Canadian rugby

[marvinparsons Profile]

Men's Sevens Roster: http://www.rugbycanada.ca/leagues/newsl ... age=101534

Of the 21 players, 14 are from BC and 7 are from Ontario. None from anywhere else in Canada.

In Ontario all but 1 are from the GTA (Belleville) and even then he plays at Queens which is old school GTA money/connections and Belleville is at least driving distance to Toronto. Not a guy from Windsor, Ottawa, London, Sudbury, North Bay. Nada.

Looking up NHL players I randomly looked up highest point totals of active Canadian players. I didn't know the answers beforehand.
Hometowns:
London
Edmonton
Aneroid Saskatchewan
Cole Harbour NS
Halkirk Alberta
Mississauga
Thunder Bay
Regina
Montreal
Brampton

So 2 of 10 are from Rugby Canada's only source of players. I'd guess Jerome Iginla, Ryan Getzlaf, Sidney Crosby, Shane Doan and Eric Staal would be slightly better than OK at rugby!! But...they'd barely get a look or decent training without moving 1000 kms.

The strength of Canada in rugby is our population, which is very large, but the policies in place make it extraordinarily challenging for anyone outside of certain geographical locations to move up the ladder.

The players there aren't as good, admittedly, but that is in large part because access to higher levels is stunted by RC/Unions.

[grande Profile]

Hey boys, just wanted to say Happy Thanksgiving to you all. Hope it's a good one!

[rusty_lock Profile]

Hey boys, just wanted to say Happy Thanksgiving to you all. Hope it's a good one!

Thanks, we live in the US now so Thanksgiving is going to be at a local restaurant that serves turkey.

[marvinparsons Profile]

Interesting article on how New Zealand youth system works: https://www.stuff.co.nz/sport/rugby/all ... and-barrel.

Unlike Canada they actually have scouts (50!) watching all tiers of rugby so as not to miss anyone, film games for central viewing and have position specific coaches keeping tabs on players to assess their strengths and weaknesses. A major theme is trying to reduce travel demands so everyone deserving can make it up the pipeline.

[jonny24 Profile]

So, Toronto Wolfpack is sponsoring Rugby Ontario's Magnificent 7s. Start of more cooperation between codes?

[Canadian_Rugger Profile]

Probably talent spotting youth and getting the word out. It was also announced that a consortium is putting a League team in NY to begin play in 2019. Talk right now is that Super League is going to go back to licensing with a couple of more French clubs, Toronto, London and a few other NA sides set to join the fold.

[sk 88 Profile Website]

Licencing was a big failure for them, and very divisive in the heartland, I'd be pretty surprised if they went back to that. Especially as Toronto are surely showing the advantages of getting an early season of easy wins in the bag whilst you find your feet.

I suppose London going tits up and the Catalans being in the relegation play off has emboldened the expansion at all costs brigade and converted a few of the swing voters.

[Canadian_Rugger Profile]

They may keep promotion/relegation but Super League is too small if they are actually serious about expansion. It was a failure because it's commercially unattractive, especially since most of the teams with the exception of Catalans are literally a stone throw from each other.

[gambass Profile]

Talk right now is that Super League is going to go back to licensing with a couple of more French clubs, Toronto, London and a few other NA sides set to join the fold.

There are some old usenet archives from the 90's where people were arguing about a Super League featuring the likes of Barcelona, Moscow or Milan. Sounds about the same, but with different names.

Still, the Wolfpack, from an european eye, seems surreal. Five figures crowd for a sport no one knows anything about ? Crazy. I don't know how viable long term this venture really is, but their achievment so far is kind of amazing. Is the Wolfpack's success (so far) duplicable in Canada or elsewhere ?

[4N Profile]

There are some old usenet archives from the 90's where people were arguing about a Super League featuring the likes of Barcelona, Moscow or Milan. Sounds about the same, but with different names.

Pretty sure you meant to include Paris? The PSG league club was an interesting story. The difference today is Catalans and Wolfpack have succeeded so more will follow.

[gambass Profile]

Pretty sure you meant to include Paris? The PSG league club was an interesting story. The difference today is Catalans and Wolfpack have succeeded so more will follow.

It was about the same time period. The PSG inclusion drove them crazy back then. PSG might be an interesting story, but that is also one of the worst ill conceived pro team ever. Players were supposed to constantly switch between their local clubs in the south and Paris for a start

Catalans is a very different story than London, Paris or Toronto as the game was alway relatively popular there. In Perpignan, they didn't create a team out of thin air.

[Canadian_Rugger Profile]

Pretty sure you meant to include Paris? The PSG league club was an interesting story. The difference today is Catalans and Wolfpack have succeeded so more will follow.

It was about the same time period. The PSG inclusion drove them crazy back then. PSG might be an interesting story, but that is also one of the worst ill conceived pro team ever. Players were supposed to constantly switch between their local clubs in the south and Paris for a start

Catalans is a very different story than London, Paris or Toronto as the game was alway relatively popular there. In Perpignan, they didn't create a team out of thin air.

Yes there are some decent Rugby League clubs in Southern France. Toulouse is playing in the Championship and is also pushing with Toronto for Super League inclusion. There is talk of Lezignan and Avignon trying to make a go of it in the English Leagues as well.

My feeling is Super League needs to expand to at least 18 teams, reinforce the big clubs in the M62 beltway but expand elsewhere. League 1 needs to merge with the Championship and will serve as a semi-professional/minor league feeder system for the Super League. It needs to become licensed and go to a conference system to maximize the number of teams and also look at deriving more money from Television deals.

Conferences could be:

Northwest England:

St Helens
Widnes
Warrington
Wigan
Leigh
Salford

Yorkshire:

Leeds
Castleford
Wakefield
Huddersfield
Hull KR
Hull FC

Metropolitan:

Toronto
New York
Montreal
Catalans
Toulouse
London


Teams play Home/Away against their conference (10 games) and play either home or away (12 games) against each team in the other conferences. Games could be organized as tours of geographic areas (Toronto, New York and Montreal could be grouped in to the same tour of games). 22 game regular season, playoffs would be top 2 in each conference plus two wildcards spots for next best records. Quarter-finals, Semi's and Grand Final. 25 games total. With room left over to run the Challenge Cup.

[4N Profile]

Speaking of Barcelona, I'm sure Catalans would start to take more matches there if bigger markets like NYC and Montreal were to end up in their league.

[rusty_lock Profile]

Nice little article on Ardron from NZ rugby site...

https://www.stuff.co.nz/sport/rugby/sup ... signed-him

I have been watching him play Mitre10 cup and have to say that I was a little worried after the first couple games but he seems to have grown into it. Given the right environment I think this could be what he needs to take his game to the next level.

[RugbyPUBtbilisi Profile]

Is an extended squad already published? 21 days left until the match.

People were talking that Canadians will bring lots of guys from A side. Is that true?

[grande Profile]

McCormick Cup final is this weekend: Brantford v Balmy Beach. Will anyone at Rugby Canada notice?

[rusty_lock Profile]

McCormick Cup final is this weekend: Brantford v Balmy Beach. Will anyone at Rugby Canada notice?

No

[rusty_lock Profile]

Is an extended squad already published? 21 days left until the match.

People were talking that Canadians will bring lots of guys from A side. Is that true?

Typically they bring a split squad on the Nov. tour. They have some european professionals that are only availble for part of the tour. We'll see what this years holds. There has been no announcement on squad yet from RC.

[jonny24 Profile]

McCormick Cup final is this weekend: Brantford v Balmy Beach. Will anyone at Rugby Canada notice?

You know, if Brantford got to host, I'd probably go. But I'm not driving to Markham.

[IrishLock Profile]

McCormick Cup final is this weekend: Brantford v Balmy Beach. Will anyone at Rugby Canada notice?

You know, if Brantford got to host, I'd probably go. But I'm not driving to Markham.

Looks like it will be streamed live so you don't need to leave the comfort of your home....

https://www.facebook.com/RugbyOntario/p ... =3&theater

[jonny24 Profile]

Thanks!

[Run34 Profile]

Some interesting names in the Brantford and Balmy Beach rosters for the McCormick Cup. Aside from the recent Canada caps (Howard, Rumball, McDonnell) I couldn't help but notice some other names stand out. For Brantford I see they have Jordan Kozina and Dylan Mundy on the wings. Kozina had played 7s for Canada for a spell even appearing for the nats at the 2009 7s World Cup. Mundy had appeared for Canada U20 back in 2011. For Balmy Beach, one-time Canada hopeful Conor McCann started in the centres. He had spent some time at the Clermont Auvergne Espoirs side, as many young Canadians seem to do. It's always interesting to see which players continue playing rugby even after national side aspirations have faded. Great to see these guys carrying on.

For those in the know, is there a website dedicated to the game in Ontario (Aside from RugbyOntario.com)? A BC Rugby News-like Ontario counterpart? I'd love to be able to check in and see what's going on back east from time to time.