RL in Liverpool

[headtackle]

Living here any new sport would have an uphill struggle 

scousers are obsessed by football and that’s it!

you might attract them to odd big games but beyond that football comes first.  If no premier league games most would prefer to watch Marine, Prescot or some of the other amateur clubs

Saints are trying to do things with the local schools. Not many of them play rugby though so again up against it

[Liverpool Rover]

56 minutes ago, Waynebennettswinger said:

I have a friend, from the Wirral rather than Liverpool, who has a season ticket for both Everton and Saints. I accept that this is unusual though.

People from outside the Liverpool city boundary might be more likely to be more inclined but within the boundary forget it. 

[Guest]

I'm sure I remember reading in one of Tony Collins books (Great Split?) that at one point Liverpool (along with Manchester) was a rugby area? Obviously this was usurped by association clubs but it wasn't always as we know today. 

NB I aren't suggesting it is likely to change....just saying.

[Waynebennettswinger]

17 minutes ago, Liverpool Rover said:

People from outside the Liverpool city boundary might be more likely to be more inclined but within the boundary forget it. 

I would tend to agree with that. We did have a lad from Anfield who used to come over to train with us, long lost touch with so no idea if he still follows league but you’re right that there is little genuine interest in the city, football is just so dominant.

When I was growing up in Merseyside I followed a football team just so I didn’t feel left out. I am too old to care about that now

I do remember the lads playing football in my youth shouting 3 points to Wigan when anyone hit the ball over the crossbar! I gave up correcting them but this just showed how little they understood League, yet were aware of at least one clubs existence, I am not sure that would be the case nowadays.

[DC77]

18 hours ago, Liverpool Rover said:

That is probably the case elsewhere but not here. In all the years I’ve been here I can count on one hand the number of people who followed a different sport as well as football. Boxing is big here but the idea that you can follow another team sport is incomprehensible.

I have lived in Liverpool (went to University), been in students union bars etc. Like many other football dominated places such as Newcastle and Manchester, football is king, but as I say, you rarely restrict yourself to one sport (team sport in this case). When I say follow, I’m not saying they would have anywhere near the same devotion to another sport (If Sky lost rights to football they would ditch Sky, as I would, as would RL devotees with RL), however you would still watch another sport that appeals if it’s on TV, or possibly even go to a big event. When RU was appealing to watch it got significant ratings for the Five/Six Nations, pulling in casual viewers. With its decline as a spectacle ratings now would be more confined to RU diehards ie. people that put RU above all else and would watch anything related to the sport. 

[DC77]

18 hours ago, headtackle said:

Living here any new sport would have an uphill struggle 

scousers are obsessed by football and that’s it!

you might attract them to odd big games but beyond that football comes first.  If no premier league games most would prefer to watch Marine, Prescot or some of the other amateur clubs

Saints are trying to do things with the local schools. Not many of them play rugby though so again up against it

They are no more obsessed than Geordies or Mancs. Both are every bit as football obsessed as scousers and the cities are dominated by the football clubs.

However no populous is 100% one (team) sport. This would mean literally one sport, and that’s it, and when another one comes on (regardless of what it is) the channel is switched over. A significant number who follow a sport are casual viewers to others. Big events such as the Ashes (which dragged in Arsene Wenger who had never seen cricket), Five/Six Nations, these pull in casual viewers. 

Its casual viewers that a sport also needs to appeal to.

[Gerrumonside ref]

On 28/10/2021 at 11:29, Richard de la Riviere said:

thank you!

Hi, I’m afraid it’s bad news as we were unable to locate our Liverpool City programmes despite an afternoon at the weekend of digging around my father’s old boxes of sporting memorabilia.

The closest we could find was a Wigan vs St Helens programme from the 1960s with Ray Ashby playing at fullback.

So although my father saw him play, he’s unable to say whether he saw him play for Liverpool City or not.

 

Edited November 1, 2021 by Gerrumonside ref

[DC77]

On 30/10/2021 at 12:27, ShropshireBull said:

We are talking about mass participation.  Theres plenty of studies showing increased car use lowers areas of play.  As I said,  people of a certain generation like to blame gadgets or culture instead of the real culprits,  themselves. 

On getting big, didnt say PI were the only prob but as the codes globalised it is inevitable that ethnic groups more predisposed will be picked up. That clearly will be a problem for participation in Aus down the line. 

Not sure what the solution is although a few could be: junior RL by weight not age, reducing subs in the game and at the radical level,  having weight caps. 

The streets were flooded with kids playing in the 90s and early 2000s, the era I grew up in. It was constant noise. Those same streets are now largely empty, and It’s got nowt to do with cars. 

The size issue is a problem for the rugby codes as any sport where power can be such a determining factor in success means there will be no let up in “bigger, faster, stronger”, ultimately transforming the game further away from what it was. With weightier collisions it also makes it more dangerous. Can’t see anyway back for RU unless they radically change the game (speed it up, and remove mass changes, factors that would require players to have greater endurance, forcing them to trim down and look more human). RL the players still largely look normal, although they are in much better shape which makes it a tougher game for attackers to excell in, hence clubs have scoring records that date to East German records in athletics. 

[Eddie]

On 30/10/2021 at 19:43, Waynebennettswinger said:

I have a friend, from the Wirral rather than Liverpool, who has a season ticket for both Everton and Saints. I accept that this is unusual though.

It is, and the average person on the Wirral is different to the average person from Liverpool in mindset anyway. 

[Eddie]

On 31/10/2021 at 13:46, DC77 said:

They are no more obsessed than Geordies or Mancs. Both are every bit as football obsessed as scousers and the cities are dominated by the football clubs.

However no populous is 100% one (team) sport. This would mean literally one sport, and that’s it, and when another one comes on (regardless of what it is) the channel is switched over. A significant number who follow a sport are casual viewers to others. Big events such as the Ashes (which dragged in Arsene Wenger who had never seen cricket), Five/Six Nations, these pull in casual viewers. 

Its casual viewers that a sport also needs to appeal to.

Mancs have county cricket, Sale, Salford and Swinton, and I think a pro basketball and ice hockey team. Newcastle has both codes of rugby. There is a reason why Liverpool has none of that, as people above who’ve actually lived there and know what they’re talking about have stated. 

[Out on the full]

On 30/10/2021 at 20:31, headtackle said:

Living here any new sport would have an uphill struggle 

scousers are obsessed by football and that’s it!

you might attract them to odd big games but beyond that football comes first.  If no premier league games most would prefer to watch Marine, Prescot or some of the other amateur clubs

Saints are trying to do things with the local schools. Not many of them play rugby though so again up against it

I do wonder why Saints keep trying to break into Liverpool.  They are beating their heads against a brick wall IMO.  Sure, you do hear scouse accents on the terraces at Saints - quite a few actually - but I would guess they are scousers living in St Helens rather than based in Liverpool although of course I could be wrong.  I suppose Saints think since Liverpool is the nearest city they should try to take the game to the people there but I'm sure they could have more success in, say, Bognor Regis or Outer Mongolia.

[DC77]

6 hours ago, Eddie said:

Mancs have county cricket, Sale, Salford and Swinton, and I think a pro basketball and ice hockey team. Newcastle has both codes of rugby. There is a reason why Liverpool has none of that, as people above who’ve actually lived there and know what they’re talking about have stated. 

Greater Manchester (Salford) has Old Trafford as it dates from the mid 19th century when it was in Lancashire, a county (represented by Lancashire county cricket club) that included Liverpool and Manchester before the recent modern boundaries came into force. This venue was also there before (association) football was even a thing. Sale, Salford, Swinton, these are all Greater Manchester. The equivalent for Liverpool (Merseyside) has St Helens. RU in Newcastle (which only got off the ground after being bankrolled by John Hall) caters to the middle classes of the NE. 

Radio Merseyside has one hour of Rugby League per week, straight after the football. Does Radio North East? The Cricket thread (especially for the Ashes) is busy on Liverpool message boards (which I use a lot). The NFL thread is also busy. Ryder Cup thread for golf was a hive of activity, likewise any tennis slam.

Its a complete myth that “scousers are only interested in football”. It dominates the sports scene yes, but no more than it does with Mancs and Geordies. 

 

 

[glossop saint]

There seems to be a good few people coming on this to say that they live in Liverpool and follow rugby league but no one else in the city does and that it is all about football. Maybe if these people had the opportunity to go to a Liverpool club and to take a friend along then you would quite quickly get to enough fans to match most league 1 teams? I appreciate that this isn't the 10,000s that will be needed for a successful SL club but maybe over time it will be.

There is no doubt that football is king but just because a few Liverpool or Everton obsessives tell you that they only watch football then that doesn't rule out the whole city (and the Wirral which any club has the potential to draw fans from).

[gingerjon]

3 minutes ago, glossop saint said:

There seems to be a good few people coming on this to say that they live in Liverpool and follow rugby league but no one else in the city does and that it is all about football. Maybe if these people had the opportunity to go to a Liverpool club and to take a friend along then you would quite quickly get to enough fans to match most league 1 teams? I appreciate that this isn't the 10,000s that will be needed for a successful SL club but maybe over time it will be.

There is no doubt that football is king but just because a few Liverpool or Everton obsessives tell you that they only watch football then that doesn't rule out the whole city (and the Wirral which any club has the potential to draw fans from).

Apparently rugby league in Cornwall on three months' notice is amazing and how dare you have doubts, but rugby league in Liverpool must never be considered because reasons.

I can't see how we're ever likely to see a Super League side in Liverpool but we have previously seen semi professional clubs and decent grassroots activity and there's no real reason, if resources were there, that can't be done again.

[Northern Eel]

1 minute ago, gingerjon said:

Apparently rugby league in Cornwall on three months' notice is amazing and how dare you have doubts, but rugby league in Liverpool must never be considered because reasons.

I can't see how we're ever likely to see a Super League side in Liverpool but we have previously seen semi professional clubs and decent grassroots activity and there's no real reason, if resources were there, that can't be done again.

There’s also a question of whether we actually need super league sides in certain areas for the grassroots game to exist. Whilst super league continues to make its own bed, attendances at local community clubs are, in many cases, increasing. RL doesn’t actually need super league to a great extent, but super league does need community activity. 

[Eddie]

7 hours ago, DC77 said:

 

Its a complete myth that “scousers are only interested in football”. It dominates the sports scene yes, but no more than it does with Mancs and Geordies. 

 

 

Wrong I’m afraid. 

[Saint Toppy]

11 hours ago, Out on the full said:

I do wonder why Saints keep trying to break into Liverpool.  They are beating their heads against a brick wall IMO.  Sure, you do hear scouse accents on the terraces at Saints - quite a few actually - but I would guess they are scousers living in St Helens rather than based in Liverpool although of course I could be wrong.  I suppose Saints think since Liverpool is the nearest city they should try to take the game to the people there but I'm sure they could have more success in, say, Bognor Regis or Outer Mongolia.

I think people misunderstand Saints role across the Liverpool city region and what it is they're trying to achieve. Ignore all the Guff from KouKash, Saints have never had any sort of ambition of developing RL in Liverpool beyond the grassroots level. Yes they're trying to generate more interest in the game and attract more fans to Saints and yes they're working with community clubs in Liverpool (partly to hopefully uncover the next James Graham). They're also working along side local & national strategies to get more youngsters taking up sport.

But they've never tried to develop RL in the City as a major sport. They can see its football dominated and thats never going to change.

[fighting irish]

2 hours ago, glossop saint said:

There seems to be a good few people coming on this to say that they live in Liverpool and follow rugby league but no one else in the city does and that it is all about football. Maybe if these people had the opportunity to go to a Liverpool club and to take a friend along then you would quite quickly get to enough fans to match most league 1 teams? I appreciate that this isn't the 10,000s that will be needed for a successful SL club but maybe over time it will be.

There is no doubt that football is king but just because a few Liverpool or Everton obsessives tell you that they only watch football then that doesn't rule out the whole city (and the Wirral which any club has the potential to draw fans from).

1% is more than enough.

[DC77]

4 hours ago, Eddie said:

Wrong I’m afraid. 

Deluded. Also note you cut out the part that refuted your comment about what sports are played where.

2 hours ago, Saint Toppy said:

They can see its football dominated and thats never going to change.

It’s never going to change (in all likelihood), likewise for Manchester and Newcastle. However, most people who follow football are also casual viewers of other sports, and it’s those that should be targeted.

Go on the busiest forum of Liverpool FC (Rawk), Man Utd (Redcafe) and Newcastle (NUFC) and look at the other sport (general) sections, you will see a plethora of other sports being debated. The threads on US sports are substantial (large number of fans of the three clubs from North America use the forums), while cricket, boxing, F1, tennis (during a slam), golf (during Ryder Up/major) get significant comments/views. To a lesser extent RU also garners some interest, and then to a lesser extent there’s RL, the latter of which generates most interest in the Liverpool forum (one thread made up of four pages), the Man U one has one page in its thread, while Newcastle doesn’t have any RL thread. 

The interest in RL is small among the three places (as it is with RU really), which harps back to the point I’ve been making about both codes becoming more attritional, more physical, more defensively orientated/structured, providing less of a platform for individuals to make eye catching attacking plays and really stand out (thus becoming household names and generating clicks/interest) as Offiah, Hanley Robinson, Tuigamala were afforded previously. Being a much tougher, more restrictive game for attacking players has resulted in there being no star (ie. household name) in either code today so there’s no-one to talk about or pull in the casual viewer.

[Eddie]

2 minutes ago, DC77 said:

Deluded. Also note you cut out the part that refuted your comment about what sports are played where.

It’s never going to change (in all likelihood), likewise for Manchester and Newcastle. However, most people who follow football are also casual viewers of other sports, and it’s those that should be targeted.

Go on the busiest forum of Liverpool FC (Rawk), Man Utd (Redcafe) and Newcastle (NUFC) and look at the other sport (general) sections, you will see a plethora of other sports being debated. The threads on US sports are substantial (large number of fans of the three clubs from North America use the forums), while cricket, boxing, F1, tennis (during a slam), golf (during Ryder Up/major) get significant comments/views. To a lesser extent RU also garners some interest, and then to a lesser extent there’s RL, the latter of which generates most interest in the Liverpool forum (one thread made up of four pages), the Man U one has one page in its thread, while Newcastle doesn’t have any RL thread. 

The interest in RL is small among the three places (as it is with RU really), which harps back to the point I’ve been making about both codes becoming more attritional, more physical, more defensively orientated/structured, providing less of a platform for individuals to make eye catching attacking plays and really stand out (thus becoming household names and generating clicks/interest) as Offiah, Hanley Robinson, Tuigamala were afforded previously. Being a much tougher, more restrictive game for attacking players has resulted in there being no star (ie. household name) in either code today so there’s no-one to talk about or pull in the casual viewer.

Liverpool have a nationwide and global fan base, the people discussing Union on their forum almost certainly won’t be Scousers. 

[The Daddy]

2 minutes ago, Eddie said:

Liverpool have a nationwide and global fan base, the people discussing Union on their forum almost certainly won’t be Scousers. 

How do you know, Did you do a survey?

[The Future is League]

On 27/10/2021 at 00:00, Eddie said:

Yep. They don’t have a RL team either. 

Correct. The RFL didn't want one there

[Eddie]

58 minutes ago, The Daddy said:

How do you know, Did you do a survey?

No, but I lived there for 18 years and know the place very well. 

[glossop saint]

Isn't the point of expansion to expand and find new markets, fans and players? Saying that a city doesn't have many people that are aware of rugby league is surely the perfect place for expansion. I have enough confidence in the game that people new to the sport will like or even love it (there are enough examples on this very forum), unfortunately I don't have the confidence that the administrators of the sport have enough of a plan to make a concerted and targeted effort to make it successful and sustainable (though I do think this is understandable in some instances).

[DC77]

4 hours ago, The Daddy said:

How do you know, Did you do a survey?

I’m afraid he’s making it up as he goes along. 

First it was “Mancs have county cricket”, when Lancashire county cricket included Liverpool who were part of Lancashire. Then it was “Manchester has RL teams”, when it’s Greater Manchester that has RL teams just as Merseyside has a RL team. 

Basic history/geography, especially to anyone from the region.

And if Mancs have this greater interest in RL, why is their 2021 RL thread less than 1 page (total 24 comments) while the equivalent 2021 RL thread on RAWK (LFC) is 4 pages? And Geordies? No thread at all... zilch, nada, goose egg. Scousers have the greatest number of posts, on RL, in their busiest football forum. 

Four pages (while the most) isn’t much at all. For comparison sake the 2021 cricket thread on RAWK, 269 pages....scousers have no interest in cricket apparently. “Ahh but that number must be solely down to foreigners as LFC have a global fanbase” (which still wouldn’t counter why RAWK has more RL comments than the Manc and Geordie forums).

The interest in RL across all three groups is small, as I said from the get go, but the casual interest in sports other than football is significant across all three. 

Back to the original point, no region is shut off. Make something appealing enough and it will attract new interest. If you look at stuff that goes viral, across all sports, more often than not it’s eye catching plays. Without question there are infinitely less of them in RU than there used to be, hence no household RU player today, and I’d say it’s almost certainly the same for RL, and it also doesn’t have a household name today. The increase in size, the increase in power, the lack of wide open spaces like before, no individual can excell like an attacking player once did which made them star. The coverage has increased, yet fewer kids could name a RL player today (outside the heartlands, i don’t think they could name any)

https://www.theguardian.com/sport/no-helmets-required/2017/may/16/rugby-league-players-bbc-coverage-tv

Mark Evans on the Tony Collins podcast (12:30 onward) talks about the change in physique (he thinks RU will have radical rule changes, and also go down to 13 players). He mentions smaller players from both are still around (Shane Williams in RU, Reagan Grace in RL), but there are far fewer of them now, and the like of them don’t weigh 11 stone like many once did neither. 

The gist of it is, the collision codes have to change the rules, in order to stay the same (that’s maintain the basic elements of the game). The problem for both is while players have got bigger, stronger, faster, it’s also dramatically changed the look of both (more so RU, but that’s academic). It’s made them harder, more attritional. So if no individual can stand out now anywhere close like before, who is there for casual observers to get interested in?