Gloucester in talks with former England lock prospect

I think you have the two teams back the front Nick. New Zealand is the ultra-physical, burst-based Super style, Top 14 is grinding.

What wouldn’t the New Zealand rugby public give to...

Haha I got excited for some inspiration and thought you were going to say.. "have them both playing for the All Blacks!" there! Lets hope theres some Top 14 upsets and two teams with few French plays make the final so all the stars can tour NZ then!

Assuming that the RFU don't wish to sack SB, which I don't think they will, then they need to put their hands in their pockets and hire an experienced "Director of Rugby" to mentor the entire coaching group until they can make robust enough decisions.

He’s also going to grind into dust key players like Bell and Thor. It’s a long season and next year will be similar with the Lions. The players already play too many games.

Schmidt is a good technician but he is a poor head coach as the latter requires planning 2-3 years ahead. See Rassie with his squad rotation for example and his use of OS players. The blueprint is there but Schmidt not bright/able/poor judgment whatever it is to get it.

On the USA, that is true, but again seasonal differences are going to be a huge factor, not to mention travel costs for away games.

Fiji would likely be included in TRC after their most talented start playing SRP, since their international break will be the same as the rest of the RC nations.

SRP is going to be hugely financially backed with the new Silverlake investment into NZR, so we should see me TV advertisements and academy expansion, which will overall improve the teams and thus the competition.

I don't know anything about this 'worldwide sports league'. Can you please tell me about it? I can't be bothered reading through bureaucratic nonsense from WR anymore.

For a variety of reasons I watched the Welsh coverage, and it was excellent.

I didn't understand most words, but "Will Skeleton" seemed to stand out all the time!

It would be great if the islands could get funding to build a nice 10k+ seater stadium, plus more on the benches etc. I just feel Super is the best way to get those other nations up to speed for inclusion into RC faster. Maybe if all of Fiji's talent had to play locally theyd be quality rivals?

Problem with your singular direction I see is that the game needs another angle to get that revenue generation up so that it can entice those Top 14 players back. I think the easiest first step is to get that revenue up and entice those players back into the local competition then expand into the Islands (what that sctrucure like stadia are equal in quality) and have those players player in the Japan and US teams form the basis of a couple more Island teams.

Remember, a late game start in the US is a nice afternoon start to the footy window in NZ and Aus!

Oh did you see the reports of the new world league again, I don't necessarily like it but that's the market i'm talking about!

Get a debutant in ya!