2025 Attendance Thread

[sweaty craiq]

1 hour ago, Leyther_Matt said:

Tbf there was plenty of room near us further down towards the Benidorm End and no Leigh fans at all spread round to the new terrace in front of the boxes behind the sticks 

The entry and lack of any walkway coupled with no stewards created chaos in that area especially with the motorway problems and most fans arriving at the same time.

[Sports Prophet]

4 hours ago, Anita Bath said:

Its not attractiveness it accessibility. For Penrith fans to get to Parramatta’s stadium in time for kick off they probably needed to leave home around 4-4.30pm. The stadium is 20 mins walk from Parramatta station and the train from Penrith to Parramatta is probably 30 mins or more.

Of course if a second NZ team was brought in this could be the 6pm kick off every week (8pm NZ time).

Thursday is similarly difficult for many fans. Tomorrow Dolphins fans would have to leave home in Redcliffe before 5.30pm latest and wouldnt be back home much before midnight with a working day on Friday…and thats a home game.

As eddie indicates we have ‘sold out’ fans in attendance for TV fees so we shouldnt maybe vote below average crowds for those days/timeslots.

Not all fans will be coming from “home” in Penrith or Redcliffe to get to those games, but that’s not to say there isn’t merit to your points.

We can’t simply force Friday 6pm slots on two NZ teams week in, week out, no matter how advantageous the timeslot is. Fans were jack of Brisbane on telly every Friday night and the advantage the Broncos earned playing consistently on a Friday night. The same would happen if NZ teams 1 and 2 alternatively played home games every Friday at 8pm local.

As such, I have an idea each for the Thursday and Friday 6pm fixtures.

Thursday night should predominantly be a suburban match. That means Sharks, Belmore, Kogarah/Gong, Brookie, Leichhardt/Campbeltown or Penrith with a big focus on entertaining a parochial home crowd. 

Friday 6pm should be an alternate mix of NZ home matches and all Sydney derbies at either Allianz or Parra focusing on the after work crowd which may even include targeting neutral fans to get along to the monthly Sydney Derby under lights.

These two fixtures are the two most underperforming fixtures by attendance. As such, improvements to these two fixtures will have the biggest impact in significantly moving the weekly attendance needle.

[Sports Prophet]

16 minutes ago, Eddie said:

Don’t know for a fact that commercial broadcasters want more people watching in the stadium than on tv? It seems unlikely to me, better product of course but they want viewers to bring in advertising. 

The commercial partners I was referring to were not broadcast partners.

[Snowys Backside]

1 hour ago, Leyther_Matt said:

Tbf there was plenty of room near us further down towards the Benidorm End and no Leigh fans at all spread round to the new terrace in front of the boxes behind the sticks 

Benidorm End !!  

Did you stand on a box Matt to get to pitch level ? 

[OMEGA]

6 hours ago, Exiled Wiganer said:

You were calling out sold out crowds as if Trinity are bringing us Bullmania mark 2. When you only need 8k - considerably less than the SL average - to do so. If your point is that they are trending upwards then that is of course a good thing. It struck me as worth highlighting coming as it did so close to a discussion around 10k being a “disappointment” for a Cup game. 
 

It might be that the direction of travel is now to shrink capacities so that full house signs go up, but Wire getting stick for having a crowd which would have too big for Wilderspool back in the day seems crazy to me. 

That’s a rather obtuse and slanted way to view my post!

of course it was about the optimism surrounding Wakefield Trinity which has seen the attendance sky rocket, surely a good thing rather than something to sneer at.

As for reducing capacity to get sell out crowds, we’ve been steadily improving the stadium and increasing the capacity so I’m not sure where you’re getting that idea from. But hey ho, it’s a Rugby League forum it wouldn’t be a normal discussion if someone wasn’t pouring scorn on another club or looking for the negatives.

Every silver lining has a cloud!

[Damien]

Always nice to see a Melbourne sellout:

 

[langpark]

Pretty scarce details so far for this round...

Salford - Leeds anyone?

Saints - Wakefield:  10,108

Hull KR - Wigan anyone?

Hunslet - Halifax anyone?

[ChrisH]

4,159 at Salford v Leeds

 

Edited April 12 by ChrisH
Earlier error

[ricky]

16 hours ago, Damien said:

Always nice to see a Melbourne sellout:

 

Also the only ticket in town: the footy is in SA this weekend

[Josef K]

Saints crowd down 3,950 on when they played London last year. They were lucky to get 10,000 as they made zero effort in promoting the match, which is typical of the club at the moment. 

[Exiled Wiganer]

On 09/04/2025 at 19:55, OMEGA said:

That’s a rather obtuse and slanted way to view my post!

of course it was about the optimism surrounding Wakefield Trinity which has seen the attendance sky rocket, surely a good thing rather than something to sneer at.

As for reducing capacity to get sell out crowds, we’ve been steadily improving the stadium and increasing the capacity so I’m not sure where you’re getting that idea from. But hey ho, it’s a Rugby League forum it wouldn’t be a normal discussion if someone wasn’t pouring scorn on another club or looking for the negatives.

Every silver lining has a cloud!

…

Edited April 13 by Exiled Wiganer

[MZH]

Not sure if this strictly belongs in the attendance thread but Hull FC have announced that a section of the MKM will be made into a safe standing area. We have a run of away games during the summer whilst the pitch gets relaid and it will be carried out then apparently. So will be in place for the back end of the season. Only space for a couple of thousand for now but hopefully it is a good thing for the atmosphere in the ground.

[Maximus Decimus]

On 11/04/2025 at 18:43, Damien said:

Always nice to see a Melbourne sellout:

 

I didn't know this despite watching the highlights.

It was one of those RL sellouts, where there are still plenty of seats around... 

If Everton is like that, and I don't get a ticket, I'll be fuming!

[Damien]

 

 

[DoubleD]

7 minutes ago, Damien said:

 

 

So not a sell out then

[langpark]

7 minutes ago, DoubleD said:

So not a sell out then

Strange. Another "sellout" which ended up having a crowd under 90% full. Unless they have some kind of weird ground member scheme like the MCG has. 

[Sports Prophet]

NRL Rd 6

Dolphins v Panthers 19,103

Dragons v Titans 8,510

Broncos v Roosters 40,814

Sharks v SEagles / Rab’s v Cows (Perth) 31,347

Eels v Raiders (Darwin) 9,556

Storm v Warriors 26,427

Knights v Tigers 25,960

NRL took games advantage of all AFL matches being played in Adelaide with a great turnout in Melbourne and just an average, but respectable double header crowd for Perth’s first of three NRL events this year.

Dolphins getting benefit of the doubt for with a tick for a sub 20k. Might be a generous mark, but it was Thursday night.

Dragons continue to underwhelm with a second or third game sub 10k already this season. Very poor.

Eels and Raiders in Darwin fell just short of 10k. Maybe harsh to not give it a tick, but, any sub 10k, wherever it is, can’t be a tick. Arguably a fail. Benefit of the doubt.

Another great crowd in Brisbane. They continue to prop up the NRL’s season average by more than doubling it.

Lastly, a cracking crowd saw their beloved Knights avoid a second straight donut by scoring in the last two minutes against a resurgent Tigers.

Edited April 13 by Sports Prophet

[whatmichaelsays]

https://x.com/catalanmedia/status/1911446388073779323?t=KBGAsLAOccU5xxudq8Wkbg&s=19

[Henson Park Old Firm]

4 minutes ago, whatmichaelsays said:

https://x.com/catalanmedia/status/1911446388073779323?t=KBGAsLAOccU5xxudq8Wkbg&s=19

Did Huddersfield pay for Catalans accommodation?

[langpark]

Nice to see some positive feedback about Huddersfield and their matchday experience for a change.  

 

[Anita Bath]

4 hours ago, Sports Prophet said:

NRL Rd 6

Dolphins v Panthers 19,103

Dragons v Titans 8,510

Broncos v Roosters 40,814

Sharks v SEagles / Rab’s v Cows (Perth) 31,347

Eels v Raiders (Darwin) 9,556

Storm v Warriors 26,427

Knights v Tigers 25,960

NRL took games advantage of all AFL matches being played in Adelaide with a great turnout in Melbourne and just an average, but respectable double header crowd for Perth’s first of three NRL events this year.

Dolphins getting benefit of the doubt for with a tick for a sub 20k. Might be a generous mark, but it was Thursday night.

Dragons continue to underwhelm with a second or third game sub 10k already this season. Very poor.

Eels and Raiders in Darwin fell just short of 10k. Maybe harsh to not give it a tick, but, any sub 10k, wherever it is, can’t be a tick. Arguably a fail. Benefit of the doubt.

Another great crowd in Brisbane. They continue to prop up the NRL’s season average by more than doubling it.

Lastly, a cracking crowd saw their beloved Knights avoid a second straight donut by scoring in the last two minutes against a resurgent Tigers.

Dragons was the Friday teatime game. Aside from when Warriors given that slot (which is prime time in NZ) they tend to select the lesser games of the weekend for that slot so double jeapordy.

[Padge]

On 08/04/2025 at 12:30, Just Browny said:

We play St Helens 3/4/5 times per season. We played them four times last year; by the end of this month we will already have played them three times this year. So not in anybody's mind does it feel like the biggest game in our history or whatever.

I can't speak for others but my interest in attending a game is governed to some extent by variety and seeing something a bit different. We took a big away following to Widnes last month, almost certainly because it was a bit of novelty.

In 86/87 season you played Saints 4 times (random year pick), total attendance for all four games was 36,312.

That season you could have played Saints up to 6 times, 2x league, 1x Lancashire Cup, 1x John Player, 1x Challenge Cup and 1x Championship Play-off.

Under the current system the most you could meet is believe it or not 6.

Note in 86/87 you could also have replays upping the chance of more meetings.

Edit to add, last season Wire v Saints meetings pulled in just over 48,000

Edited April 14 by Padge

[langpark]

Not sure how accurate these figures are.  Good news if true....

 

[Yorky]

16 minutes ago, langpark said:

Not sure how accurate these figures are.  Good news if true....

 

That's a real story of 2 halves

Firstly, excellent news on Everton sales - a really smart choice of stadium that has really paid off

 

But more bizarrely, if they are saying 85k sales so far, with 70 of that being Everton & Headingley - only 15k for Wembley. I know there is time to sell it but that is shocking

[Josef K]

5,807 at the Cas/Leigh match, 8pm was a strange KO time for a Saturday night.