Talk of the NRL expanding by a club or two in the near future. Perth & Christchurch mentioned, so there is that. Let's hope so.

I've always wondered why they don't expand to Hobart in Tasmania

We should expand to Tasmania given that many of our countrymen resided there in the penal colony.

New sides mean more of our young players being targetted

Interesting note from the head of RL commercial that there are apparently 20 marquee players in SL. Seems very high to me - wouldn't have thought many clubs could afford them.

I’m not surprised, if you have a federation trained player on more than 100k (which every team will have bar maybe London) you might aswell set them as marquee to save £50k on the cap.

Made no sense when the likes of Saints claimed to not have marquee players, just gets you more value out of the cap.

Exactly
And even if the club doesn't spend up to the cap you would still claim it for the 1/2/3 players that eat up most of your cap whether they choose to use that Space or not

Surely this is against the spirit of the game (heard that somewhere else)

Well, there's that, but also, they are Aussies, after all. Australia is home, with friends and family. Can't blame them for getting homesick in time. As posters have said, neither owe us anything, considering their achievements at Wigan. I think French's departure from Parra was not the happiest, and quite simply, he is a much better player now that the one who first arrived in England. And he wasn't too shabby then!

Andrew Johns and Brad Fittler were both calling for Field and French to get NRL gigs next year hopefully we can stagger their departures so we dont lose both at once if they do go home

Looks like the most likely scenario currently is French leaves at the end of this year and Field at the end of next. Both will have done around 5 years at Wigan in their prime - we can have no complaints.

If this is the last year they play together at Wigan then hopefully they both stay fit and the fans enjoy it as much as possible.

From what I’ve been told from someone I know at Wigan is that French is as good as gone but there is zero interest in field from the nrl