the Super League will tell you.

Smaller clubs threatened by success of Las vegas fixture because they know their have no place with big clubs from both UK, France..

 

[Gobsmacked]

Smaller clubs threatened by success of Las vegas fixture because they know their have no place with big clubs from both UK, France..

If you look at what was the Brisbane comp, all those supporters got behind the Broncos.
The trouble with the English game is all those smaller clubs keep getting promoted to top flight which keep them divided from becoming a strong single entity.

Salford struggling financially- Oldham may be promoted!! Both areas of greater Manchester.. if all the Rugby league supporters in the greater Manchester area got behind a Manchester franchise...
It would be a big successful clubs!

And it's worse than just that too because the fan dynamic is alienating.. these small town teams only envok passion from those who have an affinity with the area or live in close proximity. Why would someone in Birmingham watch or decide to follow Leigh? It's back to front.
The people of Leigh should be jumping on board behind a Manchester franchise or Liverpool.

The only way out of this is the NRL gets full control and markets it properly. Get a bloody map out and apply some common sense.

They may literally promote Oldham.. with months to prepare...
You can't make this shit up

 

[titoelcolombiano]

Time Vlandys to step in and create the NRL Europe Conference.

2 conferences of 10 in the Southern Hemesphere (Australia, NZ, PNG)
1 Conference of 10 in Europe (England, France)

Top 3 from each SH conference make the finals and top 2 from Europe.

International reach, valuable for broadcasters and sponsors, streamlined administration and marketing (NRL becomes the brand globally for RL), streamlined club and international game. Traditional clubs driving the international reach (not plastic R360 franchises), whole of game grows together.

 

[Taking The Two]

If you look at what was the Brisbane comp, all those supporters got behind the Broncos.
The trouble with the English game is all those smaller clubs keep getting promoted to top flight which keep them divided from becoming a strong single entity.

Salford struggling financially- Oldham may be promoted!! Both areas of greater Manchester.. if all the Rugby league supporters in the greater Manchester area got behind a Manchester franchise...
It would be a big successful clubs!

And it's worse than just that too because the fan dynamic is alienating.. these small town teams only envok passion from those who have an affinity with the area or live in close proximity. Why would someone in Birmingham watch or decide to follow Leigh? It's back to front.
The people of Leigh should be jumping on board behind a Manchester franchise or Liverpool.

The only way out of this is the NRL gets full control and markets it properly. Get a bloody map out and apply some common sense.

They may literally promote Oldham.. with months to prepare...
You can't make this shit up

Nobody here is getting behind mergers. That’s why they failed to get off the ground in the 90’s. You’re not pulling in the small crowds of Swinton and Rochdale with Oldham and Salford’s, calling it Manchester and riding off into the sun. It’s too emotive and people are attached to their clubs and the family ties associated with supporting their side. It would never get off the ground, nor should it, in all honesty. The sporting fan in England doesn’t see clubs as franchises, nor will they either.

 

[Pippen94]

Nobody here is getting behind mergers. That’s why they failed to get off the ground in the 90’s. You’re not pulling in the small crowds of Swinton and Rochdale with Oldham and Salford’s, calling it Manchester and riding off into the sun. It’s too emotive and people are attached to their clubs and the family ties associated with supporting their side. It would never get off the ground, nor should it, in all honesty. The sporting fan in England doesn’t see clubs as franchises, nor will they either.

Catalans is joint venture between two clubs. Could a Manchester team work with Salford, Oldham, Leigh..still existing in lower league and feeding into top flight club?!

 

[Taking The Two]

Catalans is joint venture between two clubs. Could a Manchester team work with Salford, Oldham, Leigh..still existing in lower league and feeding into top flight club?!

I don’t think it would. Swinton fans kicked up a fuss when their previous owners (who now owns Rochdale) wanted to change their name to Manchester Lions despite the fact that Swinton haven’t played in Swinton since 1992. Oldham are doing well financially for now and Leigh fans aren’t going to be keen to lose their identity for a city that they, mostly, don’t associate themselves with. You’d lose more fans than you’d bring together. I’m sure there was rumour that Salford were going to rebrand to Manchester, possibly when Marwan Koukash was owner, and their fans kicked up a fuss about that too.

Franchising and mergers in the modern era just isn’t in the British psyche I’m afraid, and I can’t see it ever happening. I don’t think it should either, in all honesty. You can have all the big cities in the world in one league but without a strategy and a plan they’ll likely go the same way as Newcastle Thunder, London Broncos and Paris.

 

[BODISGOD]

Smaller clubs threatened by success of Las vegas fixture because they know their have no place with big clubs from both UK, France..

This is a very isolated point.

 

[BODISGOD]

The trouble with the English game is all those smaller clubs keep getting promoted to top flight which keep them divided from becoming a strong single entity.

Salford struggling financially- Oldham may be promoted!! Both areas of greater Manchester.. if all the Rugby league supporters in the greater Manchester area got behind a Manchester franchise...
It would be a big successful clubs!

And it's worse than just that too because the fan dynamic is alienating.. these small town teams only envok passion from those who have an affinity with the area or live in close proximity. Why would someone in Birmingham watch or decide to follow Leigh? It's back to front.
The people of Leigh should be jumping on board behind a Manchester franchise or Liverpool.

The only way out of this is the NRL gets full control and markets it properly. Get a bloody map out and apply some common sense.

They may literally promote Oldham.. with months to prepare...
You can't make this shit up

It's in no way comparable.

1) The Broncos joined a new competition. A comp stacked with Sydney clubs. Of course this was appealing to people in Brisbane. What you are proposing here is for people to sack off their club in the existing structure and support a merged entity, it is far closer to the JVs of the NRL

2) Football is the absolute King in England. These geographies have 3/4 Super Clubs and several regional ones. There is massive competition for fan attention.

What track record do the NRL have of succeeding with new markets? Melbourne? Melbourne were supported in equity terms (as well as receiving their broadcast rights share) by the major media partner of the NRL for donkeys years and through the Cap mess. This has no equivalence in the UK.

 

[Perth Red]

If you look at what was the Brisbane comp, all those supporters got behind the Broncos.
The trouble with the English game is all those smaller clubs keep getting promoted to top flight which keep them divided from becoming a strong single entity.

Salford struggling financially- Oldham may be promoted!! Both areas of greater Manchester.. if all the Rugby league supporters in the greater Manchester area got behind a Manchester franchise...
It would be a big successful clubs!

And it's worse than just that too because the fan dynamic is alienating.. these small town teams only envok passion from those who have an affinity with the area or live in close proximity. Why would someone in Birmingham watch or decide to follow Leigh? It's back to front.
The people of Leigh should be jumping on board behind a Manchester franchise or Liverpool.

The only way out of this is the NRL gets full control and markets it properly. Get a bloody map out and apply some common sense.

They may literally promote Oldham.. with months to prepare...
You can't make this shit up

Oldham has a population of 250k.

Your argument was the same one used by people wanting to rationalise Sydney to clear space to bring in big population cities with no club. Dont have small clubs have 4 big ones in Sydney that can match AFL fanbases, people will just follow a merged or new club so lets merge or set up new ones and drop the existing ones down to NSW cup.

It doesnt work, never has, never will.

Why am I a member of Melbourne Storm, and watch every game they play on tv, when they are 3.5k kms away? You dont have to be 10kms from the stadium to actively follow a club.

 

[Pippen94]

This is a very isolated point.

It's reason behind 14 team comp

 

[Pippen94]

It's in no way comparable.

1) The Broncos joined a new competition. A comp stacked with Sydney clubs. Of course this was appealing to people in Brisbane. What you are proposing here is for people to sack off their club in the existing structure and support a merged entity, it is far closer to the JVs of the NRL

2) Football is the absolute King in England. These geographies have 3/4 Super Clubs and several regional ones. There is massive competition for fan attention.

What track record do the NRL have of succeeding with new markets? Melbourne? Melbourne were supported in equity terms (as well as receiving their broadcast rights share) by the major media partner of the NRL for donkeys years and through the Cap mess. This has no equivalence in the UK.

Are you Martyn Sadler?!

 

[BODISGOD]

Time Vlandys to step in and create the NRL Europe Conference.

2 conferences of 10 in the Southern Hemesphere (Australia, NZ, PNG)
1 Conference of 10 in Europe (England, France)

Top 3 from each SH conference make the finals and top 2 from Europe.

International reach, valuable for broadcasters and sponsors, streamlined administration and marketing (NRL becomes the brand globally for RL), streamlined club and international game. Traditional clubs driving the international reach (not plastic R360 franchises), whole of game grows together.

What is your composition of NRL Europe? You mention keeping traditional clubs, so are you suggesting promotion / relegation for that conference?

How does this work in practice? I am assuming you think there should be inter conference fixtures, otherwise you are getting into loop fixtures. Are you suggesting semi regular travel from the NH and the SH for sides? If so, look to the URC where this somewhat works in the regular season between South Africa and Europe. They do 2 game tours.

But at Finals time this is a bit of a disaster. Because you have regular seedings you can have teams down in SA one week and then travelling North the next with little to no time to plan. In terms of broadcast times, SA & Europe works but your proposal I fear is far closer to Super Rugby where timezones became a killer as the competition looked to expand. The timezone difference here is tricky, maybe not insurmountable, but tricky. Finals time imo would the hardest part here on your proposal, I'm not sure the full content here has been thought out.

In terms of salary caps and distributions to clubs, you'd have to go to equal distributions to make a fair comp. I am dubious on the commercial value that you have suggested. Perhaps DAZN buying the whole thing in the UK could mean they want to spend more but I can't see the value getting back to £40m ($82m) again like it was 10 years ago, currently it is a little over half that. Maybe it gets back up to $50m-$60m next time out. The current gap in distributions between the NRL and Super League is over $10m AUD per club. Some of that would be narrowed by two less clubs but you are still looking at probably another $70m AUD the NRL would have to find. Is that realistics?

IMHO the NRL takeover makes little sense. Instead the NRL should be carving out 4-5 weeks per year for cross hemisphere games between clubs and internationals. Within that I would fit in an expanded World Club Challenge every two years (make it 8 clubs), the RLWC, Ashes tours and other internationals. Those can be cross sold and look to use the DAZN for worldwide rights.

 

[Pippen94]

What is your composition of NRL Europe? You mention keeping traditional clubs, so are you suggesting promotion / relegation for that conference?

How does this work in practice? I am assuming you think there should be inter conference fixtures, otherwise you are getting into loop fixtures. Are you suggesting semi regular travel from the NH and the SH for sides? If so, look to the URC where this somewhat works in the regular season between South Africa and Europe. They do 2 game tours.

But at Finals time this is a bit of a disaster. Because you have regular seedings you can have teams down in SA one week and then travelling North the next with little to no time to plan. In terms of broadcast times, SA & Europe works but your proposal I fear is far closer to Super Rugby where timezones became a killer as the competition looked to expand. The timezone difference here is tricky, maybe not insurmountable, but tricky. Finals time imo would the hardest part here on your proposal, I'm not sure the full content here has been thought out.

In terms of salary caps and distributions to clubs, you'd have to go to equal distributions to make a fair comp. I am dubious on the commercial value that you have suggested. Perhaps DAZN buying the whole thing in the UK could mean they want to spend more but I can't see the value getting back to £40m ($82m) again like it was 10 years ago, currently it is a little over half that. Maybe it gets back up to $50m-$60m next time out. The current gap in distributions between the NRL and Super League is over $10m AUD per club. Some of that would be narrowed by two less clubs but you are still looking at probably another $70m AUD the NRL would have to find. Is that realistics?

IMHO the NRL takeover makes little sense. Instead the NRL should be carving out 4-5 weeks per year for cross hemisphere games between clubs and internationals. Within that I would fit in an expanded World Club Challenge every two years (make it 8 clubs), the RLWC, Ashes tours and other internationals. Those can be cross sold and look to use the DAZN for worldwide rights.

Promotion and relegation lol