The IMG Gradings Thread - Post all your IMG Gradings related questions or comments here

[del capo]

1 hour ago, The 4 of Us said:

Nice of Warrington to be helping Wigan get over the line with a few extra gig points https://www.wiganwarriors.com

On the other hand you could say that Wigan are shovelling money in the direction of SJM promotions to help Warrington's directors pay  for the likes of Big Sam !

[The 4 of Us]

1 hour ago, del capo said:

On the other hand you could say that Wigan are shovelling money in the direction of SJM promotions to help Warrington's directors pay  for the likes of Big Sam !

Quid pro quo !

[The Blues Ox]

14 hours ago, dboy said:

 

13 hours ago, Dave T said:

I don't think the rationale is given for any of the thresholds being what they are I. E. The actual numbers. 

I didn't think they were otherwise we might be able to add another 100 pages to this thread. I would think with those numbers set in stone and with clubs unable to improve in that area it would make sense for IMG to explain how they came up with the threasholds, without that explanation and transparency it does smell a little like it may have been hand picked to suit some clubs and for some teams that could be the difference between 12th and 13th spot and over 1m in funding which could in theory lead to certain clubs going out of business.

[Griff]

Catchment Area is probably the most contentious issue.   Taking Cas as an example, seeing as they've been mentioned already, not only is Leeds district just over the canal bridge on Lock Lane, but North Yorkshire is only a couple of miles as the goose flies across Fairburn Ings.  Yet they must share an area to the south west of the club with two others.

[Dave T]

14 minutes ago, Griff said:

Catchment Area is probably the most contentious issue.   Taking Cas as an example, seeing as they've been mentioned already, not only is Leeds district just over the canal bridge on Lock Lane, but North Yorkshire is only a couple of miles as the goose flies across Fairburn Ings.  Yet they must share an area to the south west of the club with two others.

Catchment as a principle is ok, I can see the sense in not getting the points if you are crammed into an area with plenty of RL clubs and limited population. 

Where I think it is executed poorly is for clubs like London. If London don't get full points for potential catchment, then it doesn't pass the sniff test. 

I don't think the likes of Leigh and Cas have much to grumble about with it. 

[Dave T]

2 hours ago, The Blues Ox said:

 

I didn't think they were otherwise we might be able to add another 100 pages to this thread. I would think with those numbers set in stone and with clubs unable to improve in that area it would make sense for IMG to explain how they came up with the threasholds, without that explanation and transparency it does smell a little like it may have been hand picked to suit some clubs and for some teams that could be the difference between 12th and 13th spot and over 1m in funding which could in theory lead to certain clubs going out of business.

It's not massively different to TV viewing figures. 

[Jill Halfpenny fan]

11 minutes ago, Dave T said:

Catchment as a principle is ok, I can see the sense in not getting the points if you are crammed into an area with plenty of RL clubs and limited population. 

Where I think it is executed poorly is for clubs like London. If London don't get full points for potential catchment, then it doesn't pass the sniff test. 

I don't think the likes of Leigh and Cas have much to grumble about with it. 

Cas would get 0.5 points for catchment, the likes of Toulouse and Bradford would get 1.5 points.  Cas would need to improve nine league places to overcome this additional point the other two have been gifted.  I'd say Cas have plenty to grumble about.

[Griff]

21 minutes ago, Dave T said:

I don't think the likes of Leigh and Cas have much to grumble about with it. 

Then we must disagree.

Any club near a LEA boundary is diadvantaged.

[sweaty craiq]

59% of Leigh’s season ticket sales are outside WN post codes.

[Griff]

54 minutes ago, sweaty craiq said:

59% of Leigh’s season ticket sales are outside WN post codes.

Postcodes aren't the measure. Maybe they should be.

[Harry Stottle]

1 hour ago, sweaty craiq said:

59% of Leigh’s season ticket sales are outside WN post codes.

Have you any idea what is the breakdown of that percentage for the WA - Warrington post code? 

[Trinity1873]

1 hour ago, Jill Halfpenny fan said:

Cas would get 0.5 points for catchment, the likes of Toulouse and Bradford would get 1.5 points.  Cas would need to improve nine league places to overcome this additional point the other two have been gifted.  I'd say Cas have plenty to grumble about.

 And also Wakefield Trinity and Featherstone, Wakefield MDC population mid 2022 according to ONS [office for national statistics] was 357,729,making it the 18th largest Local Authority in England. WMDC will probably be well over 360,000 by now.   Wakefield City alone the population is made up of well over 120,000   Castlefords is 46,000, Featherstone is around 18,500. the rest of WMDC population is made up from other small towns such as Horbury /Ossett/Pontefract/ Hemsworth etc.

So Trinity,who are in the City of Wakefield only get 0.5 points,just the same as Cas and Featherstone who have much smaller populations.

Saying that,i think within a year or two WMDC population will hit 390,000,this would give all 3 clubs in WMDC catchment area full marks ,  current trends of immigration and the amount of new housing  been built [approx. 2000 new homes are currently been built on a new estate within 1/2 mile of Trinitys Belle View Stadium] should see 390,000 possible by end of 2025

 

[DemonUK]

4 minutes ago, Trinity1873 said:

 And also Wakefield Trinity and Featherstone, Wakefield MDC population mid 2022 according to ONS [office for national statistics] was 357,729,making it the 18th largest Local Authority in England. WMDC will probably be well over 360,000 by now.   Wakefield City alone the population is made up of well over 120,000   Castlefords is 46,000, Featherstone is around 18,500. the rest of WMDC population is made up from other small towns such as Horbury /Ossett/Pontefract/ Hemsworth etc.

So Trinity,who are in the City of Wakefield only get 0.5 points,just the same as Cas and Featherstone who have much smaller populations.

Saying that,i think within a year or two WMDC population will hit 390,000,this would give all 3 clubs in WMDC catchment area full marks ,  current trends of immigration and the amount of new housing  been built [approx. 2000 new homes are currently been built on a new estate within 1/2 mile of Trinitys Belle View Stadium] should see 390,000 possible by end of 2025

 

If all three come under the same Local Area Authority you will need that Authority to have a population of 780k for you all to get the max (1.5 points) or 520k to get 1 IMG point each

[dboy]

I think the best outcome is to transfer that part of the "Five Towns", to Leeds, which is what Leeds CC want.

 

[north yorks trinity]

17 minutes ago, Trinity1873 said:

 And also Wakefield Trinity and Featherstone, Wakefield MDC population mid 2022 according to ONS [office for national statistics] was 357,729,making it the 18th largest Local Authority in England. WMDC will probably be well over 360,000 by now.   Wakefield City alone the population is made up of well over 120,000   Castlefords is 46,000, Featherstone is around 18,500. the rest of WMDC population is made up from other small towns such as Horbury /Ossett/Pontefract/ Hemsworth etc.

So Trinity,who are in the City of Wakefield only get 0.5 points,just the same as Cas and Featherstone who have much smaller populations.

Saying that,i think within a year or two WMDC population will hit 390,000,this would give all 3 clubs in WMDC catchment area full marks ,  current trends of immigration and the amount of new housing  been built [approx. 2000 new homes are currently been built on a new estate within 1/2 mile of Trinitys Belle View Stadium] should see 390,000 possible by end of 2025

 

How is population measured by IMG? Would we need to wait for the next census or is there a more "real time" way of judging to a sufficient degree of accuracy?

[The Phantom Horseman]

4 hours ago, The Blues Ox said:

 

I didn't think they were otherwise we might be able to add another 100 pages to this thread. I would think with those numbers set in stone and with clubs unable to improve in that area it would make sense for IMG to explain how they came up with the threasholds, without that explanation and transparency it does smell a little like it may have been hand picked to suit some clubs and for some teams that could be the difference between 12th and 13th spot and over 1m in funding which could in theory lead to certain clubs going out of business.

The question I would like to ask IMG is, did you know what the catchment area of each club was BEFORE you came up with the boundaries?

If the answer to that is "no", I would say, then instead of coming up with the most obvious boundaries (under 100k =0.5pts, 100k-200k = 1pt, 200k+ = 1.5pts), how on earth did you arbitrarily decide to make 130k and 260k the cut-off points?

Of course, if the answer to that is "yes", and they did know that, for example Wakefield, Cas and Fev would all have a catchment area figure of 117k under this scoring system, then we can be pretty sure that they were painting the targets around the arrows.

[Leyther_Matt]

1 hour ago, Harry Stottle said:

Have you any idea what is the breakdown of that percentage for the WA - Warrington post code? 

Only when his next fever dream comes around

[Griff]

8 minutes ago, The Phantom Horseman said:

The question I would like to ask IMG is, did you know what the catchment area of each club was BEFORE you came up with the boundaries?

If the answer to that is "no", I would say, then instead of coming up with the most obvious boundaries (under 100k =0.5pts, 100k-200k = 1pt, 200k+ = 1.5pts), how on earth did you arbitrarily decide to make 130k and 260k the cut-off points?

Of course, if the answer to that is "yes", and they did know that, for example Wakefield, Cas and Fev would all have a catchment area figure of 117k under this scoring system, then we can be pretty sure that they were painting the targets around the arrows.

What you need to be asking is why are there cliff-edge thresholds at all?

[dboy]

16 minutes ago, The Phantom Horseman said:

The question I would like to ask IMG is, did you know what the catchment area of each club was BEFORE you came up with the boundaries?

If the answer to that is "no", I would say, then instead of coming up with the most obvious boundaries (under 100k =0.5pts, 100k-200k = 1pt, 200k+ = 1.5pts), how on earth did you arbitrarily decide to make 130k and 260k the cut-off points?

Of course, if the answer to that is "yes", and they did know that, for example Wakefield, Cas and Fev would all have a catchment area figure of 117k under this scoring system, then we can be pretty sure that they were painting the targets around the arrows.

See my earlier post of the 6 steps to deciding the boundaries...

[The Phantom Horseman]

2 minutes ago, Griff said:

What you need to be asking is why are there cliff-edge thresholds at all?

No, what we need to be asking is  - is this a fair method of assessing clubs, and why aren't simple attendance figures  considered a sufficently robust metric (if audited correctly), rather than pie-in-the-sky "ooh maybe one day they will find a way to get more fans watching them"?

[The Phantom Horseman]

1 minute ago, dboy said:

See my earlier post of the 6 steps to deciding the boundaries...

Ah, I had missed that, though I've banged that particular drum before on here. You missed out step 7..."add 10,000 to your lower threshold and reduce your upper threshold by 10,000, just so it doesn't look obvious."

[Dave T]

3 hours ago, Jill Halfpenny fan said:

Cas would get 0.5 points for catchment, the likes of Toulouse and Bradford would get 1.5 points.  Cas would need to improve nine league places to overcome this additional point the other two have been gifted.  I'd say Cas have plenty to grumble about.

But isn't this rather the point? Being based in a small town with plenty of other clubs playing in the same market counts against you. 

Surely it isn't a surprise that larger towns and cities are looked at more favourably, they've been telling us that for decades now. 

[Dave T]

1 hour ago, Harry Stottle said:

Have you any idea what is the breakdown of that percentage for the WA - Warrington post code? 

A huge proportion of Saints' fans would be WA I expect. Postcodes mean little here. 

[Dave T]

46 minutes ago, The Phantom Horseman said:

The question I would like to ask IMG is, did you know what the catchment area of each club was BEFORE you came up with the boundaries?

If the answer to that is "no", I would say, then instead of coming up with the most obvious boundaries (under 100k =0.5pts, 100k-200k = 1pt, 200k+ = 1.5pts), how on earth did you arbitrarily decide to make 130k and 260k the cut-off points?

Of course, if the answer to that is "yes", and they did know that, for example Wakefield, Cas and Fev would all have a catchment area figure of 117k under this scoring system, then we can be pretty sure that they were painting the targets around the arrows.

Of course they did that. It's benchmarking. In the same way they didn't set attendances at 50k, 20k and 10k. Or TV figures at 3m. 

[The Phantom Horseman]

7 minutes ago, Dave T said:

Of course they did that. It's benchmarking. In the same way they didn't set attendances at 50k, 20k and 10k. Or TV figures at 3m. 

The fairly obvious difference is that the other categories are dynamic/transient and, to varying degrees, are within the scope of each club to improve their score, so the boundaries can't really be considered to be discriminating against/favouring clubs in the same way.