Canadian looks to spoil Wolfpack’s league debut
When the Toronto Wolfpack make their debut Saturday in London in the third-tier English rugby league, a Canadian international will be standing in their way.
English-born Louis Robinson, one of the London Skolars’ leading forwards, qualifies to wear the Maple Leaf because his grandfather was from Ottawa. The sixfoot-one, 230-pounder came to the attention of Canadian rugby league officials some six years ago when, surfing the Internet during a break from studying for exams at university, he shot them an email.
“They wrote me back almost straight away,” he said.
A couple of weeks later, Robinson got a plane ticket to play for Canada against Jamaica.
On Saturday, the 26-year-old and his Skolars welcome Canada’s first pro rugby league team — and the sport’s first transatlantic entry — to the Kingstone Press League 1 for a game being broadcast in both England (via Premier Sports) and Canada (GameTV).
“I can tell you we’ve injected a lot of life into League 1,” Wolfpack CEO Eric Perez said proudly.
The Wolfpack are certainly good for the box office. “We expect to get our biggest crowd, ever,” Skolars GM Jac Davies said.
The London team normally draws 500 to 600 fans per game at the New River Stadium, whose main stand seats around 1,000. Davies expects 1,500 Saturday, with the overflow in concrete terraces.
The odds are against the London team. Toronto is a fully professional side, while the other teams in the league are semi-pro — the Skolars have day jobs, from plumbers and electricians to teachers and engineers, and train three times a week.
Robinson used to work in the Skolars’ commercial sales department but now is with a company that designs publications for sports events.
The Wolfpack are a global bunch from Australia, England, Ireland, New Zealand, Scotland, Tonga, the U.S. and Wales as well as Canada internationals Rhys Jacks and Tom Dempsey, who like Robinson have Canadian bloodlines.
The team will be based in the north of England, travelling to home games in Toronto as needed.
Toronto debuted last weekend in a win over amateur side Siddal in the Ladbrokes Challenge Cup.
Toronto’s home opener is May 6 against Oxford RLFC.