So you think badly thought out idea's are good for the game , the conerfence clubs had a group in the NRC acouple of years ago , the RFL didn't continue with it

Putting a French group in may be possible in terms of the standard of play, but definately not the Irish. It would be a miracle if any Irish team could keep a championship 1 team below 100 points. Records would be broken every time they played.

But you start somewhere.

It would be a nice reward for say their Championship winning club

If the French and Welsh clubs consist of Toulouse and the Scorpions then it's only fair that they join the competition as they are Championship members.



However, any intention to put a different French or Welsh side, and particularly an Irish one, would be asking for trouble. If it has to be done then I suppose the only way would be for them to play in a separate group (as the then-NL3 clubs did - what happened to that?) and the winner goes through.



Personally, I'd prefer to see the other clubs join in to a second tier competition in the same manner as the old Silk Cut plate; the four best sides who don't qualify for the knock-out stages of the NRC can face the four best sides from a Welsh/French/Irish mini comp, with the eventual finalists being a curtain raiser to the main NRC final.



Putting any sort of Welsh or Irish amateur side, or even a lot of LER clubs, would just be lambs to the slaughter and do nothing for the competition.

Could there not be a preliminary round (we could call it something else, as preliminary is hard to say after a few beers) consisting of a Welsh, Irish and French team? Winner goes into the NRC? I think South Wales and Toulouse should be automatic inclusions.

Wasn't it Hemel Stags and maybe one or two other NL3 teams that used to compete in the comp. To be honest, there's not a huge difference between the elite amateur sides in the UK and the lower half of NL2. So it doesn't sound so crazy to be getting the Irish involved. I do know that there has been a lot of activity in Ireland of late, though I'm not aware of any plans to go pro just yet. However, this may prove to be the jump start to get a pro league going.

That would depend on how you define 'elite amateur side'. To me, it would be the National Conference (winter) sides, and even they rarely get a win in the Challenge Cup.

Every year this competition seems to get re-vamped, and every year it seems to get sh*tter. Just scrap the damn thing.

Hemel and St Albans were in in 2006. They were thrashed by bottom-of-the-table London Skolars and the newly formed Celtic Crusaders. I think only one match was by less than fifty and they conceded 70 twice. And if you bear in mind that these two would probably thrash an Irish team by a similar score, then it shows how wide the gap is.

An Irish team/teams is a complete non-starter imo. Putting in a club which will get completely thrashed in every game, will do nothing what-so-ever to promote the game in Ireland, or offer any possible value to the NRC competition. Who would want to part with their hard earned cash to watch that?



The Welsh will be in it anyway next season with the Scorpions. The French can be represented by Toulouse.



For other French clubs to participate, they would have to bring their season in-line with the Championship and drop the Lord Derby Cup. Otherwise they may well find themselves playing far too many games. Don’t forget that Le Bobbie may want to try some of these players out in internationals, which are becoming far more frequent for the French these days.



Now, here’s the killer…



Who is going to pay the travel costs?



Given the amount of traveling that this would create, the new UK airport taxes and overnight stays, who in the Championship, Championship 1 and the French league would be able to fund these costs? None of these clubs receive TV money to fund it. We are not talking about Super League or the NRL here.



Given that Championship clubs already have to travel to Toulouse at least once a season already, and many clubs are struggling - many failing and going bust – before we even start to add even more substantial travel costs on top of them, how can this possibly be a sensible idea?



If I had a plan to kill all lower league clubs stone dead, this would be a good way of achieving it.



Are the RFL going to fund travel costs which could cost hundreds of thousands of pounds?



I doubt it



Would the Sponsors be willing to cough up the substantial costs, for what is a pretty low profile competition?



No chance imo



Will SL clubs give up a penny of their money to fund it - for the betterment and expansion of the game of course?





Now that is fantasy.

South Wales will be automatically included in 2011, the only reason they weren't in this year's competition was that they were formed too late to be included in the group draw.



As I understand it, Toulouse were also invited to play in the competition this year but declined the invitation.

Just to back up what Eels Fan is saying about encouraging new Irish players into RL can I point out Brian Carney.



Came from Gaelic, played RL for Irish students, got a shout from the Irish national squad and then signed for Gateshead.



I think this expansion is a great idea. The French will obviously compete with the English teams and I'm sure they'll be a few Welsh teams that'll be able to give a few teams a run for their money. The Irish might not be there yet, but we need to start somewhere and the young lads coming through need some realistic incentive.