Ten-team Super League on cards as NRL set out conditions for deal

A Super League involving six of the biggest British clubs and two French teams is a strong contender for the direction of travel if the NRL take control of the competition.

Talks between Australian and British rugby league officials have been taking place for a number of weeks, ever since a meeting was brokered in Las Vegas involving Wigan owner Mike Danson, Warrington’s Simon Moran and NRL supremo Peter V’Landys.

Reports in Australia have now suggested that the NRL will indeed consider proposals to take on a 33 per cent stake in the competition, which could be sold back to Super League at a later date.

But crucially, Love Rugby League has been told that V’Landys and senior officials in Australia are adamant that it will not be a pure investment into the competition.

V’Landys wants clubs to cede control of running the competition and allow the NRL to take a full autocratic leadership role. They are not interested in investing a financial sum – they want to transform Super League with their own hand.

And that could involve reducing the competition to just 10 teams. A report in the Sydney Morning Herald states that Leeds, Wigan, St Helens, Warrington, Hull FC and Hull KR would be locked in as part of a reduced competition.

Crucially, so would two teams from France: Catalans Dragons and Toulouse. Love Rugby League has been told that both IMG and V’Landys are steadfast in their determination for French clubs to remain part of any plans of a deal.

That would seemingly bring the sport to a line in the sand moment, with debates over the role of French clubs currently set to form part of a strategic review that will be delivered later this summer.

But V’Landys and the NRL will make it abundantly clear any notion to remove French clubs is not part of any deal the Australians would consider to take a stake in Super League.

Furthermore, IMG – whose criteria would remain and determine the other clubs that join the new 10-team league – are also insistent that French rugby league remains a firm part of the sport’s future.

Whether the clubs listen, or indeed give up their control to allow the door to be pushed open for an NRL deal, remains to be seen.

But there are now the strongest indicators yet that V’Landys and the NRL want to do a deal: not just to pump money into a black hole, but to assume control of British rugby league’s biggest competition and transform it for the better.

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