Sitona

Why aren’t they showing the match on mainstream TV? No BBC 1 or 2, you will have to search for it, won’t attract any casual or new viewers

Catalans travel costs last year were close to £500000, so probably would be the same, in total, for them to pay for clubs to go to Perpignan. I am not sure that it is sustainable for one club to pay out close to £1million per year for travel alone. If this is to happen, I suspect that the club will fold very quickly and we will revert to a M62 sport.

Neil Fox is my number 1

That 13 logo is a classic that should still be used!

I remember Grandstand on the BBC showing the second half of a match nearly every Saturday in the late 60s early 7Os. Everyone knew Eddie Waring, Up and Under and Hull Kingston Rovers!

We pay £33 per month for the entertainment package and full HD sports package. We just go through cancellations at the end of our contract and they always do a deal.

Devon to headingley about 6 hours with breaks

Dutton never said the target was 750000 he actually said said the aim was to match the 570k that the womens euros got and to get as near to the ‘stretch’ target of 750000 “The goal now for organisers is to try and get near to the target of around 570,000 tickets that were sold at this summer's women's European Championships. With the tournament already near the total ticket sales of the last Rugby League World Cup held in England nine years ago, Dutton and his team are aiming to get as close to their 'stretch target' of 750,000 sales as possible.”

I would maybe look at the same type of structure theT20 World Cup has gone down with a prelim qualification for the two main groups. Don’t get hung up on attendances, the cricket doesn’t and there have been massive 92k games and some with a couple of thousand. This World Cup keeps getting compared to 2013 for attendances on this site. In 2013 there were slightly higher numbers at the grounds, but almost zero TV audience. This time we are in a massive cost of living crisis, many people can’t afford heating or even food and we are still expecting to fill stadiums, even die hard fans are thinking twice let alone newcomers. But, the bbc has gone all out with showing all the games, many on prime time on their two main channels along with other RL related documentaries and to date has had over 10 million viewers, that can only be good for the game and should encourage new supporters for the future.

Rugby League matches are 80 minutes. Shortening matches means it is not Rugby League any more!

How many think that the attendances in 2013 were helped by the fact that most is the matches were only shown on an obscure PFV TV channel that only die hard fans would subscribe to. in 2023 all the matches are on BBC an I guess a few million non-RL viewers will have watched by the end of the tournament. If only a few become regulars either at grounds or on TV that is only good for the game. If the product on the field is good enough people will watch I have not heard anyone say I don’t like rugby league because they don’t seem to have many supporters. The TV audience is important, we don’t all live near the M62. I live 350 miles from Leeds so only get to 3 or 4 games per season.

OK, the NRL grand final was 82k but the season average for the NRL was 15k. The WC final at Old Trafford will be near 75k capacity and average so far is 11k so not much different. the opening game at this year’s WC had a bigger attendance than the Final in Brisbane in 2017

Crowds are unlikely to be reported as higher than they actually are as the tax returns are likely to be audited at some point as £15 million of public money has been provided.

Government funding comes from the Northern powerhouse initiative. government committed £25 million towards the tournament and its legacy with up to £15 million pledged to support the staging of the event and up to £10 million for Rugby League’s facilities through large community projects, such as refurbishing changing rooms and installing new artificial pitches, as well as smaller-scale initiatives including supplying new kit or equipment to clubs.

There are always people who obsess over crowd figures. Those that attend are only a fraction of the audience given that all the matches are on major prime time BBC channels. Some are comparing attendances this year with 2013 but the most of the matches then were on an obscure pay for view channel. Lets see the final viewing reach the exposure that the RL is getting is fantastic and will only be good for the game!