RLWC Attendance-O-Meter

[EggFace]

29 minutes ago, Eddie said:

Strange that they said 45k sold earlier in the week, looked like 20k max. Tho I keep hearing how we get our best crowds in London  

Like my fellow Geordie Saint to tell me slap in the face and slagged off the heartlands....Paul Anka.

[Damien]

5 minutes ago, EggFace said:

Your dedication has been fantastic... I stopped after Fiji v Italy mate but loved the game today but London can do one as they don't like Rugby League and it seems its the 4th Football code after Soccer, Union and NFL yet some people on this forum are happy with the crowd.

London got a better crowd than all the heartland games, again.

[Leyther_Matt]

I genuinely think pre-Covid that game would have been a sell out. What we do about that now as a game when there’s a quarter of a million prepared to fork out £60 for Peter Kay in three years time (tickets obtained for date 2 within 90 seconds of sale btw, not that I’m smug ) I have no idea, but I do think there’s been a perfect storm during this tournament of poor weather, fuel prices and the train farce. Not massively unlike 2000 in that sense. There are plenty of little things that haven’t been done right throughout the tournament but it kind of feels like it’s been on the back foot since day one. 

[EggFace]

37 minutes ago, Damien said:

London got a better crowd than all the heartland games, again.

Will you stop quote me as just watching the Omen 1976 and the Rugby scene has confused me 

[EggFace]

5 minutes ago, EggFace said:

Will you stop quote me as just watching the Omen 1976 and the Rugby scene has confused me 

Sorry Im ###### ..off to bed love you all.

[Guest]

1 hour ago, Eddie said:

Hands up, 20k was a ridiculous exaggeration but it was around 30k, certainly nowhere near 40. 

If you take out the middle ring, which was basically empty, doesn't that mean c. 40k out of the remaining 50k?. No way. There were never 40k there. 25k I would say. 

[Guest]

1 hour ago, EggFace said:

Balls not to Union as they are doing very well but I think  the NRL should work hard that they  could take over the Pacific Islands and catchments in Australia and New Zealand after today and righty so and that be balls to the IRB.

The NRL deserves its success. How SL works will define itself not what others do.

 

[EggFace]

22 minutes ago, EggFace said:

Sorry Im ###### ..off to bed love you all.

WTF iam on...sorry..off to bed  get my head done,

[Big Picture]

7 hours ago, Dave T said:

Maybe. We need new fans, from wherever, but getting randoms in for a test match every couple of years will change nowt. We've been doing it for decades. As with all areas of our game, it needs a plan. 

It does indeed need a plan, a very solid plan which can show the investors and backers how they can benefit materially from getting involved.  Only a top-down plan could ever do that.

6 hours ago, Tommygilf said:

Indeed, but these people are all potential social media likes, follows and shares, they are casual viewers on Sky Sports, Ch4 and the BBC. Our problem seems to be that we don't seem to be able to translate international fans into club fans, or provide international fans with enough international content.

In part that's because they (like all the Geordies who reportedly made up about half the crowd at the opener in Newcastle) don't live near a major pro club or in many cases any pro club.  And in either case, if they turn up at their nearest pro club's next match the atmosphere won't be anything like what they experienced in the stadium or saw on TV and that's liable to turn them off.

Edited November 13, 2022 by Big Picture

[Big Picture]

2 hours ago, EggFace said:

Your dedication has been fantastic... I stopped after Fiji v Italy mate but loved the game today but London can do one as they don't like Rugby League and it seems its the 4th Football code after Soccer, Union and NFL yet some people on this forum are happy with the crowd.

If you want to see RL better Union and gridiron in London, then someone needs to have a plan for how to do that.  But I repeat myself yet again.

[Big Picture]

2 hours ago, EggFace said:

Balls not to Union as they are doing very well but I think  the NRL should work hard that they  could take over the Pacific Islands and catchments in Australia and New Zealand after today and righty so and that be balls to the IRB.

I daresay that World Rugby would be happy with that, then bigger and more marketable countries could get the automatic qualification spots in their World Cup which those poor, tiny island countries get now and thereby increase the market value of that tournament to broadcasters and sponsors.

[WN83]

Every time I go to London for an international I feel the locals put us to shame tbh. We can split hairs over the actual crowd today all we want but at worst there were 32-35k in there and that’s a big uplift on what we got in the heartlands last week. It felt like 80% of the crowd today were non RL fans and were just there to support their country at a sport. I think they’ll have enjoyed the day and would come back but if there are no games here next year, what are they meant to do? We don’t build any momentum from any game. We get a decent crowd on, the players put on a show and then the administrators pee it down the drain. It’s rinse and repeat! 

[Eddie]

2 hours ago, WN83 said:

Every time I go to London for an international I feel the locals put us to shame tbh. We can split hairs over the actual crowd today all we want but at worst there were 32-35k in there and that’s a big uplift on what we got in the heartlands last week. It felt like 80% of the crowd today were non RL fans and were just there to support their country at a sport. I think they’ll have enjoyed the day and would come back but if there are no games here next year, what are they meant to do? We don’t build any momentum from any game. We get a decent crowd on, the players put on a show and then the administrators pee it down the drain. It’s rinse and repeat! 

Tbf there are 8m people in Greater London (incl a lot of Northern Exiles) and many more in easy reach so you’d expect a bigger crowd. For example I know a couple of blokes from Hull and one from near Bradford who live in Norwich, and yesterday is the only game any of them have been to in the WC. Effectively it was the one game for the whole south of England and it was the England semi final, considering that the crowd wasn’t great imho. 

[gingerjon]

6 hours ago, Damien said:

London got a better crowd than all the heartland games, again.

Every time.

Every. Time.

[Tosh]

7 hours ago, Eddie said:

70k sold already, we’ll sneak in  

Is that 70k in the real world or 70k in the RLWC organizers world?

[gingerjon]

8 hours ago, Dave T said:

RLWC organisers are clueless when it comes to fan engagement. 

I suspect that any last-minute exciting fan entertainment plans for Old Trafford and the like will now be shelved, even if England women get to the final.

[The Masked Poster]

1 hour ago, Eddie said:

Tbf there are 8m people in Greater London (incl a lot of Northern Exiles) and many more in easy reach so you’d expect a bigger crowd. For example I know a couple of blokes from Hull and one from near Bradford who live in Norwich, and yesterday is the only game any of them have been to in the WC. Effectively it was the one game for the whole south of England and it was the England semi final, considering that the crowd wasn’t great imho. 

So what does that say about the 28k at Elland Rd for an all time classic? This was the only semi final in the north. 

[Bedfordshire Bronco]

9 hours ago, pahars said:

Yorkshire has no stadium that can fit 40,000. 

Elland road

[The Masked Poster]

I have had time to reflect on the game and even so, I probably won't attend the final despite paying for a ticket. Even up til relatively recently I would have gone to watch any game of RL, any time any place.

But now...nah...I will support England and not just someone I slightly prefer over someone I can't stand. My heart just isn't in it now. At least the football fans will feel as sick as I do in a few weeks. 

[pahars]

15 minutes ago, Bedfordshire Bronco said:

Elland road

37,792 

[Jim from Oz]

On 07/11/2022 at 11:41, Jim from Oz said:

TOTAL FOR WEEK 1: 95,243 (average 11,905)

TOTAL FOR WEEK 2:  68,875 (average 8,609)

TOTAL FOR WEEK 3: 72,198  (average 9,025)

Tonga v Samoa: 12,674  

TOTAL FOR THE Q/Fs: 51,139 (average 12,785) 

UPDATED TOTAL: 287,585 (average 10,270)

 

TARGETS:

2000 RLWC: 263,921

(8,514 per match)

TARGET 1 ACHIEVED  

 

2017 RLWC: 382,080

(13,646 per match)

 

2013 RLWC: 458,483

(16,374 per match)

 

2022 WOMEN’S EURO: 574,865

(18,544 per match)

 

ORIGINAL TARGET: 750,000

TOTAL FOR WEEK 1: 95,243 (average 11,905)

TOTAL FOR WEEK 2:  68,875 (average 8,609)

TOTAL FOR WEEK 3: 72,198  (average 9,025)

TOTAL FOR THE Q/Fs: 51,139 (average 12,785) 

Aus v NZ: 28,113
Eng v Samoa: 40,489

TOTAL FOR THE S/Fs: 68,602 (average 34,301) 

UPDATED TOTAL: 356,187 (average 11,873)

 

TARGETS:

2000 RLWC: 263,921

(8,514 per match)

TARGET 1 ACHIEVED  

 

2017 RLWC: 382,080

(13,646 per match)

 

2013 RLWC: 458,483

(16,374 per match)

 

2022 WOMEN’S EURO: 574,865

(18,544 per match)

 

ORIGINAL TARGET: 750,000

[Dave T]

I'll start my post by saying I think some of the crowd assessments are extreme. I don't think the stadium was less than half full. My view is around 35k with 5k no-shows. But to add some context, I'll show some photos, as I know how popular they were last time

 

Pic 1 - shows how it can look OK at a glance, plenty of bodies in there, but if yiu actually look closely you'll notice that there is a hell of a lot of emptiness. Around the posts (expensive seats) you can see the blocks there are sparsely populated. 

 

Pic 2 is behind the cameras so you wouldn't see these ever, but you can see huge empty sections in the central areas Upper and lower tier (expensive seats). Note the middle tier is used, so not completely empty. 

 

Pic 3 - middle tier and upper pretty empty behind the goals. Note, when I bought my tickets this week, I paid £30. Instead of where I am on this photo, they allocated me top row of that high, empty stand behind the sticks. A-holes. 

 

[Dave T]

Pic 4 shows the opposite end, which was one of the empties. Resolution ain't great, but this end was really empty. 

[MatthewWoody]

Can we say it's a success?

[Dave T]

And to try and finish on a positive. Pic 5 shows a panoramic view. It actually looks OK, and it's why I don't think I could say it was only  half full. 

On TV it looked mildly acceptable, because the seated area was dark and plenty tucked away, but every clip on the news and every photo is in front of huge empty read seats, which jars and is a failure, especially when compared to every other big 'Rugby' game this weekend.