Having New York in Super League will be a huge boost for the game, especially if they can attract 7-10,000 fans in the first couple of years. If that happens I would foresee 20,000 New York fans within five years and a boom in the game.
Having Toronto already there will be a great help for New York. Should Montreal and perhaps Boston follow by 2023 then we will have the geographic foundation for a great and highly successful World Cup in 2025. The fans will also stream in to the club games, especially the local derbies, and the visit of prestige foreign teams like Leeds and Toulouse.
Eric Perez has turned out to be a godsend for rugby league.
New York have said they are keen to talk to Jarryd Hayne. Mick Potter, who has been touted as their likely first coach, is currently coaching Hayne in the Fiji side. Hayne still has a high profile in the US and would be a great drawcard in their first year.
First high profile player to make the RL > NFL switch, so makes sense to get him playing RL in the USA if they can.
Could be a huge pool of talent out there too - think of the American Football players that don't make to the NFL!
All those high school kids and college kids that play the game across the country, but only 240 odd get selected to play in the NFL each year, and not all of those actually end up on a team - so RL could be the perfect place for them to move into. They won't obviously get the financial benefits that the NFL offers, but if it's the physical/skill side of the game they are interested in, they have some amazing athletes that could fit right in to most positions on an RL field.
In that way, I'm surprised RL has never really hit American shores until now...
The right decision to start them in the Championship, as many of us said should happen with Toronto. However with Super League 2020 likely to contain Toronto, New York, Catalans and Toulouse for me promotion and relegation has to end.
Other than Paris which expansion clubs have come and gone?
New York have said they are keen to talk to Jarryd Hayne. Mick Potter, who has been touted as their likely first coach, is currently coaching Hayne in the Fiji side. Hayne still has a high profile in the US and would be a great drawcard in their first year.
Hayne has a high profile in the US?? I seriously doubt that.
Hayne was a national news story in the US. Football fans remember him, and those are the people who might take an interest in League. No other League player has that going for them. NFL fans in America know names and stats like cricket fans in India - they know every player.
Gateshead is a different case, the why's and wherefores of what happened and why they went to Hull is in my opinion completely different to them failing (it was more about the money the rfl were offering).
Celtic Crusaders you could argue sort of wored with there now being to teams.
If New York work than fantastic, but like I said it has to work in terms of forwarding the league over there.
Which raises the question, what do we expect/want from expansion teams? Big crowds? Money? Or establishing the sport in areas. Getting kids etc into the sport. If it the last one, you could say London have been a success.
To be fair, maybe Heartland clubs shouldn't be threatened by this. Because if they are struggling they could always take an expansion clubs assets, players, coaching staff and relocate them to the city/town they currently play, rename them after their own name and pretend it never happened.
To be fair, maybe Heartland clubs shouldn't be threatened by this. Because if they are struggling they could always take an expansion clubs assets, players, coaching staff and relocate them to the city/town they currently play, rename them after their own name and pretend it never happened.
what an absolutely dreadfully negative and pretty staggeringly uneducated piece of Aussie garbage....
they seem to think if the New York Red bulls ( this is a football club i believe) can only pull 20 odd thousand what makes a RL team think they can get half that in its first year ???
not once do they reference the Toronto wolfpack and the fact that in a third tier league in the worst stadium I've seen since owlerton stadium they managed to pull almost half the crowd of the hugely successful Toronto FC soccer club.
in true Aussie style they also fail to note that the Yanks have a general disdain for football almost as much as league fans have for union....
For the Aussies to have a pop at a club not yet formed they would do well to look at their own back yard and see how many empty seats they currently show to the world every weekend.
try and get Perth or even Adeladie in the NRL before you have a pop at New York....
Its getting up the nose of the Aussie press so it has to be a good thing....
what an absolutely dreadfully negative and pretty staggeringly uneducated piece of Aussie garbage....
they seem to think if the New York Red bulls ( this is a football club i believe) can only pull 20 odd thousand what makes a RL team think they can get half that in its first year ???
not once do they reference the Toronto wolfpack and the fact that in a third tier league in the worst stadium I've seen since owlerton stadium they managed to pull almost half the crowd of the hugely successful Toronto FC soccer club.
in true Aussie style they also fail to note that the Yanks have a general disdain for football almost as much as league fans have for union....
For the Aussies to have a pop at a club not yet formed they would do well to look at their own back yard and see how many empty seats they currently show to the world every weekend.
try and get Perth or even Adeladie in the NRL before you have a pop at New York....
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