Re: Toronto Wolfpack may pull out of Superleague : Thu Jul 23, 2020 7:15 am  

wrencat1873 wrote:

There seems to be a contradiction here.
They agreed not to take any sky funding because they (wrongly) thought they would do better by securing their own N. American deal.
Nothing to do with being a "guest" club.

Catalan, the other "guest" club, still seem to be taking a slice of the pie.
Although their TV deal was scuppered by Elstone asking for "more" so, not really their fault ??

The whole 'guest' club premise exists only in Donnymans head, I am sure Toronto thought 'hang on, if we take central funding, we will have to share our shiny TV deal', now they haven't got one, they are saying (rightly in my opinion) 'if we're being televised by Aky, we want a slice'.... which is why I think SL will keep them in, save the £500,000 parachute from no relegation, have a stronger product to sell to Sky ... Toronto is way more of a selling point than Featherstone.

Re: Toronto Wolfpack may pull out of Superleague : Thu Jul 23, 2020 7:35 am  

wrencat1873 wrote:

They agreed not to take any sky funding because they (wrongly) thought they would do better by securing their own N. American deal.
Nothing to do with being a "guest" club.Catalan, the other "guest" club, still seem to be taking a slice of the pie.
Although their TV deal was scuppered by Elstone asking for "more" so, not really their fault ??

When TWP came into the league they were flagged in by Nigel Wood. IIRC Nigel Wood never asked Superleague if they were OK with this, and I certainly don't recall them taking any SKY funding as all of that was fully allocated. I have the allocations which Martyn Sadler set out.

Of course Catalans got a slice of the pie, they were invited straight into Superleague when Richard Lewis wanted them to underpin the French national team. They were "wanted" and Superleague conceded International Rugby League was more important than Superleague. So SL & RFL conceded TV money to them.

"Guest clubs" differ wildly, one was asked to join the party because it was thought they would re-kindle GB.v.France Internationals like the day in 1990 when the French came to Headingley and beat Great Britain

The other "guest club" were only guests of the Championship, and Supeleague were not even asked if they wanted them. Superleague bosses made it clear in articles by Pearson and McManus they did not want them but they struck a deal when the RFL conceded the end of the middle eights and the MPG in return for TWP being allowed to go up within the current SKY contract. But NO Sky money.....Again Perez had conceded this and said once he got an NATV mega deal TWP would keep that and not share it here.

Elstone of course tried to get a better French TV deal but the idea he scuppered it by "asking for more" is like something out of Charles Dickens novel. Everyone asks for more in contract talks. That the deal got pulled is because the TV company didn't even want to carry on the existing deal.

No need for this "Robert Elstone ate my Hamster" stuff.

Bottom line - Catalans don't develop players and don't bring in any TV money. Sounds like a club we know don't they?? Catalans do spend all their money on a Marquee player instead. Sounds like a club we know don't they? The danger is Catalans go 2022. Gausch hasn't been seen at any SL meetings this year so go figure...

Re: Toronto Wolfpack may pull out of Superleague : Thu Jul 23, 2020 8:04 am  

ColD wrote:

So do Catalans not get any money either - pretty sure they’re not English

Yes Sir they of course get the money. They were fully accepted by Superleague and the RFL in 2006 and charged with the role of underpinning the French national team as above. TWP were only accepted by the RFL NOT SL and all TV funds were allocated anyway. Perez was told this and in his inimitable style he boasted that if that was the case then TWP would keep the North American TV deal he had bubbling up

So Superleague kept the money that London no longer got. That's the problem with this so called "expansion" the rise of every overseas club is the fall of an English club. The loss of English SL clubs depletes player development and makes future TV deal not just less likely but likely to be pulled as McManus warned in the autumn. You can only sell SKY subs to the English. Kick out their teams and subs go down in their thousands.

For years now forums have largely ignored they day when all these marvellous and highly attractive "expansion" clubs like Cats, TO, TWP, Ottawa and NY (big announcement today) elbow out London, Wakey, Cas, Fartown and HKR (i.e. rubbish clubs) and bring us a bright new future........

(but lose us the SKY deal)

Substitution is not "Expansion"

Re: Toronto Wolfpack may pull out of Superleague : Thu Jul 23, 2020 8:23 am  

Curious to see the outcome of the decision today. SL clubs might not like Toronto but kicking them out essentially will cost each of them about £200k in funding, assuming they are replaced with a side that will demand the same central funding distribution as the other 11 SL clubs.
Do they all hate Toronto enough to give up £200k?

Re: Toronto Wolfpack may pull out of Superleague : Thu Jul 23, 2020 8:26 am  

Nothus wrote:

Curious to see the outcome of the decision today. SL clubs might not like Toronto but kicking them out essentially will cost each of them about £200k in funding, assuming they are replaced with a side that will demand the same central funding distribution as the other 11 SL clubs.
Do they all hate Toronto enough to give up £200k?

Ah! But will they be replaced?

Re: Toronto Wolfpack may pull out of Superleague : Thu Jul 23, 2020 8:36 am  

Cokey wrote:

Ah! But will they be replaced?

Can't see them playing the whole of the 2021 season with an odd number of teams. It would be farcical and would also cause chaos for their prized magic weekend.

Re: Toronto Wolfpack may pull out of Superleague : Thu Jul 23, 2020 8:53 am  

Nothus wrote:

Can't see them playing the whole of the 2021 season with an odd number of teams. It would be farcical and would also cause chaos for their prized magic weekend.

Aussies have done it before they had no problem so why can we not do it the players might find it a lot better health wise

Re: Toronto Wolfpack may pull out of Superleague : Thu Jul 23, 2020 9:02 am  

Nothus wrote:

Curious to see the outcome of the decision today. SL clubs might not like Toronto but kicking them out essentially will cost each of them about £200k in funding, assuming they are replaced with a side that will demand the same central funding distribution as the other 11 SL clubs.
Do they all hate Toronto enough to give up £200k?

Yes they all hate Toronto ipso facto Ottawa and New York as well.

Good post by Mr. Someday as regards running with 11 clubs, also good to hear some Championship clubs happy to take their place........

Re: Toronto Wolfpack may pull out of Superleague : Thu Jul 23, 2020 10:48 am  

Someday wrote:

Aussies have done it before they had no problem so why can we not do it the players might find it a lot better health wise

Correct, they did. And it could definitely be done here, but the NRL don't have a showcase round of fixtures like we do and I'm fairly sure it would cause issues with the Sky contract if there weren't the same number of teams in the division.

Re: Toronto Wolfpack may pull out of Superleague : Thu Jul 23, 2020 11:12 am  

Still no pay for the players. Why is this? Assured Monday or Tuesday.