It’s about time both the Super league and RFL got their act together and sorted this out once and for all.
Whilst I am what most people would call a ‘flat capper’ I didn’t want foreign teams in the RFL, the league has two major problems with TWP and Catalans Dragons.
My take is as the RFL/SL accepted them happily in the good times, there should be no talk of either not been supported, the Cats should be able to play in France in front of 5,000 supporters as is their right and any team refusing to travel to play them should be expelled from the league, as the other 11 teams have a duty to travel to France the Cats home ground, to fulfil their fixture and there is no possible excuse not to do so. Whilst I don’t particularly like Bernard Guasch his comments on this are correct.
If the RFL has done it’s homework they will have known about the UK visa issue with Torontos Australasian overseas players and possible Canadian Visa issues with UK players in a state of emergency.
As again they accepted TWP into the league so it is up to the RFL and SL to come up with a solution satisfactory to the TWP.
Even if that means suspending relegation for 2020 for a TWP and allowing them to opt out of the rest of 2020. They should also supply the money to offset the TWP losses due to no RL in Canada 2020.
If they want to be ‘left field’ they could exempt TWP, re-set the points to zero and play a season with 11 teams with a top four play off and the bottom two teams relegated to allow the fast tracking of Toulouse and Ottawa to create two ‘offshore’ derbies in countries ear marked for expansion and continue the RFL’s expansion into overseas markets to stop the decline the game has seen in the last 10/15 years.
This would make for compulsive TV watching for the fans and SKY.
Whilst I would still prefer to watch the RL with UK teams I believe that we must ‘grasp’ the future the game has chosen and support the TWP in any way we can.
The RFL have ‘made our bed‘ now is the time to ‘lie in it’ for what they are convinced is for the good of the game.’