The Shay Halifax

[Wakefield Ram]

13 hours ago, The Phantom Horseman said:

Apologies for the diversion, but did anyone else mis-read this as "a bit of a boogie" and immediately think of Henderson Gill?

Only if you are of a certain age

[The Blues Ox]

3 hours ago, Hopping Mad said:

Halifax Town fans are far from happy - as various threads (and an explosion of new members since Calderdale Council's decision was announced) on theshaymen.net forum indicates. Mind you, since Fax started sharing the Shay, rugby league's reputation- if you'll excuse the pun - has been mud (and the sport wasn't so despised when Fax played at Thrum Hall) with the football fraternity. In that sense, nothing has changed.

Despite the noise from Halifax Town supporters, it was inevitable Calderdale Council accepted Davy's offer - he's the only interested party with any money. The council is skint (therefore desperate to offload a loss-making, unfit-for-purpose, costly-to-maintain white elephant), the rugby league club is skint and the football club is skint. With the two clubs now mustering barely 3,000 fans between them (i.e. less than the capacity of the east stand), I imagine Calderdale's council tax payers are thrilled to see the back of the Shay.

Id say from what I have seen all over social media, in general most Town fans seem to be happy with the news but there are a really small minority who are kicking off about it. In my opinion its more to do with the ground been owned by a rugby man rather than the ins and outs of the deal. 

[Just Browny]

The point it would get nasty would be if the EFL confirmed/ruled that Halifax Town wouldn't be able to play in the Football League while sharing a ground with two teams from other sports - which the operating rules seem to prohibit explicitly.

[RigbyLuger]

Huddersfield's idea of marketing seems to have ridiculously cheap tickets every other year. The CEO seems to come under little scrutiny as well.

[maccbull_bigbullybooaza]

18 hours ago, Anita Bath said:

Trying to think of other examples of clubs moving away from their traditional supporter base.

Swinton, Fulham, I suppose you could include Salford, Blackpool, North Wales, Liverpool City, then a whole bunch of short lived ‘expansion’ teams who uprooted - Kent Invicta, Mansfield, Cardiff, etc etc.

All seemed to end in tears. One exception might be Coventry moving lock stock and barrel to Birmingham though it's early days.

I hope for the sake of the game as a whole that it works for Huddersfield. To everyone except the good folks of Oldham, Huddersfield is known as the cradle of RL.

 

You forgot Bradford's "successful" move to Dewsbury while that kiwi owner we had for a bit explored ways of building a boutique stadium away from Odsal.

[maccbull_bigbullybooaza]

15 hours ago, The Blues Ox said:

Just going on what Ken Davy had said previously in one of his interviews(I will try and find it), I have a funny feeling it was to do with the TV gantry and all it takes is to fail on one of the criteria and you end up with minimum points.

It was updated to Premier League standard. If that's not good enough for IMG it probably needs looking at.

[Leyther_Matt]

2 hours ago, maccbull_bigbullybooaza said:

It was updated to Premier League standard. If that's not good enough for IMG it probably needs looking at.

The screen at LSV was designed to UEFA standards for the Women’s Euros…..and failed with IMG

[Hopping Mad]

4 hours ago, Just Browny said:

The point it would get nasty would be if the EFL confirmed/ruled that Halifax Town wouldn't be able to play in the Football League while sharing a ground with two teams from other sports - which the operating rules seem to prohibit explicitly.

Been some discussion about how that affects York City (possibly heading back to the Football League at the end of the season) and York Knights. Conclusion seems to be, under the terms of the leases the football and rugby league clubs have with stadium owners City of York Council, York Valkyrie aren't deemed a separate (i.e. second rugby league) entity. Anybody confirm?

[Hopping Mad]

4 hours ago, The Blues Ox said:

Id say from what I have seen all over social media, in general most Town fans seem to be happy with the news but there are a really small minority who are kicking off about it. In my opinion its more to do with the ground been owned by a rugby man rather than the ins and outs of the deal. 

I'm sure that's right. Surely, most people can see the Davy option was the only way the issues of the Shay's unfit facilities would be sorted out.

Edited March 19 by Hopping Mad

[Click]

2 hours ago, maccbull_bigbullybooaza said:

It was updated to Premier League standard. If that's not good enough for IMG it probably needs looking at.

Who cares if it was updated for premier League standards, the premier League is a different sport with different regulations and requirements. 

[Simon Hall]

18 minutes ago, Hopping Mad said:

Been some discussion about how that affects York City (possibly heading back to the Football League at the end of the season) and York Knights. Conclusion seems to be, under the terms of the leases the football and rugby league clubs have with stadium owners City of York Council, York Valkyrie aren't deemed a separate (i.e. second rugby league) entity. Anybody confirm?

Knights & Valkyrie are the same club, just different teams. Suppose it's the same principle as a reserve or academy side, plus they only play about 8 home games and if it really came down to it, they'd play at the training ground.

[Gooleboy]

30 minutes ago, Leyther_Matt said:

The screen at LSV was designed to UEFA standards for the Women’s Euros…..and failed with IMG

Farcical.

[Tommygilf]

24 minutes ago, Click said:

Who cares if it was updated for premier League standards, the premier League is a different sport with different regulations and requirements. 

Exactly. UEFA also operates in countries all over Europe (including some of the very poorest) and demands the same standards from all of them. 

Given in ground replays aren't as important, or indeed ever used, at Football matches, why would they be of the same higher standard? Why should we lower ourselves?

This is a bit like complaining that pitches that are not full size for RL are fine because we play football on them...

[phiggins]

31 minutes ago, Click said:

Who cares if it was updated for premier League standards, the premier League is a different sport with different regulations and requirements. 

Yes. They actually use their TV gantries.

[Leyther_Matt]

3 hours ago, Tommygilf said:

Exactly. UEFA also operates in countries all over Europe (including some of the very poorest) and demands the same standards from all of them. 

Given in ground replays aren't as important, or indeed ever used, at Football matches, why would they be of the same higher standard? Why should we lower ourselves?

This is a bit like complaining that pitches that are not full size for RL are fine because we play football on them...

Come on, now. Let’s have it right. There’s not a minute where anyone can claim that IMG are running at higher standards than multi billion organisations such as the Premier League and UEFA and keep a straight face.

UEFA categorise their stadiums btw, so naturally their standards for competition hosts are very different to a Europa League qualifier for example. 

[maccbull_bigbullybooaza]

5 hours ago, Click said:

Who cares if it was updated for premier League standards, the premier League is a different sport with different regulations and requirements. 

Yeah it's  the largest domestic sports league in the world. Sold to more countries and viewed by more people that any other. IMG revealed last year that the current Sky TV deal is worth £21.5M a year. To put that into context Erling Haaland alone is paid £26M a year. You can't seriously claim the requirements of superleague are for higher standards of media facilities than the premier league? 

Edited March 19 by maccbull_bigbullybooaza

[iffleyox]

7 minutes ago, maccbull_bigbullybooaza said:

Yeah it's  the largest domestic sports league in the world. Sold to more countries and viewed by more people that any other. IMG revealed last year that the current Sky TV deal is worth £21.5M a year. To put that into context Erling Haaland alone is paid £26M a year. You can't seriously claim the requirements of superleague are for higher standards of media facilities than the premier league? 

I can’t believe this is still an argument - it’s been going round in circles across threads for at least 18 months now.

RL (and RU for that matter) use in-stadium screens for fundamentally different things than football does. 
 

So yes, actually, rugby does need better screens than the Premier League…

[maccbull_bigbullybooaza]

17 minutes ago, iffleyox said:

I can’t believe this is still an argument - it’s been going round in circles across threads for at least 18 months now.

RL (and RU for that matter) use in-stadium screens for fundamentally different things than football does. 
 

So yes, actually, rugby does need better screens than the Premier League…

I didn't mention the big screen I was talking about the TV gantry.