[HibeeJibee]

An initial 18 host stadiums for the 2013 Rugby League World Cup have been announced this morning. A reminder of the groups:

Quote

Group A... Australia, England, Fiji, Ireland
Group B... New Zealand, Papua New Guinea, France, Samoa
Group C... Scotland, Tonga, Italy
Group D... USA, Cook Islands, Wales

(In C & D the teams play their 2 opponents and a 3rd match v the team directly above/below them. The top 3 in Groups A & B and the winners of Groups C & D then advance to the Quarter-Final stage).

Host cities announced as follows. Each hosts 1 group game unless stated:

Quote

England...
... Bristol
... Halifax
... Huddersfield
... Hull [2 stadiums]... 3 group matches
... Leeds... 1 group match, 1 QF
... Rochdale
... St Helens
... Salford
... Warrigton... 1 group match, 1 QF
... Whitehaven... 3 group matches
... Wigan [2 stadiums]... 1 group match, 1 QF

Wales...
... Neath
... Wrexham... 1 group match, 1 QF

Ireland...
... Limerick

France...
... Avignon
... Perpignan

Opening Match, SF and Final venues are to be announced... likely to be large venues like Millennium Stadium, Old Trafford, Wembley.

Regretably, no matches will take-place in Scotland, which is quite disappointing.

[EdTheDuck]

Well, I'll be blowed
Scotland has a rugby league team....

[HibeeJibee]

EdTheDuck, on 28 November 2011 - 14:43, said:

Well, I'll be blowed
Scotland has a rugby league team....

And a fairly decent one, not that there's a huge amount of competition.

They qualified for the last World Cup and went on to miss-out on a Semi-Final Qualifier place on Points Difference.

Last autumn I saw them play a European Nations Cup game at Glasgow Hawks (the winner of the tournament - Wales - qualified for the Four Nations which finished last week).

I had hope a Scottish venue might've been chosen, for our games.

[ICTChris]

My dad played rugby union with a guy who went over the border and played league for Wigan, that would be back in the 1960s though. My dad met him years later and said that he was the hardest guy he'd ever played with, a wee scrum half.

I quite like watching rugby league, I used to enjoy the NRL on Setanta and I'll sometimes try to catch Super League if I'm at loose end and it's on Sky. I don't envy the authorities organising the RLWC - essentially there are only a few countries where it's a really popular sport and one of them is Papua New Guinea. It's important that they develop the game in the 'smaller' nations and Wales didn't disgrace themselves in the recent Four Nations, perhaps a sign of progress. It'll take a lot to break out of the traditional heartlands in the North West though - rugby union has a stong tradition in Scotland and Glasgow Warriors and Edinburgh find it hard enough to pull in crowds.

[HibeeJibee]

Aye, true. When the tournament was last in the UK in 2000 they had Scotland matches at Firhill and Tynecastle. By the looks of it no Scottish city bid to host games this time... just a bit of a shame IMO.

[T_S_A_R]

18 venues for a sport played semi seriously by 3 countries.

the cricket world cup has a rival in the ridiculous tournament stakes.

[HibeeJibee]

T_S_A_R, on 28 November 2011 - 17:16, said:

18 venues for a sport played semi seriously by 3 countries.

the cricket world cup has a rival in the ridiculous tournament stakes.

In the end, it'll be 21-22!!

It probably makes financial sense, tbf - in that each club/venue, regional media and local authority will push the particular match being held in their town or area. So there'll only be 1 match in your town or county, generally, and if you're a rugby league fan/interested neutral you'll likely go to it. Meaning more chance of sell-outs.

It also means most traditional heartlands get something, alongwith Ireland/France/Wales.

Strange one's Bristol...

[Desert Nomad]

My mate is from Leeds and he got me into watching Rugby League. Have been to a couple of Rhinos games including the challenge cup final at Murrayfield, and also May madness, where they play the entire weekend card over two days in the same venue, huge value at £24 at the time. I can't stand Union, but League is a faster, more entertaining spectacle all together.

[HibeeJibee]

Desert Nomad, on 28 November 2011 - 19:47, said:

League is a faster, more entertaining spectacle all together.

That's certainly be my experience, although I also enjoy and formerly played Union.

I remember an interesting article several years ago now by Gavin Hastings discussing what Union needs to do, long-term, to combat the likely increase in brute power, slow play and lack of vibrancy... all things which are starting to manifest themselves. His conclusion was that you reduce the opportunity to kick points; widen the park - except that isn't possible, with purpose-built stadia, so you take-out 1 or 2 players; and eliminate (supposedly) 'competed' scrums/post-tackle pile-ups.

As he said though, only 1 problem. That's dangerously close to Rugby League!!

[Bluenose5]

I will throw it out there and make some very early group predictions.

Group A:
1. Australia 2. Poms 3. Fiji 4. Ireland

Group B:
1. NZ 2. PNG 3. France 4. Samoa

Group C:
1. Tonga 2. Scotland 3. Italy

Group D:
1. Wales 2. Cook Islands 3. USA

I agree with what HibeeJibee has said about why they have probably chosen as many venues as they have, just to limit the areas to one match to fill it out as much as possible and also expose league to areas it might not be normally exposed to. The 4 Nations comp is pretty much like a world cup in alot of ways but this is good to see some of the other nations get some competitive games under their belt and help them progress.

[Jeek]

If i'm still here i'll definitely pop down to ashton gate (or new stadium) to watch

[denltfc]

HJ might know but was the draw seeded somehow because Ireland's group looks shit hard with Aus and Eng along with Fiji in the group compared to the groups that Scotland and Wales have ? I know that A&B send 3 teams to the quarters but still rather be in C&D and fighting out for the one spot.

It seems according to wiki the world rankings are as follows
Pool A: 1,3,7,12
Pool B 2,4,5,8
Pool C 9,10,13
Pool D 6,11,16

Ireland's game in Thomond Park according to the Irish papers will be against Australia, they will get hammered.

[T_S_A_R]

denltfc, on 30 November 2011 - 10:50, said:

HJ might know but was the draw seeded somehow because Ireland's group looks shit hard with Aus and Eng along with Fiji in the group compared to the groups that Scotland and Wales have ? I know that A&B send 3 teams to the quarters but still rather be in C&D and fighting out for the one spot.

i'm guessing they set it up so there is guaranteed big games in the group stage without the chance of a big team missing out.

[HibeeJibee]

Yes, I think there was an element of drawing involved but teams were definetely 'assigned' to pools as well. Same thing goes on in the CONCACAF Gold Cup, it'll be to ensure big clashes/derbies/etc.

[tigerton]

You've said that Wigan have 2 venues, but one of them is in Leigh, about 300 yards from my flat. Work with a bunch of lads who like their rugby league, but I haven't got into it at all yet. I suppose if Scotland play at Leigh Sports Village, I might head over. Would he rude not to.

[djchapsticks]

What a ridiculous competition. Only Australia, New Zealand, England and France play RL to any sort of level, everyone else is just about amateur. In fact a friend of a friend was pressing for the Scotland RL squad 3 years ago. He played RU for Paisley at the time and worked full time in a gym.

[Gowfer_Lichtie]

How many of the Scotland players are actually Scottish? I am not having a go, just genuinely interested as a follower and occasional player of Union.

[ayrunitedfw]

Gowfer_Lichtie, on 08 December 2011 - 21:20, said:

How many of the Scotland players are actually Scottish? I am not having a go, just genuinely interested as a follower and occasional player of Union.

Rugby Union is streets ahead of Rugby League in my opinion.

[Bluenose5]

Gowfer_Lichtie, on 08 December 2011 - 21:20, said:

How many of the Scotland players are actually Scottish? I am not having a go, just genuinely interested as a follower and occasional player of Union.

I would say the large majority of the Scottish team are Scottish and a fair few of them would play in the English Super League or the tier below.

Another person said its a ridiculous competition and that Australia, England, NZ and France play it to any sort of level, I personally think thats a pretty harsh comment. Yes, not many teams have the best of chances of winning it and its really down to 3 but countries like Wales play it at a higher level now as was shown in the recent 4 Nations competition and countries like Tonga, Samoa, Fiji and Papua New Guinea all have plenty of players who play at the highest level in the NRL down here. Im not going to judge League against Union as I follow both codes and both have good aspects of the game.

[HibeeJibee]

Pool stage + QF venues announced.

http://www.bbc.co.uk...league/17476146

http://www.rlwc2013.com/fixtures

No dates yet bar opening double-header at the Millennium Stadium on Sat 26 October... Wales v Italy, Australia v England.

Scotland play Tonga + Italy at Whitehaven, USA at Salford.

[tigerton]

Tonga vs the Cook Islands at the stadium beside me. No thanks. One of Scotlands matches is in Salford though, which is 15 minutes away. Might go to that.

[A-Mac]

When is this on?

[Swarley]

A-Mac, on 24 March 2012 - 05:58, said:

When is this on?

HibeeJibee, on 23 March 2012 - 16:04, said:

Pool stage + QF venues announced.

http://www.bbc.co.uk...league/17476146

http://www.rlwc2013.com/fixtures

No dates yet bar opening double-header at the Millennium Stadium on Sat 26 October... Wales v Italy, Australia v England.

Scotland play Tonga + Italy at Whitehaven, USA at Salford.

And given it's World Cup 2013 I'll put on my Sherlock Holmes deerstalker and say from 26th October 2013!

[A-Mac]

Swarley, on 24 March 2012 - 07:16, said:

And given it's World Cup 2013 I'll put on my Sherlock Holmes deerstalker and say from 26th October 2013!

I should read more than the first couple of posts

I could actually be over there at that time.

[airdrieman]

Rugby League is the better of the two codes. FACT
Looking forward to the tournament and hopefully I'll even be able to make it down to a few games.
As for how many of Scotland's players are actually Scottish, a few years ago you'd have been lucky to find more than a handful of them that were Scottish but now I'd say the majority of their players are due to a change in policy (Steve McCormack the Head Coach wants to play more Scottish players now instead of Englishmen or Aussies) and because there's now more and more Scottish players playing rugby league including David Scott who's currently playing U20s for professional side Hull KR. There's plenty of more young talent coming through the youth player development centre too at U18s, 16s and 15s ( I should know being one of them ) and there's more and more teams pooping up around the country now.