\n\tBY JOHN DAVIDSON\n<\/p>\n
\n\tThe Super League XIII clubs have voted against moving their season to summer, with the French domestic competition now expected to stay in winter.\n<\/p>\n
\n\tThe French Rugby League Federation has been keen to move the Super League XIII into winter, to better align with the NRL’s global ambitions, make the sport in France more popular and to garner more local media attention.\n<\/p>\n
\n\tBut the clubs have been against this push, with fears that a move to the summer months would be affected by hot weather and lead to even fewer players and fans involved. The 2025-2026 season started in September and finishes in May, with the grand final to be held on June 6 between Carcassonne and Pia in Paris.\n<\/p>\n
\n\trugbyleaguehub.com Long Reads understands the Super League XIII clubs voted 6-5 against going to summer.\n<\/p>\n
\n\tAccording to sources, the Federation tried to push the plan through but has been unsuccessful.\n<\/p>\n
\n\t“The Federation claims that there’ll be more media coverage in the summer, but that’s ###### because Catalans and Toulouse hardly get any, so why would lower division teams?” one individual involved said.\n<\/p>\n
\n\t“It’s too hot and part-time players go on holiday in the summer.”\n<\/p>\n
\n\tOne of the key proponents of a move to summer is Federation president Dominic Baloup.\n<\/p>\n
\n\tBaloup told L’Ind\u00e9pendant last month: “The idea is to play during a period when the media is more accessible. Between July and September, there\u2019s a window of opportunity to establish a presence, attract partners, and grow the business.\n<\/p>\n
\n\t“Some know that, without change, they\u2019ll disappear economically in three to five years. If we don\u2019t change, we\u2019re dead.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"BY JOHN DAVIDSON The Super League XIII clubs have voted against moving their season to summer, with the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":703075,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[567],"tags":[64,63,760,85],"class_list":["post-703074","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-rugby","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-rugby","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/703074","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=703074"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/703074\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/703075"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=703074"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=703074"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=703074"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}