Hmmmmm

Who didn't see this coming.

No London nxt year in superleague, or a ploy for Brentford to get the club on the cheap???????

It would seem their long suffering owner has pulled his funding, as he has threatened to do for a while......

Don't know how to create a link but it's breaking news on sky sports news at the mo.

It looks like one of the following to me:-

a) typical under hand business move to clear the club of debt to enable a new owner to come in.

b) a pre cursor to the club closing down as business. Then a completely new club is formed in the capital or we have a 13 team superleague or a team from the championship are promoted or Toulouse join.

Brentford RLFC ??????

If they are going to start again they will struggle for players according to their board they only have a hand full (max 6) of players on in preseason which they have organised them selves.

Feel for the remaining people at London. With only 6 seniors on the book, 3 members of staff. They have 15-20 academy players.

That aside, if like to see Krasniqi and McMeekan at Leeds.

Where have the rest of their senior squad gone?

I would really like to see RL work in the capital. I hope somebody can build a strong club there at elite level. I read a lot about good things happening at junior levels.

2013 Midseason - Out: Craig Gower (Newcastle Knights)
2014 Out: Jamie O'Callaghan (London Skolars), Jamie Soward (Penrith Panthers), Mark Bryant, Chad Randall, Chris Melling (Retirement), Tommy Lee (Salford City Reds), Luke Dorn, Scott Wheeldon, Michael Channing (Castleford Tigers), Chris Bailey, Antonio Kaufusi (Huddersfield Giants), Dan Sarginson, Tony Clubb (Wigan Warriors), Ben Fisher (Retirement), Matthew Cook, Oscar Thomas, David Howell, Liam Colbon, Alex Hurst, Michael Witt, Mike Bishay, Mason Caton-Brown, Shane Rodney, Michael Robertson, Shane Grady, James Woodburn Hall, Harry Little, Iliess Macani (Released).

As much as both the RFL and Sky want a RL presence in the capital, it is simply not sustainable. 58% of London's residents are from a non-indigenous parentage, and therefore less inclined to follow or be attracted to RL (please don't take that as a racist comment as it isn't - RL has always struggled to attract both players and supporters from immigrant back grounds).
Also London has a million and one other sports/pastimes/activities that a non-established sport has to compete with.

I've said it for years, RL is a parochial northern sport – always has been, always will be. Every attempt to expand the sport at an elite level, beyond its established heartlands has been futile. London, Wales, Paris… really, there is no point.

The RFL need to concentrate their resources on the pre-established clubs instead of these expansion follies and stop wasting time and money on non-starters.

I know Danny Ward's down there assisting with some youth project....

...anyone got any XXL playing shorts?

I don't think it needs to be restricted to a northern sport at all. I agree to an extent with your point on London, but don't agree on the geographical argument.

Wales, Bristol, Northampton, Nottingham, Leicester, IMO could all make it work in the long term, and if we put as much effort into areas like that as we have with London.

I am cheesed off with this though. London must have known their intentions as much as two months ago, yet they wait for the week of the announcement of the fixtures to announce this. They don't have a squad of players, so how on earth, even if financial security is found, are they going to be able to compete next year. Either we need to go with 13 clubs next year, or we promote Featherstone, Halifax, or Sheffield. What does it matter for them as the bottom two are going back down in 2015 anyway. So what do they have to lose.

What about the Skolars? Could they be the saving grace of rugby down south. From what I hear from colleagues in London who have children playing for them they're very well run and the area they sit in has had a big resurgence in following RL.

The reason I think RL could work there is that it's in a poorer area. Let's be honest RL is a working class sport. The Broncos were trying to do well in an RU hotbed just outside the rather exclusive area of Richmond. Also couple in with that to commute from the north east of London where there's a lot of English and Australian RL fans to the south west of London isn't that cheap (when you consider the higher costs of living in the capital) and probably takes you over an hour too.

Agreed.

I am also not altogether happy with just accepting that "immigrant" communities don't play RL. Doesn't feel like an intractable problem to me.

The entire game is set up for the best interests of the majority of clubs. The majority of clubs happen to be in a pretty small geographical area, so we set ourselves up to try and overcome the problems they face.

London are different in pretty much every way, and the set up we have clearly isn’t working for them. The pretty obvious reason for this is that London don’t face the same problems as everyone else in SL, so having a league set up to solve problems London don’t face but everyone else does is clearly never going to work for London or any expansion club.

London needs to be treated differently, it needs different help and if it gets it they will be a success.