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Post by Druzik on May 4, 2009 4:01:07 GMT 10
Results:
LER
SM Pia 12 FC Lezignan 50
Carcassonne 62 Carpentras 4
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Post by Druzik on May 9, 2009 0:52:18 GMT 10
This from Cliff Spraklen on TRL Am hearing that Lyon look likely to drop into Elite 2 next season, barring some dramatic intervention.. The club has surprisingly much more depth than for many a season with Reserve and Junior teams. But a case of "reculer pour mieux sauter", step back to go foward. Three of the club#s best players are coming to play in England for the summer.
The positive news is that the "double headers" with LOU XV will continue, with three envisaged for next season. This is likely to bring both more spectator and commercial support, especially as the team is likely to win games.
The Elite 2 final on 17th May will be Baho v the winners of the "Petite Finale" held between Albi and Corbeil at Entraigues this weekend.
Baho will not move up. They reformed last summer taking many of the Le Barcares players who won the Elite 2 last year. They will mot move up just as Le Barcares did not. Albi want to return to Elite One but this is not the same team, nor indeed club, that reachred the Lord Derby Final last year. So think it remains a longer term goal. The Federation are keen to see Albi back.
Corbeil has said they would do everything possible to move up if they won the Elite 2 Championship. This is the club that discussed with me recently playing in an English competition, given the immense distances to the south from the Paris region. They do good development work having produced the Mayan twins at Limoux, and Coulibaly at St Gaudens. In fact there are two younger Coulibaly's in the current Corbeil side. Coach is Aussie Jamie Papa.
Corbeil hammered Albi recently at Corbeil, but then Albi were weakened. Playing at Entraigues gives Albi marginally less travelling and a better chance. |
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Post by Druzik on May 11, 2009 2:24:47 GMT 10
From Cliff Spraklen
Those of you who take Rugby League World will have seen my article on Corbeil-Essonnes from the Ile De France (Greater Paris) region), and noted the progress made under dedicated Chair Claude Houbloop.
Corbeil took another step foward today winning the Petite Finale of the Elite 2 Championship. beating Albi 48-16 at Entraigues in Provence.
Corbeil now meet Catalan club Baho in the Grand Final next weekend.
Claude has said he will make every effort to secure the funding to move up, if Corbeil win the Elite 2 Championship. If not he might well look to an English summer competition.
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Post by Druzik on May 11, 2009 2:41:25 GMT 10
More from Cliff
After having a poor start to the season, causing the Directors to read the riot to the players, who secured the Elite Championship last year, Lezignan confirmed they have hit top form at the business end of the season. Following an away play-off victory last week at Pia, they went to Limoux, the "minor premiers" and secured a hard fought victory by just two points. Lezignan's Greg Mazard made a try scoring tackle in the dying minutes, forcing Limoux's Hervre Marrot into touch just 3 metres out.
In the other eliminating semi-final play-off Carcassonne went to Pia and won.
With Lezignan through to the Final, Carcassonne now travel to Limoux next weekend for the Petite Finale, the winners going through to meet Lezignan.
Results:
X111 Limouxin 18 FC Lezignan 20
SM Pia 18 As Carcassonne 25
So whoever wins from Limoux v ASC it will be an "all Aude Final". Lezignan's presence in the Final will of course guarantee a noisy, colourful affair, with a decent crowd.
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Post by supersteve on May 11, 2009 11:30:21 GMT 10
Just out of interest, what crowds do they usually get to a top tier match in France for their own domestic comp?,
And what do they get to the final?
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Post by Ryan N on May 11, 2009 14:33:14 GMT 10
From Cliff Spraklen Those of you who take Rugby League World will have seen my article on Corbeil-Essonnes from the Ile De France (Greater Paris) region), and noted the progress made under dedicated Chair Claude Houbloop.
Corbeil took another step foward today winning the Petite Finale of the Elite 2 Championship. beating Albi 48-16 at Entraigues in Provence.
Corbeil now meet Catalan club Baho in the Grand Final next weekend.
Claude has said he will make every effort to secure the funding to move up, if Corbeil win the Elite 2 Championship. If not he might well look to an English summer competition. That would be good. A Paris team can only help. Theoretically what English summer comp would they look at? |
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Post by Druzik on May 11, 2009 15:52:28 GMT 10
From Cliff Spraklen Those of you who take Rugby League World will have seen my article on Corbeil-Essonnes from the Ile De France (Greater Paris) region), and noted the progress made under dedicated Chair Claude Houbloop.
Corbeil took another step foward today winning the Petite Finale of the Elite 2 Championship. beating Albi 48-16 at Entraigues in Provence.
Corbeil now meet Catalan club Baho in the Grand Final next weekend.
Claude has said he will make every effort to secure the funding to move up, if Corbeil win the Elite 2 Championship. If not he might well look to an English summer competition. That would be good. A Paris team can only help. Theoretically what English summer comp would they look at? Yes a Paris team would be great... the would look to the national conference leagues, so the level below Championship 1 (old NL2). These are still semi pro teams. |
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Post by Druzik on May 11, 2009 16:02:58 GMT 10
Just out of interest, what crowds do they usually get to a top tier match in France for their own domestic comp?, So usually somewhere between 1000 - 3000. But you have to remember that most teams sit in towns of no more than about 10,000-15,000 people, so those crowds are actually fantastic. So to give you an idea the games I have been to, the magic weekend last december got about 2000 in Carcassonne. In Toulouse they had over 3000 a few weeks ago (this was a championship game against leight though). So I went to last years LER final, it was Lezignan v Pia and they got about 8,000 to it. 7000 were from lezignan alone which has a population of about 10,000. Lezignan won it and apparently at 3am they had 5000 people lining the streets to see the team come home. Below is my video of the game. This years Lord Derby final also got over 8000, it was in a 12,000 seat stadium so looked bloody good. Two top teams as well, Carcassonne and Limoux palying. Below is my vid from the game. The great thing about french RL these days is that the power base seems to have shifted from the Catalans teams like pia and UTC back to the Aude region, i.e. actual french teams, Carcassonne, Limoux and Lezignan being the dominant teams. in the last two seasons, you have had Lezignan, Albi, Carcassonne, Limoux and Pia making the finals, the first three winning, no sign of UTC in there who are the Les Cats reserves effectively... so there is some good depth and strength in the french comp despite what people like to say. |
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Post by Ryan N on May 11, 2009 16:05:28 GMT 10
That would be good. A Paris team can only help. Theoretically what English summer comp would they look at? Yes a Paris team would be great... the would look to the national conference leagues, so the level below Championship 1 (old NL2). These are still semi pro teams. That might even be easier travel for them than say going down south in France? |
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Post by Druzik on May 11, 2009 16:09:26 GMT 10
Yes a Paris team would be great... the would look to the national conference leagues, so the level below Championship 1 (old NL2). These are still semi pro teams. That might even be easier travel for them than say going down south in France? Maybe, depends which conference they play in, if its the muidlands south, then yes. But I think the idea is that winter they play in LER and summer the play in England... makes sense really. The other thing is that there are two other 'paris' clubs as well and also a few junior clubs, so the base is there for something good. The other rummblings out of Paris are that one of the lower div Union teams are interested in doing a Leeds come Harlequins and have a dual code team... this would provde the funds to sustain a paris team in the Elite and give them a brand new stadium that holds 20,000 apparently. I'll dig up cliffs post on that as well and put it up. |
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Post by Druzik on May 11, 2009 16:17:11 GMT 10
MOre from Cliff on this topi... hes arguing with a guy on TRL Jesus Bowes. You ado seem so knee-jerkingly negative about things French. I recall your so negatively dismissive comments about Toulouse and their plans on the basis of the LER team at the time.
The world is dynamic. Clubs, people and teams change. The case for TO was always the economic, social and political underpinning, not the team on the pitch in a given season. Teams can be bought as the UK so amply and often demonstrates more easily than securing the other necessarries.
But as to Corbeil there are a number of issues. Thus far the club has not been planning for Elite One, but would feel honour bound if it won the Championship of Elite 2, to have a look at the possibilities and implications. I think the team has performed better than was envisaged. The club does do considerable development work, and has been commended for its work in what as ParisSurtout alludes to, as seriously disadvantaged areas.
But the club has a problem operating in the French context simply because it is so far from all the other clubs at the same level. Playing London or southern English based clubs, would actually be easier in terms of logistics and potentially lower costs. The club is also interested in the exploring summer Rugby league, which does not win much support from other French clubs.
These are reasons why Claude has been "thinking aloud" about other possibilities. Certainly Corbeil would not want to find itself in the position that Lyon found itself over the years, being in the Elite One comp without the a competive team.
Nor is there much in the way of a regional competition.
Claude would be delighted to see a full-time Development Officer installed in the IDF region, and he is admiring of the way things have gone in the London area. He would for example love to be playing London Skolars on a regular basis.
But our own championships in the UK change from season to season, so who is to say what will happen, and indeed what could happen.
I do not agree that amateur teams could not travel to Paris once a year. Heworth, the York NCL club, are sending their under 16s to Corbeil and feeder club Montgeron later this year, and after Heworth Chair Kenny sykes trip to France in charge of the NCL team next month, who knows how that might grow.
Amateur clubs are actually quite good at going to play in France. Stanningley under 15s go to St Martin de Crau near Marseille in two weeks time, Leeds Akkies travel a lot, South London Storm had a good exchange with Realmont near Albi. Indeed Realmont are coached by ex SLS player Hamesy. there are loads of exchanges in the amateur ranks, both winter and summer, so that is not automatically a proble.
But it is surely about exploring possibilities. The Channel is 20 minutes in the tunnel.
But on to ParisSurtout's pertinent points. Corbeil in the Essonnes is not the best place for a Paris flagship French club. It does produce young players better than many French clubs, but its location is not the most attractive for gaining media and business support, which must be one of the objectives of say a Championship playing Paris club.
There remains a project on the drawing board for a French club based near Nanterre, as affluent as Corbeil is disadvantaged. This is to make the redeveoped Stade Coombes a "rugby stadium" housing Racing Metro XV and a new Rugby league club. The architects are tye Osmont family , formerly of Chatillon in their Elite One stay, and now responsible for Nanterre in DN One, below Elite 2. Nanterre in DN One is financial suicide, so the club faces questions over its future. Regis Osmont is well-connected politically, working for the French National Assembly. He has put foward his project to the relevant public authorities to support it.
However, I believe he is very frustrated by the lack of Federation action over Paris/IDF and I suspect he has not always seen eye to eye with Nicolas Larrat.
As to Larrat's plans he has said he envisages a Paris club in Elite One and then the championship. But so far nothing concrete has emerged. It remains crucial to identify potential investors and then the hardest bit to secure investment. I hope that the forthcoming international in Paris will be part of that process.
ParisSurtout the project in fact would not be based on the Stades Yves Manoir at Colombes aka Stade Colombes, but at the Stade des Bouvets Nanterre.
Racing Metro 92, an amalgam of Racing and the old Paris Local Authority clb, have been promoted to the Top 14.
Currently the play at Colombes, but the capacity is a far cry from the glory days, and considerably reduced. Redevelopment work is taking place there but even after that it will still only be 14,000 capacity. And it is shared with the football club. The club will play Top 14 games there next season at least.
But the Chair of Racing is planning to relocate to the nearby Stade des Bouvets at Nanterre. Capacity will be considerably increased to 30k plus and be very modern. This will be completed by 2011. He wants it to be a "rugby" stadium, and is open to projects that would include Rugby League. The very rich Hauts de Seine Conseil General would probably support this. Osmont has submitted his proposals to Nicolas Larrat and the French RL federation. So far he has not received a reply. He cites the model of Leeds Rugby as a viable model, beneficial to both sections, the stadium itself and local business.
Try thinking out of the box. What if the travel were subsidised? Who knows what clubs will be in what comps in say a couple of years. Might be more southern clubs.
I was not just talking about RLCN but about the whole range. Anyway RLCN is not "amateur" but officially " open". Some clubs pay players as we have seen at Coventry, Hemel, Dudley Hill, Featherstone , Dewsbury Celtic and others, (though not Bramley). So who knows what way it will go. We see change year on year.
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Post by Ryan N on May 11, 2009 16:37:42 GMT 10
MOre from Cliff on this topi... hes arguing with a guy on TRL Jesus Bowes. You ado seem so knee-jerkingly negative about things French. I recall your so negatively dismissive comments about Toulouse and their plans on the basis of the LER team at the time.
The world is dynamic. Clubs, people and teams change. The case for TO was always the economic, social and political underpinning, not the team on the pitch in a given season. Teams can be bought as the UK so amply and often demonstrates more easily than securing the other necessarries.
But as to Corbeil there are a number of issues. Thus far the club has not been planning for Elite One, but would feel honour bound if it won the Championship of Elite 2, to have a look at the possibilities and implications. I think the team has performed better than was envisaged. The club does do considerable development work, and has been commended for its work in what as ParisSurtout alludes to, as seriously disadvantaged areas.
But the club has a problem operating in the French context simply because it is so far from all the other clubs at the same level. Playing London or southern English based clubs, would actually be easier in terms of logistics and potentially lower costs. The club is also interested in the exploring summer Rugby league, which does not win much support from other French clubs.
These are reasons why Claude has been "thinking aloud" about other possibilities. Certainly Corbeil would not want to find itself in the position that Lyon found itself over the years, being in the Elite One comp without the a competive team.
Nor is there much in the way of a regional competition.
Claude would be delighted to see a full-time Development Officer installed in the IDF region, and he is admiring of the way things have gone in the London area. He would for example love to be playing London Skolars on a regular basis.
But our own championships in the UK change from season to season, so who is to say what will happen, and indeed what could happen.
I do not agree that amateur teams could not travel to Paris once a year. Heworth, the York NCL club, are sending their under 16s to Corbeil and feeder club Montgeron later this year, and after Heworth Chair Kenny sykes trip to France in charge of the NCL team next month, who knows how that might grow.
Amateur clubs are actually quite good at going to play in France. Stanningley under 15s go to St Martin de Crau near Marseille in two weeks time, Leeds Akkies travel a lot, South London Storm had a good exchange with Realmont near Albi. Indeed Realmont are coached by ex SLS player Hamesy. there are loads of exchanges in the amateur ranks, both winter and summer, so that is not automatically a proble.
But it is surely about exploring possibilities. The Channel is 20 minutes in the tunnel.
But on to ParisSurtout's pertinent points. Corbeil in the Essonnes is not the best place for a Paris flagship French club. It does produce young players better than many French clubs, but its location is not the most attractive for gaining media and business support, which must be one of the objectives of say a Championship playing Paris club.
There remains a project on the drawing board for a French club based near Nanterre, as affluent as Corbeil is disadvantaged. This is to make the redeveoped Stade Coombes a "rugby stadium" housing Racing Metro XV and a new Rugby league club. The architects are tye Osmont family , formerly of Chatillon in their Elite One stay, and now responsible for Nanterre in DN One, below Elite 2. Nanterre in DN One is financial suicide, so the club faces questions over its future. Regis Osmont is well-connected politically, working for the French National Assembly. He has put foward his project to the relevant public authorities to support it.
However, I believe he is very frustrated by the lack of Federation action over Paris/IDF and I suspect he has not always seen eye to eye with Nicolas Larrat.
As to Larrat's plans he has said he envisages a Paris club in Elite One and then the championship. But so far nothing concrete has emerged. It remains crucial to identify potential investors and then the hardest bit to secure investment. I hope that the forthcoming international in Paris will be part of that process.
Try thinking out of the box. What if the travel were subsidised? Who knows what clubs will be in what comps in say a couple of years. Might be more southern clubs.
I was not just talking about RLCN but about the whole range. Anyway RLCN is not "amateur" but officially " open". Some clubs pay players as we have seen at Coventry, Hemel, Dudley Hill, Featherstone , Dewsbury Celtic and others, (though not Bramley). So who knows what way it will go. We see change year on year.
It's an interesting thing. We have all this room for expansion in England, France, Wales, Ireland, Scotland and possibly Italy, all Rugby Union nations. So theoretically with the right support they could all become something like their Union counterparts. And the difference is, a lot of these countries would be coming off a similar starting platform, so Italy and Scotland might theoretically be more competitive than their Union counterparts. I mean, we need to try and market it, there's plenty of businessman interested in Rugby as a whole. Someone has to do something like the NRLUS involving all these regions, Paris, Southern England, Scotland, Ireland and Italy, and the difference is, there is already a base supporter base there possibly (well more likely than in the US). If only I had the money... |
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Post by Druzik on May 11, 2009 17:02:38 GMT 10
It's an interesting thing. We have all this room for expansion in England, France, Wales, Ireland, Scotland and possibly Italy, all Rugby Union nations. So theoretically with the right support they could all become something like their Union counterparts. And the difference is, a lot of these countries would be coming off a similar starting platform, so Italy and Scotland might theoretically be more competitive than their Union counterparts. I mean, we need to try and market it, there's plenty of businessman interested in Rugby as a whole. Someone has to do something like the NRLUS involving all these regions, Paris, Southern England, Scotland, Ireland and Italy, and the difference is, there is already a base supporter base there possibly (well more likely than in the US). If only I had the money... Look Itlay is coming along nicely as it is with Tizziano. They now have a good mix of local players as well as heritage players and have a domstic comp starting this year... of course the Franchini 9s is now a stable part of the European RTL calandar. Ireland and scotland also are growing nicely and will have semi pro teams in the championship 1 very soon as it is. Look its important to let teams just develop at their own pace, some will be quicker than others, but what we need is regular tournamsnts that allow teams to imporve and move up through the ranks. |
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Post by Ryan N on May 11, 2009 17:17:05 GMT 10
Look its important to let teams just develop at their own pace, some will be quicker than others, but what we need is regular tournamsnts that allow teams to imporve and move up through the ranks. I understand this, but the Super League can not handle this expansion, and for any of these nations to get anywhere there needs to be a professional team(s). That's why we need to develop France, or look for a European comp. I know it's something that seems rushed, but I think Europe can definitely handle it. I dunno, there's so many options, but there needs to be a second competition of the standard of Super League in 10 years. My personal opinion, that's all. |
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Post by Druzik on May 11, 2009 17:52:26 GMT 10
Look its important to let teams just develop at their own pace, some will be quicker than others, but what we need is regular tournamsnts that allow teams to imporve and move up through the ranks. I understand this, but the Super League can not handle this expansion, and for any of these nations to get anywhere there needs to be a professional team(s). That's why we need to develop France, or look for a European comp. I know it's something that seems rushed, but I think Europe can definitely handle it. I dunno, there's so many options, but there needs to be a second competition of the standard of Super League in 10 years. My personal opinion, that's all. But thats just it, it doesnt have to be in Super league. The championship level;s can handle this as well. If we can make at least another level fully pro then why not have it there. If the french get their act together then certainly they can absorb a team or two from italy as well as catalonia (spain). Russia is alraedy doing this with the Ukranian team(s). |
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