Crusaders Leave SuperLeague

[Nothern]

Been announced this morning on BBC. Crusaders have withdrawn their bid for a renewed franchise for 2012-2015.

Uncertain if they will continue in Co-operative Championship as yet.

Def unexpected and a blow to expansion.

Good news for Wakefield though.

See: http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/rugby_league/14189659.stm

 

[hutch]

Absolutely devastating news to rugby league in wales. Crusaders have done more for rugby league in 6 years than Wakefield have in the last 50! The international game will suffer and will be felt in this years 4 nations!

 

[Jankuloski]

Well f*ck..

 

[Evil Homer]

Discussion here: http://forums.leagueunlimited.com/showthread.php?t=388067

 

[East Coast Tiger]

Well that's the end of Welsh RL as a potential threat to the bigger nations. Replace Wales with France now and save some face before they get slaugheterd in the 4N. Virtually all their home grown players will now be lost to the game by the end of the season unless they go to another club. You could pick a team of Catalans players who would murder Wales on their own, even without any players from other clubs. I'd hate to think how many will go to the Racecourse Ground for the Aussie game now. They might get 3000 if they're lucky. Even a game in Paris doubled that. In the heartlands in the south it would get double that again.

And to all those who think Dickie Lewis should be running IRL have a close look at how he has handled the whole franchsing/expansion process over there. This on top of all the other c**k-ups the RFL and RLEF come up with on a regular basis. The bloke just sits in the back seat at the RLIF and bitches about things under his breath and undermines his fellow members, but when given the chance to run things at a domestic level in his own country and he runs a basket case administration that constantly causes the whole sport major embarrassment.

 

[Mike_Jets]

Sad day for Welsh League but a good day for heartland teams - Superleague will be stronger for it. We need someone with real cash to boost the game and then expansion can happen.
If we can get two or three tiers in Europe allowing heartland teams derbys and income along with a few expansion type teams then the game can grow, but I still think it was time to expand to 16 teams...

 

[madunit]

Perfect reason why relegation and promotion should never have been scrapped

 

[bartman]

Relegation? We should send a delegation over there, to discuss promotion and relegation...

 

[madunit]

oops lol

 

[Mike_Jets]

I dont think promotion/relegation would help stability - three tiers of 14 for me with eventual promotion to 16 then 18.
10 English teams in each of lower leagues with 2 French, 1 Welsh and 1 Scottish.

 

[Evil Homer]

Perfect reason why relegation and promotion should never have been scrapped

Absolute BS, scrapping promotion and relegation was the best possible thing that could have happened for the game. Don't comment if you don't know what you're talking about.

 

[madunit]

everyone's entitled to an opinion, so I'll comment where I see fit.

And many people, and players in Superleague have the same opinion as me.

 

[Evil Homer]

everyone's entitled to an opinion, so I'll comment where I see fit.

And many people, and players in Superleague have the same opinion as me.

Everyone is entitled to an opinion, but what exactly is yours based on? I can't recall a single player ever supporting the automatic P&R system, and they would have to be completely stupid to do so because it means massively reduced job security with literally zero benefit for them. The only people who support that system are the inbred fans of village clubs like Leigh because they know that their clubs probably won't ever be big enough to warrant a place in Super League on merit. No offence but I think you have absolutely NFI what you're talking about, and it's obvious that you haven't put any thought whatsoever into what you are saying.

 

[madunit]

You're insinuating that there was no job stability under P&R

Where exactly is the job security for the Crusaders players?

 

[Evil Homer]

You're insinuating that there was no job stability under P&R

Where exactly is the job security for the Crusaders players?

The failure of Crusaders is because the owners of the club are absolute f**king crooks. They also own Wrexham FC, a soccer club with 140 years history that has previously played in the UEFA Cup, and the likelihood is that the same thing will happen to them in the coming weeks, in fact the Wrexham fans have already formed a Supporters Trust to try and save the club should the owners decide to pull the plug on them as well. I don't see how you can equate any of this with the RFL or the licencing process in any way, like I said it's pretty clear that you haven't thought through what you are posting at all.

 

[madunit]

If there was no job security under the R&P system and its clear that job security can't even be confirmed under the current system, then it's pretty fair to say neither system is perfect, thus they are both flawed.

A better system needs to be devised ensuring the security of clubs competing in the Superleague. I personally believe the current system is not much better at all from the R&P systems.

but then again i have No f**king idea and as such I am not allowed ot make a comment, so I'll leave you with your little thread.

 

[Evil Homer]

If there was no job security under the R&P system and its clear that job security can't even be confirmed under the current system, then it's pretty fair to say neither system is perfect, thus they are both flawed.

A better system needs to be devised ensuring the security of clubs competing in the Superleague. I personally believe the current system is not much better at all from the R&P systems.

but then again i have No f**king idea and as such I am not allowed ot make a comment, so I'll leave you with your little thread.

How can you possibly say that though? Crusaders' players lost their jobs because the club was being run by crooks and thus went belly-up. That's totally different from players and staff being at risk of losing their jobs every season if their club happens to underperform and finish bottom of the league. If there was a system of P&R still in place, Catalans would no longer be in Super League and would probably have now gone bust, and in their place we would have Halifax, a team that when they last played in Super League lost 27 of 28 games and had the points from the one win that they did record deducted for a salary cap breach. It doesn't take a genuis or even a semi-intelligent person to see why automatic P&R was such a completely and utterly stupid system. Job security is just one aspect of it. Of course you have a right to comment, if you had posted that Crusaders should never have been allowed in Super League in the first place then I could have understood where you were coming from, but instead it seemed like you just posted something that you'd read from another forum without thinking it through at all.

 

[Mike_Jets]

Catalans and Crusaders would have been given a no relegation clause ie like Toulouse and South Wales are.
Yes the current situation is because of the owners but also a larger problem of the team not really being ready in various aspects.
A North Wales team being in Championship with 10 English teams and Toulouse and Edinburgh would be my preference for next year - in 3 or 4 years they may be ready to return and be replaced in the Champ by South Wales and in turn Valley replacing them in C1 - or maybe Toulouse being promoted and Lezignan (who would be in C1) being promoted and Limoux moving up from French league, or even Barrow/Halifax coming up!?

Widnes in Superleague and Welsh players being paid and playing at the top end of a league or in better teams is actually going to be better for International RL imho.

 

[Evil Homer]

Toulouse will not be in the Championship next season, and hopefully no French teams will ever be in the semi-professional Championship again. Edinburgh is nowhere near ready for a semi-pro team.

 

[bender]

Toulouse will not be in the Championship next season, and hopefully no French teams will ever be in the semi-professional Championship again. Edinburgh is nowhere near ready for a semi-pro team.

Is that confirmed, or just a rumour?