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RayCee

RayCee

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Talking of Huddersfield's attendance, after a good post-war period up until 1961-62 season, on field success fell away dramatically. For some years after that, they were rarely even in the top flight of RL and eventually for many years on the trot not at all. In 1998, they started making a comeback but a whole generation of RL fans would have been lost by then. For a lower profile code like RL, it will eventually fall below the radar unless a team can regain success reasonably quickly. Existing fans will in due course become Football supporters and a new generation of potential fans won't even consider following RL. They are then all but impossible to win back once that happens. 

As a comparative example, Leeds also has a Football club to compete with but post-war they have always been reasonably successful without any prolonged downturn. That has given RL fans there a successful club to support and keep on doing so. I'm not saying that's the whole story but I do believe that to avoid being overrun by the juggernaut that is Football, a club cannot afford a prolonged period of obscurity from top flight RL and then expect the fans to come flocking back when, after some decades, they emerge from hibernation. 

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My blog: https://rugbyl.blogspot.co.nz/

It takes wisdom to know when a discussion has run its course.

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AB Knight
AB Knight

Confirmed attendance of 1073 for York Valkyrie vs St Helen’s Ladies last Sunday, cracking turnout.

Eddie
Eddie

Over 1,000 at Serbia v Greece apparently, excellent.    https://www.facebook.com/100043116426362/posts/pfbid02NFNFzYAoG171o3VgsibhVYLAdXmZgfkyWH2w3EaQunDurAxmea8rtmhzCrHmCqydl/

Les Tonks Sidestep
Les Tonks Sidestep

1709 at Sheffield last night, a record for the OLP

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Sports Prophet

Sports Prophet

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5 hours ago, ghost crayfish said:

Amazing to see the Dolphins drawing such large crowds in Brisbane. Really does show 2 Brisbane teams is long overdue... particularly when you compare them to some of the perpetual strugglers in Sydney.

I agree, many Sydney clubs continue to struggle in the crowd stakes, but I am certain much of this is to do with the archaic venues some of them play out of.

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Harry Stottle

Harry Stottle

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On 29/08/2023 at 17:50, meast said:

See responses above.

Why do people in every town and city in the British Isles support football clubs but not rugby league?

I know it's me but it feels like one of those conundrum questions like "Why do men have nipples". There is no logical answer.

Edited by Harry Stottle
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Sports Prophet

Sports Prophet

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1 hour ago, RayCee said:

Talking of Huddersfield's attendance, after a good post-war period up until 1961-62 season, on field success fell away dramatically. For some years after that, they were rarely even in the top flight of RL and eventually for many years on the trot not at all. In 1998, they started making a comeback but a whole generation of RL fans would have been lost by then. For a lower profile code like RL, it will eventually fall below the radar unless a team can regain success reasonably quickly. Existing fans will in due course become Football supporters and a new generation of potential fans won't even consider following RL. They are then all but impossible to win back once that happens. 

As a comparative example, Leeds also has a Football club to compete with but post-war they have always been reasonably successful without any prolonged downturn. That has given RL fans there a successful club to support and keep on doing so. I'm not saying that's the whole story but I do believe that to avoid being overrun by the juggernaut that is Football, a club cannot afford a prolonged period of obscurity from top flight RL and then expect the fans to come flocking back when, after some decades, they emerge from hibernation. 

I believe this is a very plausible theory, but winning the fans back is the challenge and yes, on field success would be a great help.

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Bedfordshire Bronco

Bedfordshire Bronco

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4 hours ago, RayCee said:

Talking of Huddersfield's attendance, after a good post-war period up until 1961-62 season, on field success fell away dramatically. For some years after that, they were rarely even in the top flight of RL and eventually for many years on the trot not at all. In 1998, they started making a comeback but a whole generation of RL fans would have been lost by then. For a lower profile code like RL, it will eventually fall below the radar unless a team can regain success reasonably quickly. Existing fans will in due course become Football supporters and a new generation of potential fans won't even consider following RL. They are then all but impossible to win back once that happens. 

As a comparative example, Leeds also has a Football club to compete with but post-war they have always been reasonably successful without any prolonged downturn. That has given RL fans there a successful club to support and keep on doing so. I'm not saying that's the whole story but I do believe that to avoid being overrun by the juggernaut that is Football, a club cannot afford a prolonged period of obscurity from top flight RL and then expect the fans to come flocking back when, after some decades, they emerge from hibernation. 

I'm more optimistic about getting new fans in.....I know plenty if people down here who are converts as adults

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Eddie

Eddie

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1 hour ago, The Hallucinating Goose said:

Men have nipples because they develop on the embryo before it develops into a male or female embryo. 

Why though? Why don’t nipples develop on an embryo after it has become female, the same as other aspects specific to one sex? 

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RayCee

RayCee

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1 hour ago, Bedfordshire Bronco said:

I'm more optimistic about getting new fans in.....I know plenty if people down here who are converts as adults

Of course some can and I'm sure Huddersfield have had some success in that area. However, there is a somewhat successful Football club there which makes it that much harder.

Also it’s one thing to know some people and quite another to have enough converts to have them coming to a stadium regularly in large numbers. It’s not helped by having a stadium larger than current requirements.

The fans they do have are enthusiastic at least.

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My blog: https://rugbyl.blogspot.co.nz/

It takes wisdom to know when a discussion has run its course.

It takes reasonableness to end that discussion. 

 

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Bedfordshire Bronco

Bedfordshire Bronco

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36 minutes ago, RayCee said:

Of course some can and I'm sure Huddersfield have had some success in that area. However, there is a somewhat successful Football club there which makes it that much harder.

Also it’s one thing to know some people and quite another to have enough converts to have them coming to a stadium regularly in large numbers. It’s not helped by having a stadium larger than current requirements.

The fans they do have are enthusiastic at least.

Have to say I was surprised how good it felt the other day for the Leeds game with only 7000....plenty of noise and atmosphere 

I was fearing the worst as the last time I was there it was for an exiles game with a lot more in 

Having 10,000 would be a decent target 

 

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meast

meast

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5 hours ago, RayCee said:

Of course some can and I'm sure Huddersfield have had some success in that area. However, there is a somewhat successful Football club there which makes it that much harder.

Also it’s one thing to know some people and quite another to have enough converts to have them coming to a stadium regularly in large numbers. It’s not helped by having a stadium larger than current requirements.

The fans they do have are enthusiastic at least.

Not many, if any other team in SL, or indeed, RL can claim the increases Huddersfield have had in the last 25+ years.

All those fans who sneer at us, how many of them have been part of sub 1000 crowds, how many of them saw 1000 fans at a game as something exciting?

How many of those fans who sneer have seen their same clubs in the position Huddersfield were in? For years we lived hand to mouth, cap in hand, aimlessly hoping we could last another week, did the RFL help us? did the other clubs bail us out? no, we had to work ourselves up from the very bottom of rugby league, something most fans who sneer and pull us down won't even be able to comprehend.

We came through that and then slowly started rebuilding, 1998 we were halfway through that rebuild when we handed a SL place, even though realistically we weren't ready for it, we had 3 seasons of misery culminating in relegation in 2001 during which time our fanbase had dwindled back down to the early 1990's levels again, most of the floating RL support in and around the town was quickly mopped up by the success of Bradford and Leeds ( Halifax, Keighley, Batley, Dewsbury and Hunslet) all experience the same and their crowds have never recovered).

We have more or less doubled our hardcore fan base from around 2000 in the mid 2000's to around 4,000 now, how many other SL clubs can boast this?

And just as we looked like we could start attracting decent crowds, HTAFC enjoyed their best spell since the late 1960's and once again, any floating or casual sports fans in the area was mopped up by Huddersfield Town.

Sometimes it does feel like a losing battle, but a battle that we have to fight for, most clubs in most sports would be praised for the way their club and its supporters have battled through the years and stuck at it for little reward, but not Huddersfield, not rugby league, that's sneered at and belittled by those who know nothing of what being a Huddersfield fan is about.

But thanks for the kind words , it makes a nice change 🙂 

 

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Huddersfield Giants Supporters Association

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meast

meast

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38 minutes ago, Bedfordshire Bronco said:

Have to say I was surprised how good it felt the other day for the Leeds game with only 7000....plenty of noise and atmosphere 

I was fearing the worst as the last time I was there it was for an exiles game with a lot more in 

Having 10,000 would be a decent target 

 

Our target just to break even in terms of finances is around 8,000 that's a highly unrealistic target, even our owner and chairman know that which is why they continue to fund the losses.

We know realistically that the Huddersfield folk will not get behind and support the Giants in large numbers, so maybe they will admit that it's time to slowly cut their losses.

It will be a crying shame for Ken and Keith, and indeed Richard and the other directors if we fail to win a major trophy under their watch, after everything the have done for the club, and indeed the town, but there's only so much can be done when the town's residents clearly aren't supportive.

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LeytherRob

LeytherRob

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46 minutes ago, meast said:

Not many, if any other team in SL, or indeed, RL can claim the increases Huddersfield have had in the last 25+ years.

All those fans who sneer at us, how many of them have been part of sub 1000 crowds, how many of them saw 1000 fans at a game as something exciting?

How many of those fans who sneer have seen their same clubs in the position Huddersfield were in? For years we lived hand to mouth, cap in hand, aimlessly hoping we could last another week, did the RFL help us? did the other clubs bail us out? no, we had to work ourselves up from the very bottom of rugby league, something most fans who sneer and pull us down won't even be able to comprehend.

We came through that and then slowly started rebuilding, 1998 we were halfway through that rebuild when we handed a SL place, even though realistically we weren't ready for it, we had 3 seasons of misery culminating in relegation in 2001 during which time our fanbase had dwindled back down to the early 1990's levels again, most of the floating RL support in and around the town was quickly mopped up by the success of Bradford and Leeds ( Halifax, Keighley, Batley, Dewsbury and Hunslet all experience the same and their crowds have never recovered).

We have built more or less doubled our hardcore fan base from around 2000 in the mid 2000's to around 4,000 now, how many other SL clubs can boast this?

And just as we looked like we could start attracting decent crowds, HTAFC enjoyed their best spell since the late 1960's and once again, any floating or casual sports fans in the area was mopped up by Huddersfield Town.

Sometimes it does feel like a losing battle, but a battle that we have to fight for, most clubs in most sports would be praised for the way their club and its supporters have battled through the years and stuck at it for little reward, but not Huddersfield, not rugby league, that's sneered at and belittled by those who know nothing of what being a Huddersfield fan is about.

But thanks for the kind words , it makes a nice change 🙂 

 

Not exactly something other clubs should be aspiring to...Image

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daz39

daz39

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7 hours ago, Sports Prophet said:

I believe this is a very plausible theory, but winning the fans back is the challenge and yes, on field success would be a great help.

There are no fans to win back, those are long dead and gone, we need to find new supporters and finding them in a student/commuter town with no affiliation to the town or the sport is nigh on impossible as we have found out.

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Eddie

Eddie

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39 minutes ago, daz39 said:

There are no fans to win back, those are long dead and gone, we need to find new supporters and finding them in a student/commuter town with no affiliation to the town or the sport is nigh on impossible as we have found out.

Are there really so few people in Huddersfield who are born and raised there, and have historic links to the town through parents and grandparents? 

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daz39

daz39

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1 hour ago, Eddie said:

Are there really so few people in Huddersfield who are born and raised there, and have historic links to the town through parents and grandparents? 

That have had the habit of going to watch Huddersfield Rugby League club passed down to them to keep the family tradition going? No, between 1980 and 1990 our crowds were often below 1,000, there was very few Dads or Grandads taking the next generation as most clubs seem to benefit from, just a few hundred hardy souls who went along out of hope and habit really.

It was only really from 2000 ish that we started to attract completely new fans/families, unfortunately a lot of these have now drifted away as the kids grew up and lost interest and the parents stopped coming too.

Going to the rugby is just not something that people in Huddersfield have ingrained into them unfortunately.

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LeytherRob

LeytherRob

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1 hour ago, meast said:

What point are you trying to make here?

 

You claimed that no club in SL "can claim the increases Huddersfield have had in the last 25+ years". Let's look at the facts, in the last 25 years/23 seasons(to exclude the 2 covid affected seasons), Huddersfield have an average home attendance of 5,528, about 250 more than the current average this season. 25 years ago in 1998, Huddersfield averaged 5,142 vs 5,262 this year - a 2.3% increase.

 

Looking at  the other clubs in SL, of the 8 clubs that were in SL in 1998 and 2023, only Castlefords(down by 1%) has lower growth than Huddersfield. The biggest being Hull and Warrington which have both more than doubled.

Team 1998 2023    Change
Castleford 6777 6694 99%
Huddersfield 5142 5262 102%
Hull FC 5514 12176 221%
Leeds 11754 13772 117%
Salford 4819 5102 106%
St Helens 7061 12610 179%
Warrington 4897 10731 219%
Wigan 11294 13205 117%
     
       

So the point is, yes many clubs can claim much bigger increases in the last 25 years than Huddersfield, both as a % and numerically.

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