New European cup. (Or whatever it's called) Qualification agreed? Part 2

First topic message reminder :

A continuation of the previous thread. For everyone with more to say.

Its true.

just look at italy,spain and germany - they may not quite have the same influx of foreign players - but they have taken international football to another level due to mixing with the south americans, dutch etc.

but then understand that the dutch, belgium, swiss and south american teams are also getting better as a result of playing in those leagues.

so no it doesn't mean the end of irish and scottish rugby.

Infact quite the opposite..

Scotland have been killed by the rabbo tbh.. If more of there players played in France or England or even just other rabbo teams they would have a much bigger talent pool to choose from that play at a high level

Sin é wrote:He wouldn't have to abuse it. Declining to even tender for the PRO12 would make anyone suspicious of BT and their modus operandi and whether you would trust them enough to work with them.

So because, at the moment, BT have no interest in broadcasting the Pro12 it should make people suspicious? I don't follow that logic either.

Are you saying they should have lead Celic Rugby around, pretending to be interested, when in fact they wanted the English (and French) club games? That would be better?

And yes, I'm Sky are very good at sucking up to the union bosses. Same as drug companies flying doctors to spa/golf resorts to promote their products. They know the game and they play it very well.

andyi, yes I remember you sying before. Is it moe like 20 pro English clubs? Plus the 20-odd French ones makes it >40. Then the Pro12, >50 and then the Georgian and Russia teams >70.

Its time for a pan european league IMO

70 teams in 4 divisions..

yes that will cost a lot of money in travel etc- but we need to filter that money down from the top..sky or bt would go into a bidding war to get tv rights for the top divison or two. then have an FA cup styled comp. Everyone has a shot- but the better teams play at a later point

HammerofThunor wrote:andyi, yes I remember you sying before. Is it moe like 20 pro English clubs? Plus the 20-odd French ones makes it >40. Then the Pro12, >50 and then the Georgian and Russia teams >70.

I'm not sure how "professional" the teams in Georgia and Russia are TBH. I wouldn't be surprised if some of them are actually semi-pro given the levels of crowds and money involved in those leagues!

As for the championship in England your probably close with that number.

Dual registration of AP youngsters help most clubs fill out their playing squads and I'm sure some of the Semi-pro teams may also have a few full time pros.

But I can't see how clubs like Ealing and Moseley could possibly have 35-40 full time players.

Rugby Union is the national sport in Georgia, the national team often get 50,000+ for their games, the only thing wrong with the country is the polotics are a mess and most of it is run by the mafia, but that is for another article.

mystiroakey wrote:Its true.

just look at italy,spain and germany - they may not quite have the same influx of foreign players - but they have taken international football to another level due to mixing with the south americans, dutch etc.

but then understand that the dutch, belgium, swiss and south american teams are also getting better as a result of playing in those leagues.

so no it doesn't mean the end of irish and scottish rugby.

Infact quite the opposite..

Scotland have been killed by the rabbo tbh.. If more of there players played in France or England or even just other rabbo teams they would have a much bigger talent pool to choose from that play at a high level

Oh how I love your shared wisdom, strokey - pls be so kind as to explain your statement tho?

andyi wrote:

Sin é wrote:Andy, I'm not making the claims about which is bigger, its the person who wrote the report of the workshop that Feehan gave.

However, in France it is evident that the Club game is overshadowing the international game because there is so much more money in the club game. Toulouse are playing their French international players in club games even though they agreed to rest them in their most recent League agreement with the FFR.

What will happen in France (and maybe England) is that like soccer in England, it will be full of non-English internationals playing in its league and that will have a detrimental effect on the national team.

The England national team were failing for decades before the increase of foreigners into the premier league. Its an old excuse!!! As i said stick to rugby.

The English clubs haven't had the money to import anyone up to now, though it is noticeable that Saracens seems to be buying up most of the best available talent and the rest can't compete. Wait until they get some money in from their big TV deal.

my wisdom is my wisdom. its may not be shared but it is explained.

if you would like to elaborate or refute the concise statement then feel free.

LordDowlais wrote:Rugby Union is the national sport in Wales, the national team often get 50,000+ for their games, the only thing wrong with the country is the polotics are a mess and most of it is run by the mafia, but that is for another article.

Fixed.

LordDowlais wrote:Rugby Union is the national sport in Georgia, the national team often get 50,000+ for their games, the only thing wrong with the country is the polotics are a mess and most of it is run by the mafia, but that is for another article.

Ive seen that quoted often but a search of you tube for their home games brings up games with lots of empty seats, especially the suppossed mamoth crowds against Russia.

I know they got a big crowd against Samoa recently and have in the past have some decent crowds but i'd take the  "50K often" quote with a pinch of salt!

Example:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=UQgNWi-NsNk

Cardiff Dave wrote:

LordDowlais wrote:Rugby Union is the national sport in Wales, the national team often get 50,000+ for their games, the only thing wrong with the country is the polotics are a mess and most of it is run by the mafia, but that is for another article.

Fixed.

Absolutely Brilliant and perfectly true.

HammerofThunor wrote:

Sin é wrote:He wouldn't have to abuse it. Declining to even tender for the PRO12 would make anyone suspicious of BT and their modus operandi and whether you would trust them enough to work with them.

So because, at the moment, BT have no interest in broadcasting the Pro12 it should make people suspicious? I don't follow that logic either.

Are you saying they should have lead Celic Rugby around, pretending to be interested, when in fact they wanted the English (and French) club games? That would be better?

And yes, I'm Sky are very good at sucking up to the union bosses. Same as drug companies flying doctors to spa/golf resorts to promote their products. They know the game and they play it very well.

The collapse of the Pro12 would have suited BT's ambitions for the Rugby Champions Cup and in line with their strategy to 'own rugby'.

Why on Earth would having a third of the teams being in a failing league be good for the broadcasters? That makes no sense (unless you're a believer in some of the crazier conspirancy theories).

And they don't want to own rugby (that's just an out of context quote that is thrown around). The were taking about the TV rights and specifically the English club game.

LordDowlais wrote:Rugby Union is the national sport in Georgia, the national team often get 50,000+ for their games, the only thing wrong with the country is the polotics are a mess and most of it is run by the mafia, but that is for another article.

Lilo is the Georgian nation game, tradiaitional, and football is the most popular game .  They also have 6,500 players in Georgia (that's all players, according the new snazzy IRB wall chart). Out of a population of 5,000,000

EDIT: And how often is often?

andyi wrote:

LordDowlais wrote:Rugby Union is the national sport in Georgia, the national team often get 50,000+ for their games, the only thing wrong with the country is the polotics are a mess and most of it is run by the mafia, but that is for another article.

Ive seen that quoted often but a search of you tube for their home games brings up games with lots of empty seats, especially the suppossed mamoth crowds against Russia.

I know they got a big crowd against Samoa recently and have in the past have some decent crowds but i'd take the  "50K often" quote with a pinch of salt!

Example:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=UQgNWi-NsNk

Well,well,well, all it takes is a little bit of research, check the attendences on this link, I think this might surprise some of you:-

http://stats.espnscrum.com/scrum/rugby/records/team/highest_attendance.html?id=81;type=team

So in terms of my last question it's twice with an attendance 50k and over? And they were all in 2002?

The highest attendance in the last couple of years (two year ENC cycle) is 15000.

HammerofThunor wrote:Why on Earth would having a third of the teams being in a failing league be good for the broadcasters? That makes no sense (unless you're a believer in some of the crazier conspirancy theories).

And they don't want to own rugby (that's just an out of context quote that is thrown around).  The were taking about the TV rights and specifically the English club game.

They wanted to break up the Celtic/Italian Union alliance in the Pro12 which were the main obstacles to the BT Cup competition. They wet hoping that the Irish & Welsh (they didn't care about the rest) would come crawling on their knees to play in their competition.

Why would anyone want to 'own' even English rugby. That comment put the wind up the Unions - it just shows that BT are not really very smart at all.

They had 35000 in 2010 against the USA. I bet the home nations would struggle to get that much against them.

Sin é wrote:

HammerofThunor wrote:Why on Earth would having a third of the teams being in a failing league be good for the broadcasters? That makes no sense (unless you're a believer in some of the crazier conspirancy theories).

And they don't want to own rugby (that's just an out of context quote that is thrown around).  The were taking about the TV rights and specifically the English club game.

They wanted to break up the Celtic/Italian Union alliance in the Pro12 which were the main obstacles to the BT Cup competition. They wet hoping that the Irish & Welsh (they didn't care about the rest) would come crawling on their knees to play in their competition.

Why would anyone want to 'own' even English rugby. That comment put the wind up the Unions - it just shows that BT are not really very smart at all.

Again, it's 'own' the English club rugby TV rights. And the reason would be so that people who want to watch English club rugby have to subscriber to BT Sports (or get BT broadband and get BT Sports FREE). I thought that was obvious.

I'm sorry, but when were they trying to break up the Celtic/Italian alliance of the PRO12? Was this before they knew about the Sky deal or after? And was it before or after they back away and said they didn't want to cause problems (something sevel posters jumped on cackling that BT were abandoning the PRL)? Time to put the tin-foil hat on again before the PRL mind control wray kicks in again.

LordDowlais wrote:They had 35000 in 2010 against the USA. I bet the home nations would struggle to get that much against them.

Yes they did. 3 years ago. And maths isn't my strong point but I'm pretty sure 35,000 < 50,000. Are you going to back down from your "often get more than 50,000" statement?

As for the home nations, difficult to say, we usually played them out there during the summer with the Churchill Cup but we sold out against Fiji the year before last.

So the claim that they often get over 50K is b*ll*x!

And the last 3 games were:

01/02/14 Georgia 35 Belgium 0 crowd  ??    played at Arcvala Stadium (capacity 2000)
16/11/13 Georgia 16 Samoa 15  crowd 18,000 played at Lokamotiv Stadium (capacity 25000)
16/11/13 Georgia 23 USA 25    crowd  ??    played at Rustavi Stadium (capacity 10720)

There is massive potential in Georgia, crowd sizes since the turn of the millenium proves this, if we do not tap into it and help it grow, it could become another country lost to the game, just as Romania were lost during the 90's, we cannot afford to keep ignoring the potential these countries have, they must have some sort of European competition for their clubs sides, albeit a second or third tier comp or have their clubs put into the Amlin, whatever, but something needs to be done.

HammerofThunor wrote:

Sin é wrote:

HammerofThunor wrote:Why on Earth would having a third of the teams being in a failing league be good for the broadcasters? That makes no sense (unless you're a believer in some of the crazier conspirancy theories).

And they don't want to own rugby (that's just an out of context quote that is thrown around).  The were taking about the TV rights and specifically the English club game.

They wanted to break up the Celtic/Italian Union alliance in the Pro12 which were the main obstacles to the BT Cup competition. They wet hoping that the Irish & Welsh (they didn't care about the rest) would come crawling on their knees to play in their competition.

Why would anyone want to 'own' even English rugby. That comment put the wind up the Unions - it just shows that BT are not really very smart at all.

Again, it's 'own' the English club rugby TV rights. And the reason would be so that people who want to watch English club rugby have to subscriber to BT Sports (or get BT broadband and get BT Sports FREE). I thought that was obvious.

I'm sorry, but when were they trying to break up the Celtic/Italian alliance of the PRO12? Was this before they knew about the Sky deal or after? And was it before or after they back away and said they didn't want to cause problems (something sevel posters jumped on cackling that BT were abandoning the PRL)? Time to put the tin-foil hat on again before the PRL mind control wray kicks in again.

Hammer, BT must have known that their deal with PRL was going to cause an upset, and yes, if they couldn't get their hands on Europe, then a B&I league would have been in their sights. Also, any weakening of Rabo was to the advantage of PRL. BT were in bed with PRL.

& yet BT are sponsering several RABO teams

broadlandboy wrote:& yet BT are sponsering several RABO teams

And?

LordDowlais wrote:There is massive potential in Georgia, crowd sizes since the turn of the millenium proves this, if we do not tap into it and help it grow, it could become another country lost to the game, just as Romania were lost during the 90's, we cannot afford to keep ignoring the potential these countries have, they must have some sort of European competition for their clubs sides, albeit a second or third tier comp or have their clubs put into the Amlin, whatever, but something needs to be done.

There are some efforts being made - for instance the Tiblisi Cup last June. SA won it.

Ireland sent an 'emerging' Ireland team (mostly young Pro12 players like Jordi Murphy and Ian Keatley) as Ireland was touring Canada & USA. That emerging team beat Georgia 20-15.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2013_IRB_Tbilisi_Cup

The average attendance was 2,000 per match.

TV companies should broadcast sport.  They should bid for coverage of sporting events and cover sporting events they've been contracted to cover.

They should keep themselves out of the organisational aspects of sport.  Broadcasting rights - nothing else - based on rules and calendars given to them by the governing sporting bodies.

That did not occur in this instance.  BT aligned themselves to one sporting body as that sporting body used the leverage of promised Broadcasting money to exert pressure on the structures of the European competition.  BT had an agent at the structural changes table and that is alien to my notion of where broadcasting companies should be.  If they want to own/control a sport completely then create a sport of their own - from scratch.  Do not attempt to hijack a sport...just televise it.

broadlandboy wrote:& yet BT are sponsering several RABO teams

That is to annoy Sky (though in fairness to them, they have had a small sponsorship of Ulster for a couple of years now).

The Scottish teams were the new kids on the block and word had it that they are trying to sponsor the Irish teams, which is a bit odd since BT don't operate in Ireland.

Its amazing how interested they got when they discovered Sky were going to broadcast 30 games in the Pro12.

LordDowlais wrote:There is massive potential in Georgia, crowd sizes since the turn of the millenium proves this, if we do not tap into it and help it grow, it could become another country lost to the game, just as Romania were lost during the 90's, we cannot afford to keep ignoring the potential these countries have, they must have some sort of European competition for their clubs sides, albeit a second or third tier comp or have their clubs put into the Amlin, whatever, but something needs to be done.

Isn't that what the 3rd tier comp proposal put forward by the PRL is?

At present putting these development (or mickey mouse if we being harsh) teams in the Amlin gives us huge thrashings watched by a few hundred folk. That's not going to grow the game.

The Amlin CC at present is dross (and of no interest to TV companies) until the HC rejects come in at the QF stage. It needs a major overhaul to make it a bit more Europa League and Less Inter-toto. Cut it to 20 teams, get rid of the makeweights into a new competitive 3rd tier competition and offer the finalists of the 3rd tier competition a place in it.

I guess the 3rd tier comp would have to precede the new 1st and 2nd tier comp's in order to let teams qualify.

Also I hope they are prepared to fund it. It wont be worth much to TV and Sponsors, so take a cut of the 1st/2nd tier revenue and make sure the travel costs of the 3rd tier teams are met otherwise you will just teams dropping out of it, like the Spanish did in the Amlin.

"16/11/13 Georgia 16 Samoa 15  crowd 18,000 played at Lokamotiv Stadium (capacity 25000)"




"There is massive potential in Georgia,"




yep agreed. good potential there

Sin é wrote:

broadlandboy wrote:& yet BT are sponsering several RABO teams

That is to annoy Sky (though in fairness to them, they have had a small sponsorship of Ulster for a couple of years now).

The Scottish teams were the new kids on the block and word had it that they are trying to sponsor the Irish teams, which is a bit odd since BT don't operate in Ireland.

Its amazing how interested they got when they discovered Sky were going to broadcast 30 games in the Pro12.

Did that happen around the same time BT actually started getting interested in Sports broadcast? But, yes, I'm sure it was all their dastardly plan to kill off the Pro12.  

LordDowlais wrote:There is massive potential in Georgia, crowd sizes since the turn of the millenium proves this, if we do not tap into it and help it grow, it could become another country lost to the game, just as Romania were lost during the 90's, we cannot afford to keep ignoring the potential these countries have, they must have some sort of European competition for their clubs sides, albeit a second or third tier comp or have their clubs put into the Amlin, whatever, but something needs to be done.

So you're not going to admit that you were wrong with the "often more than 50000" comment?

HammerofThunor wrote:

Sin é wrote:

broadlandboy wrote:& yet BT are sponsering several RABO teams

That is to annoy Sky (though in fairness to them, they have had a small sponsorship of Ulster for a couple of years now).

The Scottish teams were the new kids on the block and word had it that they are trying to sponsor the Irish teams, which is a bit odd since BT don't operate in Ireland.

Its amazing how interested they got when they discovered Sky were going to broadcast 30 games in the Pro12.

Did that happen around the same time BT actually started getting interested in Sports broadcast? But, yes, I'm sure it was  all their dastardly plan to kill off the Pro12.  

Did what happen?

Timeline is Sky announced as Pro12 broadcaster in May 2013.
BT Announced sponsorship of Scottish clubs in July 2013.
BT announce it is in 'advanced sponsorship talks with Irish & Welsh clubs' Dec 2013 http://sport.bt.com/rugbyunionhub/rugbyunion/bt-sport-target-rugby-sponsorship-S11363861645784

John Feehan said that BT sport declined to tender for the Pro12. Why the big interest all of a sudden?

Obviously the big loser in all this is the ordinary fan. People will now be faced with two subscriptions to watch the one tournament. The Irish customer will be disproportionately hit, especially in Munster and Leinster (BT already exists as a consumer product in NI, and is fairly common).

The saving grace is that the Irish teams games you'll miss if you can't get or won't pay for BT are in single figures.

Notch bt is in Ireland and is also common.. Its given out free with something bt broadcasts in the whole of UK and ireland

Streams....................................   ............................ of water during the flood, I mean.............................

Who pays for that cheating???

It's a business disaster. A bloomin' loophole in the whole money masterplan!

mystiroakey wrote:Notch bt is in Ireland and is also common.. Its given out free with something bt broadcasts in the whole of UK and ireland

Yeah, but they won't have it free long term.

Nothing is free. First commandment of humanity.

Did what happen?

Timeline is Sky announced as Pro12 broadcaster in May 2013.
BT Announced sponsorship of Scottish clubs in July 2013.
BT announce it is in 'advanced sponsorship talks with Irish & Welsh clubs'  Dec 2013   http://sport.bt.com/rugbyunionhub/rugbyunion/bt-sport-target-rugby-sponsorship-S11363861645784

John Feehan said that BT sport declined to tender for the Pro12. Why the big interest all of a sudden?

Do you realise that if BT weren't interested in televising,t hat doesn't mean they're not interested in sponsorship. You're seeing two things and inventing a causal link based on nothing but temporal proximity. It makes much more sense for BT to sponsor teams in a league they don't televise, especially if those sides play the majority of their games on free-to-air.

I can't even remember how we got not to this. Was it you suggesting BT were trying to destroy the Pro12 by giving them money?

Sin é wrote:

broadlandboy wrote:& yet BT are sponsering several RABO teams

That is to annoy Sky (though in fairness to them, they have had a small sponsorship of Ulster for a couple of years now).

The Scottish teams were the new kids on the block and word had it that they are trying to sponsor the Irish teams, which is a bit odd since BT don't operate in Ireland.

Its amazing how interested they got when they discovered Sky were going to broadcast 30 games in the Pro12.

Why is it amazing? Sky wouldn't let them advertise on their channel so they sponsored the teams instead.

BT don't operate in Ireland, correct. But the irish play in the Rabo which is broadcast to other countries that do have BT. I'm really not getting why you think thats amazing, sounds like like basic business practices to me.

In a statement on Wednesday, Feb 5, ERC explained that the unanimous decision to postpone financial distributions followed preliminary professional advice received by the ERC board and was taken in the best interests of ERC.

Source

Should the ERC not be doing whats best for the clubs and competition, not itself?

HammerofThunor wrote:

Did what happen?

Timeline is Sky announced as Pro12 broadcaster in May 2013.
BT Announced sponsorship of Scottish clubs in July 2013.
BT announce it is in 'advanced sponsorship talks with Irish & Welsh clubs'  Dec 2013   http://sport.bt.com/rugbyunionhub/rugbyunion/bt-sport-target-rugby-sponsorship-S11363861645784

John Feehan said that BT sport declined to tender for the Pro12. Why the big interest all of a sudden?

Do you realise that if BT weren't interested in televising,t hat doesn't mean they're not interested in sponsorship. You're seeing two things and inventing a causal link based on nothing but temporal proximity. It makes much more sense for BT to sponsor teams in a league they don't televise, especially if those sides play the majority of their games on free-to-air.

I can't even remember how we got not to this. Was it you suggesting BT were trying to destroy the Pro12 by giving them money?

Sorry, you need to be an ediot if you don't think that the reaction of BT Sport (who don't have a presence in Ireland) is to annoy Sky by sponsoring Irish teams.

BT used to have a presence (I had their broadband for a while), they sold out to Vodafone about 4 or 5 years ago.

nathan wrote:

In a statement on Wednesday, Feb 5, ERC explained that the unanimous decision to postpone financial distributions followed preliminary professional advice received by the ERC board and was taken in the best interests of ERC.

Source

Should the ERC not be doing whats best for the clubs and competition, not itself?

Who is 'itself'?

Sin é wrote:Sorry, you need to be an ediot if you don't think that the reaction of BT Sport (who don't have a presence in Ireland) is to annoy Sky by sponsoring Irish teams.

BT used to have a presence (I had their broadband for a while), they sold out to Vodafone about 4 or 5 years ago.

Are the Irish sponsors blocked out when watched by Welsh people? Or English people? Sponsorship is basically advertisement. You can't see the benefit for BT Sports to advertise their product on sporting teams that they don't televise but which are broadcast on free-to-air channels, therefore getting relatively large viewing figures?

No, you're right, they're spending all that money to 'annoy' Sky.

It's fits with your view of the world, that's grand. We can all think what we like, it's the true freedom. But that doesn't make it true.

HammerofThunor wrote:

Sin é wrote:Sorry, you need to be an ediot if you don't think that the reaction of BT Sport (who don't have a presence in Ireland) is to annoy Sky by sponsoring Irish teams.

BT used to have a presence (I had their broadband for a while), they sold out to Vodafone about 4 or 5 years ago.

Are the Irish sponsors blocked out when watched by Welsh people? Or English people? Sponsorship is basically advertisement. You can't see the benefit for BT Sports to advertise their product on sporting teams that they don't televise but which are broadcast on free-to-air channels, therefore getting relatively large viewing figures?

No, you're right, they're spending all that money to 'annoy' Sky.

It's fits with your view of the world, that's grand. We can all think what we like, it's the true freedom. But that doesn't make it true.

BT have nothing to flog in Ireland.

Sin é wrote:

HammerofThunor wrote:

Sin é wrote:Sorry, you need to be an ediot if you don't think that the reaction of BT Sport (who don't have a presence in Ireland) is to annoy Sky by sponsoring Irish teams.

BT used to have a presence (I had their broadband for a while), they sold out to Vodafone about 4 or 5 years ago.

Are the Irish sponsors blocked out when watched by Welsh people? Or English people? Sponsorship is basically advertisement. You can't see the benefit for BT Sports to advertise their product on sporting teams that they don't televise but which are broadcast on free-to-air channels, therefore getting relatively large viewing figures?

No, you're right, they're spending all that money to 'annoy' Sky.

It's fits with your view of the world, that's grand. We can all think what we like, it's the true freedom. But that doesn't make it true.

BT have nothing to flog in Ireland.

But they do in Wales and Scotland where the irish games would be televised.

EDIT: Looks like they do have a range of services to sell in Ireland too. http://www.btireland.com/

They have pulled out of ROI - the only thing they have to sell in Ireland is through a subscribtion to Setanta. The Pro 12 will remain on FTA services like RTE, BBCNI and TG4 in Ireland.