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Attendances (Multiple Merged Threads)


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Just now, Jughead said:

Beyond the first game, the whole London Broncos/Harlequins thing never really worked and it was really the start of the decline for Broncos. 

Botched delivery on the RL side, TBH

Build a man a fire, and he'll be warm for a day. Set a man on fire, and he'll be warm for the rest of his life. (Terry Pratchett)

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It would only ever work if the two sports were equal partners and the owner/owners treated them as such. But there's almost nowhere where that could happen because the host club - union or league -  is so well established in the local market, that the addition just becomes a revenue provider.

The only places I could see it working are Newcastle, where the union club isn't that strong, or (gulp, dons hard hat) Sale/Salford.  

Everywhere else, even if fans are open minded and are looking for another summer/winter interest, the imbalance would be too big and someone would come off worst.  

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16 hours ago, ShropshireBull said:

Because it was the first ever all french derby and many people from across the southern belt of france and would have gone. Tanking your own product to then say "Ha! Told you it wouldnt work! " is what someone who worked as a double agent for the RFU would do,not someone who cared about the sport. 

If it was giants first ever game vs Leeds I wouldnt shove it thursday night.  When toulouse have 20 plus years in SL like Huddersfield and Wakey your disengenuous comparisons would be valid. But they havent so they arent. 

You don't know that "many people across the South of France would have gone", you're surmising and guessing again.

I am going by the actual figures, bit what people think or hoped would have happened.

The fact is that regardless of what day, night, venue, traffic, weather etc, there wasn't enough interest in the game to pull in even 10,000 people across the South of France.

When it comes down to fact, figures and history it shows that less than 9,000 people went to the first ever all French super league game, it won't say (but it was a Thursday night so we can assume thousands more would have attended had it not been a Thursday nights) will it?

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17 minutes ago, Jughead said:

Botched idea across the board, tbh. 

I'm not saying it definitely would have worked - I think it could have but would have taken effort that wasn't there in the end -  but the way it was done pretty much guaranteed its failure from the off.

 

Build a man a fire, and he'll be warm for a day. Set a man on fire, and he'll be warm for the rest of his life. (Terry Pratchett)

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12 hours ago, Phil W said:

For me to grow the profile of the game expansion has to happen. Now this is where I put my tin hat on.

At Newcastle we share facilities with Newcastle Falcons and are under the banner of Newcastle Rugby. 

If I was in the RFL I'd be speaking to Premiership Rugby clubs around would they be interested in having league teams. Steve Lansdowne for example has loads of money and Bristol would be a great location. Rugby league and union under the same umbrella gives year round income. This could also work the other way, what's to stop the RFU approaching say St Helens and seeing if they want to get into union, again year round income generator.

 

I said before but if I had the coin I have League 1 team in the Scottish Borders and the Welsh Valleys.

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19 minutes ago, Tommygilf said:

Very decent crowd* at Salford tonight 

*relatively

That post started so well and then you seemed to lose all confidence 🤣

I must admit, the last few times I've watched Salford the ground has looked less of an issue. Not sure if they've just worked out how to spread them around better

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7 minutes ago, Dave T said:

That post started so well and then you seemed to lose all confidence 🤣

I must admit, the last few times I've watched Salford the ground has looked less of an issue. Not sure if they've just worked out how to spread them around better

Well you don't see that massive stand, and the stand opposite the camera whilst "tactically filled" is still pretty sparse.

Probably a mixture of spreading the crowd around better and a genuinely bigger crowd. Its a 12k capacity ground after all with 2 standing terraces.

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2 hours ago, Tommygilf said:

Not that hard pressed really though

I have a lot of time for your comments Tommy, and would be interested to hear in what way you think RL Is thriving in France and NZ? I know there are pockets in both countries. 

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8 hours ago, Eddie said:

I have a lot of time for your comments Tommy, and would be interested to hear in what way you think RL Is thriving in France and NZ? I know there are pockets in both countries. 

Thank you.

France is due to host a World Cup in the next 3 years which will be massive for RL in the country. To even be at that stage represents a massive amount of growth in the past 25 years. To now have 2 super league quality clubs is also massive.

NZ for its part has produced a player base and audience that is massive for the NRL. Because of the growth of RL within the Pacific diaspora within NZ, it is also the source of so much of the international game in the region too. 

Obviously the sport isn't as strong as it is in Australia in either, but the same could be said for the vast majority of the UK too!

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14 hours ago, ShropshireBull said:

More people would have gone on a weekend than a thursday night, people who believe otherwise are not intellectually capable. 

I don´t think Giant fans after a decade of woeful crowds should be lecturing any other club tbh. The status quo of clubs like Huddersfield has clearly failedthe sport. The lesson is not to tank your own product.  

But again, you're guessing and surmising, you don't know if people would have turned up or not.

You need to get over the fact that Huddersfield are alive and well, it's not doing you any good.

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5 minutes ago, Scubby said:

That's 900 over the capacity at Moor Lane. Salford hopefully now thinking big not small!

Could have been a lockout at Moor Lane and we’d have had priceless FA Cup-style footage of local urchins climbing trees to get a glimpse of the action. 

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On 09/06/2022 at 14:56, steve oates said:

.........But it didn't work. Despite the massive on field success Hetherington didn't see any real growth despite the magnificent cup feat and he eventually declared RL was simply not working in Sheffield. 

Just for reference, this is complete bulls hit.

Hetherington sold Sheffield as a very solid going concern and integral member of the top flight about 18 months before they won the Challenge Cup. And has never, ever, made any comment whatsoever about "RL simply not working" in the city.

The Sheffield story does highlight the importance of key individuals whose own abilities can make clubs, and the perils that can follow when those individuals leave. The idiots who followed Hetherington thought they were genius businessmen, but they didn't have the first clue about running a Rugby League club in a non-RL area like Sheffield.

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4 minutes ago, M j M said:

Just for reference, this is complete bulls hit.

Hetherington sold Sheffield as a very solid going concern and integral member of the top flight about 18 months before they won the Challenge Cup. And has never, ever, made any comment whatsoever about "RL simply not working" in the city.

The Sheffield story does highlight the importance of key individuals whose own abilities can make clubs, and the perils that can follow when those individuals leave. The idiots who followed Hetherington thought they were genius businessmen, but they didn't have the first clue about running a Rugby League club in a non-RL area like Sheffield.

It's annoying when people repeat untruths like this and it undermines their entire arguments. I remember the same poster making the same claim previously and being corrected. Once may be accidental but to just repeat it again suggests an agenda at play.

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46 minutes ago, M j M said:

Just for reference, this is complete bulls hit.

Hetherington sold Sheffield as a very solid going concern and integral member of the top flight

The Sheffield story does highlight the importance of key individuals whose own abilities can make clubs, and the perils that can follow when those individuals leave. The idiots who followed Hetherington............

 

Sheffield Eagles (Wikipedia) Just as the club seemed to be on the verge of its greatest period, following the win in the cup final, things began to go wrong. The expected increase in attendances did not happen and the team did not perform well, finishing close to relegation. Finances plummeted and with little outside help it became apparent that the Eagles were not viable in their current state. Just a year after performing the greatest upset in Challenge Cup history, the Eagles announced that they were to fold at the end of the season should no investors come on board to save the club.

I also personally recall the disappointment that the Wembley Victory did nothing to boost the Eagles in terms of attracting people to play Rugby League in Sheffield and new people to come in and provide greater levels of investment. We should beg to differ. You appear to be saying if Hetherington had stayed Eagles would now be still in Superleague, with bigger crowds and with a relatively strong presence in schools and a significant number of Amateur clubs developing the kids into professionals?  Are you?

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4 minutes ago, steve oates said:

You appear to be saying if Hetherington had stayed Eagles would now be still in Superleague, with bigger crowds and with a relatively strong presence in schools and a significant number of Amateur clubs developing the kids into professionals?  Are you?

I'm not saying anything of the sort, stop creating false binaries.

But we can be very certain that if Hetherington had remained the club would not have gone bust and would not in a million years have merged with Huddersfield. For starters he would never have begun paying over the odds for players or budgeted for huge increases in crowds which would have driven the club out of business if/when they didn't turn up.

Sheffield had to be run as a tight ship, it was never going to be a great moneymaking venture and its success (by which I mean a reliable SL club with 3-5,000 crowds and financial stability) came through doggedly sticking around, embedding themselves locally, grabbing attention where they could, spotting and signing players on the cheap who would overachieve and being willing to cash in on good players that other clubs would pay good transfer fees for (Powell to Keighley and Aston to and then from Fev being the obvious examples).

Mark Aston continues to run Sheffield on similar principles today, but the ability to get to the top flight isn't quite as easy as it was.

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