Trojan

All great players indeed but who played before the time that I supported Fev. Gerry Round Ken Hirst Neil Fox Alan Skene Jan Prinsloo Harold Poynton Keith Holiday Jack Wilkinson Milan Kosanovic Mal Sampson Don Vines Brian Briggs Derek Turner I used to support Trinity before I learned better

What about the cup? And who will be Leeds U's derby with next season? Huddersfield? Sheff U? Barnsley? Hull City? Doncaster? Middlesborough perhaps. All in the same "area" i.e. Yorkshire. Bradford City are closest but not in the same League - Farsley Celtic are even closer and in the same city.

Chris Bibb Martin Pearson Steve Quinn Paul Newlove Owen Simpson Graham Steadman Deryck Fox Karl Harrison Richard Chapman Chris Burton Peter Smith David Hobbs Brendan Tuuta Jeff Grayshon Stuart Dickens Keith Bell Alan Banks

What does constitute a derby in sport? Hull v Hull KR is certainly a derby. As is Leeds v Hunslet. But does Saints/Wigan really count as a derby? Or Leeds/Bradford for that matter? What about Bradford/Keighley? I've cited Cas/Fev. The grounds are probably only 3 miles apart and they are both in Wakefield met - but Cas is a town and so is Fev. And what about Wakey? What about Batley, Dewsbury and Huddersfield - all in Kirklees MDC? Swinton and Salford would surely count wouldn't they? Obviously in soccer Wednesday/United is a derby. Presumably Villa v City, but what about West Brom? Arsenal/Spurs? what about the other London sides? And Man City and Man U are actually in different towns, although they're both called Manchester. Liverpool/Everton is certainly a derby - you can see one ground from the other. So what do we in RL call a derby? And has there ever been a definitive definition of one?

In my experience everyone in Wigan believes in him

Gordon Brown (the Scottish Union player not the PM) appeared on a sports chat show in Oz in the eighties with Andy Gregory - Brown was a bit miffed to find that Gregory was the main guest - Brown had never heard of him.

The more the merrier for me. Perhaps we can produce a tough inner core for the England team. Then we may stand a chance of at least running the Aussies close if not beating them in a series. That's what happened in the late eighties early nineties. With our top players playing in Oz we came within a whisker of beating them in series several times. I suppose Jamie Peacock is too old now, but I think he (and we) would have benefitted from his going to Oz from the Bulls instead of Leeds. Perhaps Tomkins and Eastmond could be next?

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I used to know a 'Fax fan quite well, (this is in the eighties) and he regarded the Bradford game as the most important of their season. I suppose 'Fax have more derby possibilities than most given the proximity of Bradford, Rochdale, Oldham, Huddersfield and Keighley. Presumably in the old days when 'Fax and Fartown took it in turns to play in the Lancashire League, the Oldham and Rochdale fixtures were their derbies.

In 1938 they attracted a then record crowd of 54k for a RL Championship Final to Elland Road. The game was moved there from Wakey and they used the Parkside posts. Must count as the biggest derby game ever.

May not be the biggest as far as crowds go, but in terms of intensity and passion Fev/Cas must be no.1. Trouble is they're a bit few and far between these days. And when Cas get kicked out of SL Fev will take their place so there'll still be no derby games.

I believe Eddie Waring built a Dewsbury championship winning side based on guest players during wartime.

I've been away in Whitby, and am just catching up. One point I would repeat though is that everyone writes about crowds on here as though they are a static commodity. "The crowd watching team a. can be cajoled in to watching team b." Crowds are not static commodities they are dynamic, their composition changes. I would guess that had Fev beaten Wakefield at Huddersfield in 1998, and gained access to SL many of those who now go to Belle Vue would be coming to PO Road. They wouldn't be deserting Wakey it's just that at the time they were not RL supporters, some of them perhaps weren't even born. The same applies to 'Fax and the Giants and Bulls. Probably to Widnes, Saints and Warrington too. It is the removal of the possibility of one's team being able to compete with the big boys IMO that has depressed the crowds in the Chamionship, and possibly deterred potential supporters from watching Championship rugby, and the absence of anything to play for in the second half of the season has possibly depressed crowds in the lower end of SL. Plus of course taken away the spice, the bite of fear or anticipation.

No it wouldn't have meant the death of the game. It might have meant the death of some clubs, (many clubs even) from what we now know Wigan for certain. Probably others too. Not Leeds, not Hull, probably not Saints. But the game would have continued and clubs been resurrected like the Welsh Union clubs were. Perhaps a stronger leaner fitter game, but more importantly without being hooked on Murdoch. The reformed clubs, born out of necessity would perhaps have been the merged ones suggested by the Murdoch deal, but crucially they would not have been perceived to have been forced on the various clubs' fans but grown from the fans' need for a team to support. It's all "ifs and ands" but I thought at the time that the deal would be bad long term for RL, and IMO it has been.

But Warrington, Hull and Huddersfield are not really short of money, are they? Perhaps when the likes of Wakey, or Cas, or Salford knock out one of the big boys the romance will be back. I'm not holding my breath, turkeys don't usually vote for an early Christmas.

Because Mo stampeded them. Presumably with threats and possibly bribes (for the clubs) of big money. We weren't there, we don't know. What we do know is that it was all decided in a couple of weeks, not really a way to plan long term for a fairly major sport. We're still suffering from Mo. Wigan were still suffering from him when they sold Central Park, fortunately that nice Mr Whelan bailed them out. Who's going to bail RL out?

In 1987 Fev and Oldham were relegated. Oldham knocked Wigan out of the cup the same season. There is no way that an upset like that would happen today - not Oldham knocking Wigan out, but a bottom SL side knocking out one of the big boys. The playing field has never been level, but at the moment the slope in favour of the big clubs is precipitous. For me all this talk of franchising being a way to expand the game is a red herring. If the expansion clubs threaten the hegomony of the big names, then somehow or other they'll be stamped upon. Unless franchising is abandoned and abandoned quickly we'll really be up sh!t creek. The big clubs don't seem to be able to see that they are digging a pit and sooner or later they, along with the rest of us are going to fall into that pit.

But in those days a club like Fev stood a chance of winning the CC. In fact they did. And in '86 Cas won it, and in '87 'Fax won it. What chance have they got today? None - that's why the CC crowds have declined. And the lack of P&R, of games that matter is why the Championship crowds are declining and why at the lower levels SL crowds are also declining. The spice of the upset has gone from the CC and the edge of P&R has gone from SL anad the Championship. Unless we sort it out one way or another - in ten years there'll be no game to sort out. Steve Fox in this week's LE humourously perhaps, points the way things might go if we go on the way we are going.

There've been GB games at the Reebok too, and Loftus Road, for that matter. There were also cup semi finals and JP semis and finals at the old Burnden Park. And of course the old Boothferry Park. Didn't Wigan play Warrington at Green Bay Packers ground?

The fact that we're still having this argument three years down the line surely illustrates that large numbers of RL fans are unhappy with the type of game franchising has produced - a game with no "edge" to it. How would it be if at Wimbledon they'd said to Venus Williams's (or Federer for that matter) opponent, "Sorry kid, but Venus is a regular here, so until you win a few more semi finals we're not letting you play the big one, we're letting her (him) play it instead" Effectively that's what franchising does.

Ah. I knew that both League fixtures in the 87/88 season were in '88, because a. I went to both and b. I've a video of the Watersheddings game. I also went to Old Trafford. I must admit I don't remember the Maine Road game. Both Oldham and Fev must have been relegated that season, even though I remember Oldham knocking Wigan out of the cup in the snow.

I don't remember Fev playing Oldham at Maine Road in 1987. I remember them playing Oldham at Old Trafford in 1988. They played their home league game in 1988 at P O Road and the away game a week later at Watersheddings.