gingerjon

They announced a new podcast, I think, during one of the last BBC broadcasts. Can't see anything else about it though.

I’m very much in favour of it as a method of getting serious bids with solid investment.

The value they've assigned it is, to my mind, too high - and the five year window too long. And, TBH, I wouldn't necessarily have a problem with Super League doing an equivalent. Heck, the lowest tier used to require a bond paid in advance that would be equivalent to over £100k now.

On the RTE page, it is the main rugby headline. That is quite a way down the page as GAA and soccer dominate the page today but it is there at least.

Piccadilly Circus is indeed where tourists go to be ripped off, correct.

How to write a news article that gives absolutely no new information whatsoever

I make it that, of the top 13 listed, 11 are fundamentally Australian domestic. KFC's Australian marketing seems to be sports focused a lot of the time. That is not true of its UK marketing. Kia, in the UK, go through cricket? Worth noting, I just googled Kia's partnerships and, on their UK page, they mention the Australian Open but not the NRL.

The bookies are on rotation at the darts. It's invariably one sponsoring the tournament, another sponsoring the coverage, and then a whole bunch of bookies ads during the breaks. And then they just shuffled the chairs the next time.

No one(*) is saving for a home as it would take about a decade of saving money they don't have to afford even the most entry level of homes. They do seem to like a quick bets via the phone. (* - I know this is a massive generalisation but seems to hold for most people.)

Which is one of the reasons why I suspect it's not actually been the most generous of sponsorships. I'm not particularly sorry to see it end.

The partnership has come across more and more as a mate helping out something he likes. There's no issue with that but it's the same reason non league football clubs are sponsored rather than the motivation that sees Subway sponsoring the women's football league cup.

Two reasons. (But I do agree that we don't need to see it as the end of the world - yet). Reason One - Fred sponsors *everything*. That's unhealthy. Reason Two - Our recent track record in recruiting and retaining sponsors does not seem great.

I don't disagree - and I think I've been pretty clear about my view of the merging of the divisions and the overall lowering of standards.

The Ashes series, at least, had a different named sponsor

But for two glorious years, before the total collapse of the sport, we would have dragged all the clubs down to the same level. Which does seem to be what some people want.

There does also come a point where the split wouldn’t actually be supporting any clubs.

That's a really good observation. I have no idea about the post season structure but any home play off should be sold as the biggest deal ever. *And* have fun event stuff going on as well.

There is no way London average 5,000 in Super League without putting the work in now.

I’m not convinced there’s a massive market for D1 rugby league at this time either. That’s why the Broncos (in my view, other opinions are available) need to be getting very good at putting on events. They cannot be expecting to suddenly have 5,000 committed rugby fans turning up - there needs to be some attempt to be drawing people who want fun sport, decent events etc. At the minute (and, again, happy to be shown I’m wrong) I’m not seeing a huge amount that shows they get their market.

How we haven’t landed a decent 0% drink sponsor is a bit of a mystery to me. I would have thought that would be a good fit but … well, times are tough and maybe others just have different views.

For specific things, I think there is a fair bit of truth in that. A lot of pre-streaming culture is like a voyage of discovery only made by a few - simply because we aren't living in a time when kids were at home with nothing but daytime TV that was showing old films etc. I know a lot of kids/young adults don't have the same instinctive understanding of what an analogue clock is showing. Not that they don't necessarily know but it's almost like translating a language in your head versus being fluent. Videos and cassettes, I think they do know. But probably wouldn't have the first clue what to do if given a VHS tape, a connected video player and a remote control. They all seem to know about vinyl though! There's probably a ton of day to day things from before I was born, possibly not even that long before, that I probably wouldn't recognise. But, like anyone, I don't know what I don't know.

Couple that with the voluntary moving away from highly visible gambling advertising that is being led by soccer and this all feels somewhat inevitable.

I think this is the disappointing thing. There is obviously money and it really doesn't cost a huge amount to put on a few things at each game that just give it a bit more of an event feel. Those things then look good on socials etc.

As I said on the London thread: in the absence of any announcement, the clubs have been told that everything is being decided by grading. They also have a comprehensive grading framework with the scoring laid out. So it might be rubbish but, as of now, it is a 14 team top tier, the rest in a second tier, places decided by known grading framework.

In the absence of any announcement, they know exactly what the system is planned to be.