New team entering the Pro 14

So if there is one less of the current Welsh teams next year what would you like to see.
It's just a bit of fund

1. North Wales funded by the WRU - some thoughts people might have
A. WRU problem it is up to them to sort it as long as there is a team we don't care
B. Great for the League, growing pains for 2-3 years but new market and new fans in the long run.
C. Waste of time will be closed down in 2-3 years and will make the League look stupid.

South African Team.
A. Griquas or Pumas are joining anyway. Let's add one in a year early as they have fans and players and the SA might throw a few more € to the league for having an extra team.
B. Why would we want Kings II, they will be worse than a North Wales team.
C. Let's see if we can get one of the big teams a year early and they can put the G/P in Super Rugby.

Georgian Team
A. They have the players and will improve the forward battles in the league.  They are the next best team in Europe so a logical choice.
B. They are too far away, how can fans get there.  They are a tiny country with no money so just a drain.
C. They can't even get their teams into the Challenge Cup and get beat by Tier two Italian teams, they would be worse than any team we could get (a representive team would actually be quiet strong)

Russian Team.
A. They are in the Challenge Cup and part from this year have won games in it so not to bad.
B. They are backed by money and could be used by the Russian Government as a promotional tool so they will have funds (Russian AI games had lots of state sponsors and local military families had their tickets paid for)
C. The league doesn't believe the Russian baggage would be good for the League.
D. Russian bots would be dispatched to talk up the league thus improving its image

Leinster A
A. Sure they play half the games already we might aswell make it official but they must have two official squads
B. We only want to be beat twice by Leinster not four time.
C. What a joke, all the other leagues would laugh and we couldn't be sure they wouldn't fix results.

A league based North Wales team.
A. The IRFU, SFU & WRU can each pick 10-20 players to send to this new team covering their wages.
B. The coaching team from another nation manages it.
C. If we do it Wales can keep 3 strong teams but we don't need to travel far.
D. Too much infighting it will never work
E. It's an Irish plot to conquer Wales

How about setting up a team in England, a sort of Pro14 "exiles" team, made up of players who were qualified for Scotland Ireland and Wales but are based in England.

Irish Londoner wrote:How about setting up a team in England, a sort of Pro14 "exiles" team, made up of players who were qualified for Scotland Ireland and Wales but are based in England.

I did think about a French or English based team but don't think it would get approval from the relevant union

Yeah cannot see RFU signing off on it, though wasn't the owner of Ealing talking about joining Pro Rugby?

Exiles would be nice but London Scottish are certainly no-where near professional now, although they do frequently get players on loan from the SRU it's usually the has-beens and very young.

If there was a celtic exiles, it'd surely be mostly Welsh given their strong history and regional club game. I can't see many Scottish fans getting behind it. Not sure about Ireland.

Cornish pirates from a cultural perspective would be cool, but again, they're currently not near professional form, despite form in the past. Jersey could be an option as they're a unique situation geographically.

SA teams need to up their game if they want to be considered for more. Look at Treviso and how much they've improved.

Georgia would be interesting but geography is an issue, as much as it is for South African teams. How many fans go down regularly? It's a big ask.

To me it makes more sense if we're going further afield to have two north american teams, maybe one canadian and one US. Unless they manage to establish a pro league.

I think the Pro14 should be in talks to get an MLR representive team or two that is the step between MLR and international that could be entered into the Pro18 when it happens.

That way the as the MLR gets better they still see the Pro14 team as the top team.  Before it would be entered into the Pro18 you could have Pro14 teams play over there.  As the league is much more nationalistic having pro14 teams will get better attraction than to premiership teams.  I don't know how the 7s work but having the game in the same city the week or two after the 7s might help attendances or even the night before

What jokers voted to disband the league. How about you do one and go watch something else.

I voted to Disband the League.

I am a club rugby fan, nothing is better than having your premier local club doing well.

Purely selfishly, I would be more than happy if the Pro14 could recruit a couple of Iberian (I wont call them Spanish!) teams - maybe one from Catalonia, and one from Euskadi?

Might not do too much for the standard of the rugby, but would be good for the supporters!

TightHEAD wrote:I voted to Disband the League.

I am a club rugby fan, nothing is better than having your premier local club doing well.

Other than just saying stuff on the internet to get a rise out of people though. I'll bet that's your favourite.

demosthenes wrote:Purely selfishly, I would be more than happy if the Pro14 could recruit a couple of Iberian (I wont call them Spanish!) teams - maybe one from Catalonia, and one from Euskadi?  

Might not do too much for the standard of the rugby, but would be good for the supporters!

I want to change my vote to this for some lovely away days.

demosthenes wrote:Purely selfishly, I would be more than happy if the Pro14 could recruit a couple of Iberian (I wont call them Spanish!) teams - maybe one from Catalonia, and one from Euskadi?  

Might not do too much for the standard of the rugby, but would be good for the supporters!

Do Tuscany have a rugby team?

Club before Country for me.

Club rugby is special, would love to see a Welsh league with passionate derby days.

TightHEAD wrote:Club before Country for me.

Club rugby is special, would love to see a Welsh league with passionate derby days.

I don't have a problem with what you're saying, infact I understand it completely. I just think you're taking this as an opportunity to stick it to the Pro14 because you don't like it.

Truth be told I take more interest in Glasgow than I do Scotland probably because I have a season ticket at Scotstoun.

I like the Scottish teams.

Welsh club rugby, like Scottish club rugby and Irish club rugby are incapable of playing to the standard required to compete against the bigger nations.

Either we compete at a regional level or we go under

Just to clear up the SA teams the talk is that Griquas and Pumas will not be joining the Pro 14, but will be joining super Rugby with 2 of Stormers, Sharks or Bull's moving to the Pro 16. So SA have 2 big and 2 smaller teams in each league.

A fifth Irish team. Based slap bang in the middle and taking the slices of the other four that they don't seem to need. Players who don't like city life and love making their own poteen would rush at the chance.

Personally i would love world rugby to help set up (a bit like they help the Fiji drua) a team based in Belgium (where stade Francis have taken a few games before) based on tier 2 players, and only allowed 5 tier one players. I think belgium has potention as thats why Stade have taken games there, it would mean that top players signing for it would not be asked to retire from international rugby, which may make it more appealing. It would help out a number of tier 2 teams by having their players slightly more concentrated. Imagine a team with Georgian forwards, south seas backs. It would be a plus for the League and world rugby.

geoff999rugby wrote:Welsh club rugby, like Scottish club rugby and Irish club rugby are incapable of playing to the standard required to compete against the bigger nations.

Either we compete at a regional level or we go under

Um, yeah. Unless you haven't noticed we Welsh compete at a regional level AND we're going under.

True but if you don't replace/upgrade it with a Regional alternative Welsh rugby will die on the vine
Making regional rugby work so that they can compete against the best France and England have to offer
is the only show in town for the 4 NH Pro14 countries

In my opinion, the team would need to have proven itself at a similar level so, Georgia, North America, Pumas and Griquas (who never played in Super rugby) a big fat no. Even a team from North Wales would be absurd.

This pretty much only leaves the London exiles, i would like to see London Irish and London Welsh in the 16 teams league.

Ireland have around 6million population (north and south combined) and 4 teams. Scotland have something around 5million? ... 2 teams. Wales have around 2.5million (these are only rough estimates of course)and 4 teams. Italy have some 50something million and 2 teams.
Maybe it IS simply two too many teams for the Welsh population? That's not trying to be insulting to the Welsh who obviously love and are quite naturally drawn to and skilled at rugby but just the viability of population meets number of modern professionally run, well resourced teams?
Is two Regions the natural route not just to sustainability but to top level continuous competitiveness in competitions?

SecretFly wrote:Ireland have around 6million population (north and south combined) and 4 teams.  Scotland have something around 5million?  ... 2 teams.  Wales have around 2.5million (these are only rough estimates of course)and 4 teams.  Italy have some 50something  million and 2 teams.
Maybe it IS simply two too many teams for the Welsh population?  That's not trying to be insulting to the Welsh who obviously love and are quite naturally drawn to and skilled at rugby but just the viability of population meets number of modern professionally run, well resourced teams?
Is two Regions the natural route not just to sustainability but to top level continuous competitiveness in competitions?

Wales are roughly as good as Ireland.. They should have as many teams as them playing in the competition. They need better management and better coaches.

New Zealand has the same population as Wales and has 5 teams! Let’s go for 5!

Then again, Japan has a population of 126 million but only has 1 team in Super rugby. Wales should enter 0.02 of a team!

The Oracle wrote:Then again, Japan has a population of 126 million but only has 1 team in Super rugby. Wales should enter 0.02 of a team!

Exactly, that was a very poor argument!

Wales currently have a very good national side but dig deeper and the picture is nowhere near as rosy

Coaching is an issue but so is funding and, increasingly, so is participation.
Wales need to be compared to Scotland and Ireland in terms of what they can sustain.
Japan, Italy and New Zealand have different factors in play that make comparisons based on population invalid

I might be horrendously ignorant here but is Wales' issue not simply that no other country in the World has the same ratio of people to top level pro rugby teams. On top of that the Welsh teams are fairly concentrated in South Wales.
A possible solution for Wales could be to appeal to the SRU for some input into a team. Scottish Rugby were looking to invest into an English team but there's issues there with regard to English qualified players in the squad. We also don't have enough money to get another pro side here. So why doesn't the SRU take control of a part of a Welsh side and provide some investment. In return they would get partial control of the side and players/ coaches would be given a place in the side. It's a novel idea but one that could suit both parties. Especially considering losing the Ospreys or the Scarlets or the Blues would be bad for the Pro14; it would damage the product that the SRU are invested in. However if we gained the capacity to send our players who are struggling for game time down to Wales and coaches that need to make the step up down also we find a solution that helps both parties.

Wales are roughly as good as Ireland at International. As regards Regions v Provinces, no, the similarity of fortunes diverges. The topic is or was Regions/Pro14 teams not International.

Some say Irish players invest too much of their 'heart' into their Provinces. I feel Wales is the exact opposite. Players in Wales really become their true selves as players when wearing the National red. I'm not the one saying Regions seem to be struggling financially and a big part of that difficulty seems to be following or lack of it. I'm not creating that scenario so I say it's a valid question to ponder whether the rugby going population of Wales might be better suited to two very very good sides (with a big presence in Europe most years. - gaining more sponsorship leverage because of it).rather than the current four down in the south.
Legitimate proposition. It can be argued against, and it was... .....but legitimate query.

Was gutted today to see the might of North Wales lose to the worst Premiership team in the Dragons “region”. Ready made mind.

Kingshu wrote:Just to clear up the SA teams the talk is that Griquas and Pumas will not be joining the Pro 14, but will be joining super Rugby with 2 of Stormers, Sharks or Bull's  moving to the Pro 16. So SA have 2 big and 2 smaller teams in each league.

That would be good if true as we would be able to see fan buy in.

With the SA becoming stakeholders it is in their interest to have it work.

My father-in-law is a bulls fan in North England. He would go to alot of their European games as would many of the Bulls and Stormer fans.

With two strong teams from SA, 2.5 from Ireland, 1.5 from Scotland and Wales and 1 from Italy we would have a good battle each year for the title.

123456789. wrote:I might be horrendously ignorant here but is Wales' issue not simply that no other country in the World has the same ratio of people to top level pro rugby teams. On top of that the Welsh teams are fairly concentrated in South Wales.
A possible solution for Wales could be to appeal to the SRU for some input into a team. Scottish Rugby were looking to invest into an English team but there's issues there with regard to English qualified players in the squad. We also don't have enough money to get another pro side here. So why doesn't the SRU take control of a part of a Welsh side and provide some investment. In return they would get partial control of the side and players/ coaches would be given a place in the side. It's a novel idea but one that could suit both parties. Especially considering losing the Ospreys or the Scarlets or the Blues would be bad for the Pro14; it would damage the product that the SRU are invested in. However if we gained the capacity to send our players who are struggling for game time down to Wales and coaches that need to make the step up down also we find a solution that helps both parties.

Was one of the options above. Think the Unions putting certain players up for loans in the league is a good idea. Strenghten the lower team at a reduced price and allows unions with more players than spaces to still manage them

The league needs some stability quick, it's not exactly great for the short term future of the league when asking companies to sponsor or invest when there is constant uncertainty and change. It's not great for those in the league either when clubs are starting to sell season tickets and are trying to tie up contracts for next season.

For me long term if the league want to grow maybe they need to assess a second competition, the likes of the Welsh and Irish are trying to bridge the gap between the clubs and the regions/provinces. A development league is surely the answer to that. Bringing in teams from Spain, Russia, Germany, Georgia etc may be the answer. If the competition is setup right it could generate extra income for everyone while growing the game with a view to create a second tier to bring through the developing nations

123456789. wrote:I might be horrendously ignorant here but is Wales' issue not simply that no other country in the World has the same ratio of people to top level pro rugby teams. On top of that the Welsh teams are fairly concentrated in South Wales.
A possible solution for Wales could be to appeal to the SRU for some input into a team. Scottish Rugby were looking to invest into an English team but there's issues there with regard to English qualified players in the squad. We also don't have enough money to get another pro side here. So why doesn't the SRU take control of a part of a Welsh side and provide some investment. In return they would get partial control of the side and players/ coaches would be given a place in the side. It's a novel idea but one that could suit both parties. Especially considering losing the Ospreys or the Scarlets or the Blues would be bad for the Pro14; it would damage the product that the SRU are invested in. However if we gained the capacity to send our players who are struggling for game time down to Wales and coaches that need to make the step up down also we find a solution that helps both parties.

Numbers my man, that suggestion is far too reasonable and sensible for the world of professional rugby. Bloody good idea.

Another attempt for Scottish rugby to take over someone else's territory? This is downright imperialistic. Time for some very high Trumponian walls!

123456789. wrote:I might be horrendously ignorant here but is Wales' issue not simply that no other country in the World has the same ratio of people to top level pro rugby teams. On top of that the Welsh teams are fairly concentrated in South Wales.
A possible solution for Wales could be to appeal to the SRU for some input into a team. Scottish Rugby were looking to invest into an English team but there's issues there with regard to English qualified players in the squad. We also don't have enough money to get another pro side here. So why doesn't the SRU take control of a part of a Welsh side and provide some investment. In return they would get partial control of the side and players/ coaches would be given a place in the side. It's a novel idea but one that could suit both parties. Especially considering losing the Ospreys or the Scarlets or the Blues would be bad for the Pro14; it would damage the product that the SRU are invested in. However if we gained the capacity to send our players who are struggling for game time down to Wales and coaches that need to make the step up down also we find a solution that helps both parties.

New Zealand has about the same population but 5 pro teams.

The teams are fairly concentrated in South Wales, but so are the fans/population!

I've wondered previously whether we should have some sort of Pro14 draft system to help players get game time without them being lost to another league such as England or France. Think that would be good for everyone. However, I can see that it might mess with the foreign player policies of some unions, the development pathway, strategic aims ('Developing players for Team Wales/Ireland/Scotland', etc.). Sure there's a way around it though.

SecretFly wrote:Another attempt for Scottish rugby to take over someone else's territory?  This is downright imperialistic. Time for some very high Trumponian walls!

Like the Darien scheme but with slightly less malaria.

marty2086 wrote:The league needs some stability quick, it's not exactly great for the short term future of the league when asking companies to sponsor or invest when there is constant uncertainty and change. It's not great for those in the league either when clubs are starting to sell season tickets and are trying to tie up contracts for next season.

For me long term if the league want to grow maybe they need to assess a second competition, the likes of the Welsh and Irish are trying to bridge the gap between the clubs and the regions/provinces. A development league is surely the answer to that. Bringing in teams from Spain, Russia, Germany, Georgia etc may be the answer. If the competition is setup right it could generate extra income for everyone while growing the game with a view to create a second tier to bring through the developing nations

I have been calling for this for a while. If World Rugby were willing/made to fund a few teams it would be workable. My suggestion would be the B6N