The franchise, which would be known as the Bears but still based in North Sydney, officially launched their bid to return to the top flight on Wednesday.

A desire to take games and allocate resources to areas like Wagga Wagga, Coffs Harbour, Dubbo and Tamworth was a key part of their pitch, while four to six home games would be played at North Sydney Oval.

The Canberra Raiders have already formed a strong partnership with Wagga, and will bring a third home game to the city in 2022.

"With COVID people are to moving to regional and rural parts of NSW, and we want rugby league and the NRL specifically to to have a stronger footprint there and have a very clear pathway for those areas," Dickson said.

"It's very important we don't sound like it's all approved, but it's a goal. The desire would be to engage with various regions, Wagga could be one of them, and as we do that we'd work with their development officers to see how we can assistant them with resources."

Dickson said the franchise, which would only be considered for entry into the NRL in 2025 at earliest, would hope to provide another pathway for local talent into the NRL.

"We'd like to offer two to four scholarships per year to kids who are high performers to come to Sydney, learn the craft and if there's a contract at the end, fantastic," he said.

"If not they go back to their region as a better player.

"It's also about not just bringing games to these areas, but what does the week leading up to the game look like?

"We'd look at how we bridge the gap so there's a true connection there, and people feel part of that journey."

The Bears have been in hibernation from the NRL since 1999, aside from an ill-fated merger with Manly.

A 17^th franchise called Dolphins which will be based out of south-east Queensland will enter the NRL in 2023.

The Raiders' Wagga fixture for next year will be confirmed when the NRL draw is released in the near future.