It's worth the money alone to send your best over. Especially when we were so successful in the World 7's.
If they expanded the competition to also include the Super League clubs, as well as QLD CUP and NSW CUP teams, that would make it one hell of a tournament.
I'd do this though:
8 groups of 6 teams
Australia:
NSW: Manly, Bulldogs, Canberra, Parramatta, Balmain, Wests, Illawarra, St George, Cronulla, North Sydney, Central Coast, Newcastle, Penrith, NSW Country, Easts, Souths (16)
QLD: Redcliffe, Brisbane Broncos, Brisbane Bombers, Gold Coast Titans, North Queensland Cowboys, Mackay Cutters, Ipswich Jets (7)
Others: Auckland Warriors, Wellington Phoenix, USA (always funny), PNG, Tonga, Fiji, Italy, Samoa, Perth, Adelaide, Melbourne (10)
UK: Wigan, Leeds, London, Hull FC, Hull KR, Catalans, Widnes, Huddersfield, Salford, Castleford, Bradford, Warrington, Wakefield, St Helens (14)
Every group has 2 NSW, at least 1 UK team (2 max) and the last 2 spots are made up of "QLD and Others".
Each team plays each other once, you have a squad of 15 and you must play everyone in that squad at least twice (team of 12 per game) in the group round.
Top 2 from each group go through to the Knockout Round.
If you are not in the 15 for your team, you can play for any of the other teams that are not in the NRL or Super League. Therefore, someone like George Rose could play for Country NSW, or Perth, or Wellington Phoenix for the tournament.
The group matches happen over Friday and Saturday, with every team playing 1 games (24 games) on the Friday, 4 (96 games) on the Saturday. The round of 16 to the Final happens on the Sunday. You'd play the games split over 4 grounds, with 2 groups at home at each ground.
Therefore:
Friday:
- Eden Park hosts 12 games at 30 mins each (incl. breaks etc) = 5pm to 11pm (6 hours)
- Mt Smart hosts 12 games at 30 mins each (incl. breaks etc (20 min game, 5min break in between and at the end)) = 5pm to 11pm
(2 games for 1 team each group, 1 game for the other 4)
Saturday:
These same 2 grounds play host to 24 games each, 12 hour day with an 1 hr break, starting from 10am, finishing 11pm.
They also bring in 2 more grounds to cover the other 48 games, at North Harbour (Stadium and adjacent Oval)
Sunday:
15 games, all at Eden Park. 7.5 hour day, starts at 9am, gets to 4pm, hour break, 5pm Final kickoff. Trophy raised by 6pm.
If you think that sounds like a lot...Manly as an example, would have to play at least 5 x 20 min games over 2 days...then if they were to make the Final, another 4 games just on the Sunday. That's 180mins of footy over 3 days. Not a bad effort for $500,000.
I think it would give the trophy a lot of value, especially if teams sent their full squads and made a serious effort at it as well. Imagine having a Manly vs Wigan GF again. That'd be awesome!!