Super league- League Cup

[Forster6063]

Rather than the same old loop fixtures, would anyone buy into another trophy more?

12 team comp, drawn into 4 groups of 3 with a guarantee of two games, then semi’s and Final at a new, somewhere different 30-40k capacity stadium.

Read an article the other day, regarding the charity shield. As much as I don’t buy into it, I just feel we play a lot of rugby for not a lot of trophy lifts compared to football.

What fans don’t want a day out and bragging rights.

and I know it’s still the same fixture, but with a different meaning would it add more?

GF, Shield, Challenge Cup, and a league Cup.

no more rugby just a bit more to play for.

[Wanderer]

cracking first post Forster.
Welcome to the board 

[whatmichaelsays]

All the fun of loop fixtures and all the box-office pull of the early rounds of the Challenge Cup, rolled into one handy package. 

The answer isn't to find ways to sell more rugby. It's to make the rugby we have more valuable and more appealing to people who don't currently buy it. 

"Stack it high, sell it cheap" doesn't work in the entertainment industry. 

[Forster6063]

1 hour ago, Wanderer said:

cracking first post Forster.
Welcome to the board 

Cheers mate

[Sir Kevin Sinfield]

No we need less Cup games not more, they are very poorly attended until the Final.

[Wellsy4HullFC]

If it added variety, I'd be for it.

But it won't, because it's the same games in a different dressing.

A cup involving teams from other leagues and nations would be variety... but we don't have any teams to do that against.

[THE RED ROOSTER]

In favourt if it could be sold to terrestrial television as a seperate package from the Pay TV deal.

[GUBRATS]

1 hour ago, Wellsy4HullFC said:

If it added variety, I'd be for it.

But it won't, because it's the same games in a different dressing.

A cup involving teams from other leagues and nations would be variety... but we don't have any teams to do that against.

Well , we do actually , but last time we tried it , it wasn't pretty 

[Forster6063]

1 hour ago, Wellsy4HullFC said:

If it added variety, I'd be for it.

But it won't, because it's the same games in a different dressing.

A cup involving teams from other leagues and nations would be variety... but we don't have any teams to do that against.

you’d just hope it would inspire teams lower down the league, or a 5th/6th place to have a go...

One team doesn’t generally win everything in football, start seeing a Salford/Cas/KR lift a trophy, pushes them onto GF’s etc.

We probably don’t need another comp tbh, just need to find away to make other teams compete for silver.

[Eddie]

2 hours ago, Sir Kevin Sinfield said:

No we need less Cup games not more, they are very poorly attended until the Final.

You want to get rid of the Challenge Cup?

[Hela Wigmen]

I’d rather people just get over the fact that their are loop games. 

[DimmestStar]

8 minutes ago, Hela Wigmen said:

I’d rather people just get over the fact that their are loop games. 

Exactly. Loop games are currently a financial necessity and a new cup competition would see half the clubs getting only one game from it and not necessarily at home.

Ideally we should have 14 teams in Super League which provides 27 games including magic weekend. We should be working towards this maybe in a couple of years when clubs have (hopefully) started to recover from the financial blows dealt by COVID.

Until then we are going to have loop fixtures so let's just get on with it.

[Forster6063]

2 hours ago, DimmestStar said:

Exactly. Loop games are currently a financial necessity and a new cup competition would see half the clubs getting only one game from it and not necessarily at home.

Ideally we should have 14 teams in Super League which provides 27 games including magic weekend. We should be working towards this maybe in a couple of years when clubs have (hopefully) started to recover from the financial blows dealt by COVID.

Until then we are going to have loop fixtures so let's just get on with it.

I’d like to see a a 2nd cup that would see season ticket holders watch the early round/group stage, that SL host.

it’s still your same amount of games/game at home. if you was guaranteed one home, one away before semi’s.

 

[Sir Kevin Sinfield]

12 hours ago, Eddie said:

You want to get rid of the Challenge Cup?

I didn’t say that but it has become stale and needs reforming 

[Forster6063]

47 minutes ago, Sir Kevin Sinfield said:

I didn’t say that but it has become stale and needs reforming 

The big sides need putting in earlier...

I know there will be blow out scores, and that..

 

but for your little teams, a big day out at a SL club, plus the chance for SL to player youth players...

CC has gone stale because if you win 3 games your at Wembley.

and the Semi is also a day out at Bolton

[whatmichaelsays]

13 hours ago, DimmestStar said:

Exactly. Loop games are currently a financial necessity and a new cup competition would see half the clubs getting only one game from it and not necessarily at home.

Ideally we should have 14 teams in Super League which provides 27 games including magic weekend. We should be working towards this maybe in a couple of years when clubs have (hopefully) started to recover from the financial blows dealt by COVID.

Until then we are going to have loop fixtures so let's just get on with it.

The problem with that "well we know you don't like the product but we need it so just suck it up, buy it and quit your moaning" is that, as a way of appealing to your customers, it's a pretty lousy way to do it. Quite damaging in fact. 

The "loop fixtures are a necessity" argument is an argument based on zero-growth thinking and short-termism. Over time, there is evidence that they're damaging the product in the long term. At the end of the last "normal" season, there was a tail-off in crowd figures that many attributed to "fixture fatigue". Only a Grade-A idiot would ignore that evidence and carry on as if nothing is wrong. 

We're approaching a point where the pandemic has broken the habit and inertia of season ticket buying and that habit may not return. In many areas of life there is a trend towards "unbundling" products (eg, TV services like Netflix vs bundled satellite and cable services, mobile phone SIMO plans vs bundled phone plans, DIY travel and low-cost airlines vs package holidays). You can't assume that RL will remain immune from that and if it is the case that fans start buying tickets more flexibly, trying to "bundle in" games to a season ticket that people don't really want isn't going to work. 

There is nothing to stop the game finding an alternative to loop fixtures - something that people will want to buy, will happily pay good money for and would hopefully broaden the sport's appeal. 

 

[Eddie]

59 minutes ago, Sir Kevin Sinfield said:

I didn’t say that but it has become stale and needs reforming 

Any suggestions for how to do that? 

[whatmichaelsays]

10 minutes ago, Forster6063 said:

The big sides need putting in earlier...

I know there will be blow out scores, and that..

 

but for your little teams, a big day out at a SL club, plus the chance for SL to player youth players...

CC has gone stale because if you win 3 games your at Wembley.

and the Semi is also a day out at Bolton

How does any of this appeal to people who don't watch RL? It all seems to be designed to maybe, possibly if the draw if lucky, give fans of smaller clubs - people who already watch RL - a "day out". Is that really what RL is lacking? 

[Forster6063]

12 minutes ago, whatmichaelsays said:

How does any of this appeal to people who don't watch RL? It all seems to be designed to maybe, possibly if the draw if lucky, give fans of smaller clubs - people who already watch RL - a "day out". Is that really what RL is lacking? 

Not at all, it’s about presenting the opportunity of a giant killing...

The hope, that the likes warrington etc field one too many youngster and under estimate a Oldham/Rochdale.

At present it’s too easy to get to Wembley and that’s why people have lost interest.

[whatmichaelsays]

12 minutes ago, Forster6063 said:

Not at all, it’s about presenting the opportunity of a giant killing...

The hope, that the likes warrington etc field one too many youngster and under estimate a Oldham/Rochdale.

At present it’s too easy to get to Wembley and that’s why people have lost interest.

So the way to appeal to new supporters is to hope that a Super League team might not play their first team players against a team from the lower leagues? 

The reason that people don't watch the cup is because we don't give enough chances to Oldham or Rochdale to get through to the next round? 

[RugbyLeagueGeek]

11 minutes ago, Forster6063 said:

Not at all, it’s about presenting the opportunity of a giant killing...

The hope, that the likes warrington etc field one too many youngster and under estimate a Oldham/Rochdale.

At present it’s too easy to get to Wembley and that’s why people have lost interest.

I'm not necessarily disagreeing with you here, but how are we gauging if people have lost interest? Attendances are always poor for the Challenge Cup because it isn't on the season ticket. And if we want to retain the unpredictable nature of a traditional format knockout competition, then there isn't any way around that problem as I see it.

In terms of tv viewing figures, my guess (without having the figures to hand) is that the Challenge Cup gets far higher viewing figures than SL by virtue of being on the BBC. So arguably, it's of far greater interest to the wider public than SL. 

Attendance figures at the final appear to be down, but I'd be interested to know how much of that is potentially concerned with years of austerity and/or relying on the same dwindling pool of supporters to turn up, year on year. Also, those supporters now have another 'festival of RL' type event in the Magic Weekend to consider.

Either way, I agree that interest in the CC seems to be down, but I'm not sure I could put my finger on one precise cause. I suspect it's a combination of factors.

[Forster6063]

No what we do is little the whole game down to about 4 teams who then get to join SL for a tiny tournament to Wembley.

 

More opportunity’s would be given for a Cup run if the big boys came on early as they would probably draw each other and if you fell on the right side of the draw you could find yourself in the last 4 

[Forster6063]

9 minutes ago, whatmichaelsays said:

So the way to appeal to new supporters is to hope that a Super League team might not play their first team players against a team from the lower leagues? 

The reason that people don't watch the cup is because we don't give enough chances to Oldham or Rochdale to get through to the next round? 

 

[whatmichaelsays]

4 minutes ago, Forster6063 said:

No what we do is little the whole game down to about 4 teams who then get to join SL for a tiny tournament to Wembley.

 

More opportunity’s would be given for a Cup run if the big boys came on early as they would probably draw each other and if you fell on the right side of the draw you could find yourself in the last 4 

Removing last year's tournament out of the equation as it was a bit of an anolomy, the Challenge Cup doesn't seem to have a massive issue with having non-SL clubs reach at least the QF stage:

2019: Bradford (QF) and Halifax (SF)

2018: Leigh (QF)

2017: Featherstone (QF)

2016: 

2015:  Leigh (QF)

2014: Leigh and Keighley (both QF)

2013: Sheffield (QF). 

That's as far back as I can be bothered to go, but it doesn't seem to me that, with a decent cup draw, non-SL clubs can't make a decent go of making it to the last eight. Without looking, I'd suggest that record above compares well with the domestic clubs of other sports. 

If the issue is that the SL clubs are too good for those Championship or L1 clubs, then the answer to that is not to hope that those SL clubs field weaker teams. Who wants to pay £20-odd to watch [L1 club] vs [SL club's fringe players]? 

[RugbyLeagueGeek]

8 minutes ago, Forster6063 said:

No what we do is little the whole game down to about 4 teams who then get to join SL for a tiny tournament to Wembley.

 

More opportunity’s would be given for a Cup run if the big boys came on early as they would probably draw each other and if you fell on the right side of the draw you could find yourself in the last 4 

I agree that this would improve things a bit, but I can't see it making a massive difference to the final's attendance (other than negatively).

If one of the big boys does get knocked out early, then we have a situation where the RFL panics that we're facing the prospect of a low attendance for the final because London/Catalans/Toulouse/ might actually get there instead of Wigan or Leeds and it's going to knock 20k off.

If the minnows enjoy a bit of a cup run, personally I can't see that increasing the likelihood of their fans attending the final if they still get knocked out by the quarter final stage.

The issues are more varied than this on its own I believe.