Players left in limbo as Crusaders fold

Bakkies. The Cronulla Sharks nearly croaked 3 or 4 times,there are RU clubs in England losing money hand over foot and even some in France and of course S15 in NZ.It happens.When they actually die ,you may have a point. And superLeague war and its aftermath would not have had much to do with expansion teams dying,by any chance. You do actually understand the value of the Storm to the NRL is worth more than it costs News ltd backing.This has been stated by Gallop and NRL officials on more than one occasion.The figures are in the pay Tv ratings.Whenever the Storm play,they are among the highest of the NRL ratings figures for that medium. The money spent on the Storm is chicken feed compared to the money being expended on GWS and the Suns.In fact according to the Storm CEO,the club is operating better financially than it has been for some time.Good financial management does that. The Tahs losing money as also the Brumbies and the Rebels are privately backed.It happens in a country with many codes,and a small population.They continue on,football clubs are not great profit makers. It is only the Crusaders who have carked it,the others are still playing.the Crusaders will no doubt find a spot in the semi pro conferences,as have the Scorpions.

A lot of the league expansion teams died. The Cowboys were struggling financially and were lucky that News Corp could prop them up. The Storm have been draining millions each year.

@ Matt.. Agreed.. Especially since in Oz alone.. A whole RU domestic Competition disappeared after one season.. the ARC. :lol:

Bakkies That is not the situation for rl in NZ today,and we dare not continue to dwell in the past. The clubs in the NSWRL lower division were in heartland and not expansion areas.Else we could still have Newtown playing in the NRL and no Melbourne or Warriors. And don't kid yourself if the Qld Reds had been also rans this year,the ARU would have had to pump more money in to prop them up.They had been losing money prior to 2011.You should get down on your knees and thank Cooper and Genia.

The Crusaders goin broke isn't necessarily a bad thing, dropping to the championship for mine is a good thing. The south Wales Scorpion play in Championship 1 (the 3rd tier in Europe) and those guys then had to jump up to the ESL and that is a pretty mean feat, so its a good thing on the development level, and Wrexham FC has folded as well, so if the cru stay alive in some form then the future may not be that bad. Also, I think we forget how much League has progressed in Wales since the Great Britain days. I thinly France should be the major focus along with South England but Wales mustn't be left by the wayside.

Stade Francais was never going to die. Had they been relegated they would have been in an amateur division for a couple of seasons and work their way back up through Pro D2. Manchester City did the same in English football when they were relegated to League One. The only issue of concern was the money that Guazzini might have lost in the scam and Laporte's role (Laporte played a part in the problems at Bayonne which is now sorted and Bayonne have come out of it stronger). Laporte was going to oversee the coaching staff. Guazzini's strength is marketing and advertising. He has strong connections with the City of Paris council who are funding the new Stade Jean Bouin. He now has a competitor in Paris in Racing Metro who are building a new stadium as well. He doesn't have as much money as Lorenzetti Racing's owner and Boudjellall (Toulon owner). Clubs that dropped out of the NSWRL Winfield Cup ended up in a lower division and haven't been able to come back up. The Warriors were close to be shut down and this was at a time when the NZ domestic competition was struggling.

Rugby union in QLD became extinct during the mid early 20th century. Wasn't the war between the QRFL and BRL responsible for rugby union's return to Queensland?

The same cut and paste article was on the BBC website

Pops you stated failure to expand,I simply elaborated where you are incorrect.Basing it soley on the demise of the Crusaders is a tad foolhardy.Why? because the code has experienced unprecedented growth in Wales.The Welsh admin and the RFL ,have stated its business as per usual.The pro team was only a part of the total equation. You may well notice the numbers playing in NZ in the past few years were down,and with the new admin they have in fact grown,and now getting the game back into the schools,with a national school comp. http://www.rleague.com/db/article.php?id=38180 Always willing and proud to be of assistance any time.I actually grew up on rugby union at a private scholl,strange bedmates indeed. You ignored Jamaica,Lebanon,and Serbia as examples of grassroots growth,which I can understand. I thought you told us you were from South Afirca not that long ago.Sure get around.

Bakkies, Stad Francais nearly died in its arse. Sporting teams of any code will be susceptible to going broke. In fact a number of union clubs have gone broke since professionalism. Stop linking every ill of the world to a rugby league only sphere.

Crosscoder, my good man, I was simply stating a fact. That fact was based on the demise of the Crusaders. I never mentioned the Warriors. You may note that there were more people playing Rugby League in New Zealand in the 1980s then there is now. So perhaps the expansion there is not all it is cracked up to be. I take umbrage at your suggestion that I was not picked in my rugby league team. Born and bred in the inner-west I grew up on the game son. If it was not for me deciding to do my nationalistic duty and serve in the Korean penisula for this great country, i humbly believe I may have had a future in rugby league.

They wont bring in a 2nd NZ team,they would be well down the pecking order anyway. Anycase having the Warriors has increased the profile of the game over there,and yes we can thank Watson.He obviously could see the benfit of having such a team. A new national admin,has seen participation numbers increase.I would hardly now call the expansion into NZ a failure.Look at the position of both the warriors and the under20s on the ladder.Says it all really. And the Swans nearly died on two occasions in Sydney,but were resurrected intiially by private capital.

It's based on the parent union club's logo: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harlequin_F.C. I have no idea when the logo was developed, but I've seen old pics with that logo going back a fair while. It wasn't developed with modern 'sports branding' purposes in mind.

Oh, the name I like. I was referring to the logo. Yowzers.

What? Harlequins? It's quite a famous rugby brand in the UK. There are a number of clubs branded that throughout the world, even here in Australia.

Good lord... Australian sport has dished up a lot of appallingly bad team logos over the years but WOW I don't think we've ever come close to matching that.

Strange how they have this up on the Harlequins RL website. Doesn't look like a complete break with them, just a new identity: http://www.league.quins.co.uk/news/13752.php

Now it looks like they are going to be tenants at The Stoop with no link to Harlequins Rugby. Possibly changing back to the London Broncos name.

What are they rebranding as? London Gypsies? London Zingari has a unique ring to it - though it is more associated with cricket.

Harlequins League are rebranding and moving from The Stoop