Re: Jon Wilkin agrees with what I have been saying for years : Tue Nov 24, 2020 8:47 pm  

Saddened wrote
There is always a place for Leigh, Wakefield, Salford, Fetherstone etc, but it's not in the top division of a professional competition.

The sports needs an elite competition filled with city based sides that can attract investment. The sport is good enough and appealing enough, but it hasn't got any forward thinkers. Elstone is the worst thing to ever happen to the sport, he is going to destroy it.

He doesn’t know that Wakefield is a City, and that Castleford is a town. He needs to attend school lessons in geography.

Re: Jon Wilkin agrees with what I have been saying for years : Tue Nov 24, 2020 8:49 pm  

Wilkin fulfilled his live ambition. Playing for Toronto. Now he thinks he has the answer as they did.
Been with Nobby too long.

Re: Jon Wilkin agrees with what I have been saying for years : Tue Nov 24, 2020 10:32 pm  

Dunkirk Spirit wrote:

Saddened wrote
There is always a place for Leigh, Wakefield, Salford, Fetherstone etc, but it's not in the top division of a professional competition.

The sports needs an elite competition filled with city based sides that can attract investment. The sport is good enough and appealing enough, but it hasn't got any forward thinkers. Elstone is the worst thing to ever happen to the sport, he is going to destroy it.

He doesn’t know that Wakefield is a City, and that Castleford is a town. He needs to attend school lessons in geography.

And ironically Wigan and St Helens happen to be towns.

Re: Jon Wilkin agrees with what I have been saying for years : Tue Nov 24, 2020 10:32 pm  

Saddened! wrote:

Wilkin is 100% correct. Like it or not Rugby League is dying in this country. It will be semi-professional by the end of the new TV deal and some of the clubs involved won't exist at that point. Covid will if anything accelerate that and we'll see clubs pulling out of the Championship and lower next season, if not Super League.

That will be fine to a lot of supporters, they won't care how low the bar goes, as long as their club isn't one of the ones that go.

The sport simply has to grow and attract investment if it is to survive as a professional sport. The salary cap and ridiculous system for entry into the sport is a huge barrier to that. They should be open to any investment at the moment. Toronto should be in, the fact finding dossier about them is clearly fraudulent. York, London, Toulouse, New York should be in and Ottawa should be in once they get going. Daft? Ridiculous? It's not, it's where the money is. There is always a place for Leigh, Wakefield, Salford, Fetherstone etc, but it's not in the top division of a professional competition.

The sports needs an elite competition filled with city based sides that can attract investment. The sport is good enough and appealing enough, but it hasn't got any forward thinkers. Elstone is the worst thing to ever happen to the sport, he is going to destroy it.

The sport had a massive opportunity with the inception of Super League and the idea at that point was good. The cap was meant to increase year on year, minimum stadium requirements were meant to be followed through and licences given out to the best applicants. Yet here we are in 2020 with Cas and Wakefield playing from absolute dumps voting clubs out to get a slightly higher split of the reducing TV money. The same clubs who voted out Toronto were also against reserve grades and academies. There's no surprise Saints, Wigan and Leeds dominate the trophies, it's because they are the only clubs who always invested in their academy setups.

Get back under your bridge.

Re: Jon Wilkin agrees with what I have been saying for years : Tue Nov 24, 2020 10:35 pm  

Who actually gives a 4ck what that clown Wilkin says,just unfortunate that SKY and the SL show give these cranks air time!

Re: Jon Wilkin agrees with what I have been saying for years : Tue Nov 24, 2020 11:16 pm  

Bartholemew Smythe wrote:

Who actually gives a 4ck what that clown Wilkin says,just unfortunate that SKY and the SL show give these cranks air time!

I know, they forgot to invite Garry Schofield on to last week's programme.

Re: Jon Wilkin agrees with what I have been saying for years : Wed Nov 25, 2020 12:24 am  

Dunkirk Spirit wrote:

He doesn’t know that Wakefield is a City, and that Castleford is a town. He needs to attend school lessons in geography.

Not only is Wakefield a city, it now seems their own semi-rich owner has finally got the Yorkcourt and Newmarket companies to tip up after they reneged on the ground at Newmarket.

So a city club in which there is no soccer club to rival them, and no longer any RU club to rival them either, playing out of a much improved facility may well be looking at better and more competitive times..........What's not to like

But I suppose Wilkin thinks Ottawa is the future

Mr. Sadler won't let it go either, declaring yesterday that the new trade deal between Canada and Great Britain means that TWP's return should have been a no brainer.

I don't see how removing Tariffs from Snake Oil is gonna ignite Rugby league in Canada

Re: Jon Wilkin agrees with what I have been saying for years : Wed Nov 25, 2020 12:41 am  

Saddened! wrote:

Wilkin is 100% correct. Like it or not Rugby League is dying in this country.

Mate, it's apparently been "Dying" for 124 years

What really died was Canadian Rugby League, killed stone dead by the very man who revived it.

That man was not Perez, he failed to resurrect the twice dead Canada RL, the corpse of which he dug up in 2010 and ran to little effect before he ran into Argyle.

Those who insist the Canadian dream was becoming a reality tend to be people who invested far too much of themselves into that dream.

So much so they cannot bring themselves to admit they were so very very wrong..........

Re: Jon Wilkin agrees with what I have been saying for years : Wed Nov 25, 2020 1:10 am  

Maybe someone might realise that the infatuation with expansion is damaging the sport ?

RL needs consolidating, not expanding. All i saw last year was Toronto every week getting thumped because Sky are infatuated in global expansion of RL. Even without the pandemic, Super League last year was a complete turn off ! Boring ! All Toronto were were 17 Journeymen from the same pot on highly inflated wages because their primary clubs (SL or Championship), wouldn't pay them. Toronto was never going to work, and lets be frank, we should be glad that Catalans are steeped in History, otherwise they wouldn't work either. Catalans were never a risk in my opinion.

The percentage of expansion success in Rugby League is absolutely minimal. The lower leagues take a bow, because they are not chasing the holy grail or pricing themselves out to achieve SL status in an lightening fast time. Nothing has changed since Fulham in 1980. Promoted straight away, 10000 plus crowds, and a few years later, playing at Chiswick Polytechnic in front of 400. Same with PSG, same with Gateshead. Do I need to go on?

Now York is to some an expansion place for RL according to some and John Wilkin. What a load of tosh. Would be interesting to see what Nick Pinkney and Graham Steadman think of these announcements, but people on here are deluded. York is a lovely City, but expansion for RL? Give me a break !

SL is desperate and probably realise now that the root cause of all this is expansion. The golden ticket for Toronto has put them in this place and they now need a goat to sacrifice in 2021 as a result.

As for John Wilkin, he has had his fill, and he has had his final pay cheque. A good one too and he has contributed to Torontos demise. Super League in my opinion need away fans more than ever before. That extra 30k per visiting team means absolutely everything in todays commercial environment. Its probably the reason why the SL are having suicidal tenancies of inviting Bradford into the mix because its a big City. Big City or not, a season full of whallopings is not going to do them or SL any good so Bradford will be another Fulham in 1980. Odsal will be a ghost Town after 6 games or so, but I see where they are coming from with this, which tells me that they don't fancy Toulouse either.

Re: Jon Wilkin agrees with what I have been saying for years : Wed Nov 25, 2020 1:15 am  

John Wilkin, having a sly pop at clubs like Leigh, this despite him & St Helens having their collective ass handed to them at the LSV where ironically, Leigh *who according to Wilkin bring nothing to Super League* made John Wilkin look like a rabbit caught in the headlights !

I will take your opinion with a large dose of salt Mr Wilkin.

*Edit * This was in front of over 9 000 at Leigh LSV, the same LSV that has hosted RL internationals & multi Grammy winning, worldwide platinum selling artists *oh & they all paid to be there too* !!!