IT WAS a pleasure to be present at the launch of the Betfred Championship and League One and the AB Sundecks 1895 Cup at Wakefield on Friday afternoon, particularly because the launch took place in the new stand at Belle Vue, which has now been named the Neil Fox Stand.
The new facility is a long overdue but excellent improvement to the old Belle Vue stadium, which is now one of the longest established and most continuously occupied stadiums of any football code in Britain.
It was difficult not to look around Belle Vue on Friday without feeling thankful that Trinity didn’t move out of the city of Wakefield into a new stadium at Newmarket several miles to the north, which at one time had seemed a distinct possibility.
Instead the club is slowly redeveloping its existing facility and it will be great to see how many of the seats are occupied when Wigan arrive for Trinity captain Matty Ashurst’s testimonial game this Friday night.
I just hope the weather improves from what we have seen recently and I hope that Matt, who has been a great servant to Wakefield since joining them in 2015, gets a great turnout for his big game.
And it will be particularly interesting to see how Wakefield, who are listed as 1/3 favourites by Betfred to win the Championship, perform against the Super League champions.
It would be interesting to know how many fans would back them at that price.
Wigan, incidentally, are 7/5 second favourites to win the World Club Challenge, with Penrith the favourites at 8/13.
Perhaps the Warriors would be a better bet at that price.
Money makes the world go round
Being at Belle Vue on Friday and reflecting on the fact that Wakefield have sold almost 5,500 season tickets so far for 2024, it was hard not to conclude that a wealthy backer makes all the difference to a club’s prospects.
Trinity’s average crowd last year was 4,319, according to the Rugby League Yearbook 2023-2024, and so the club has already sold more tickets than spectators who came through the gate last year.
That is surely down to the optimism that has been engendered by Matt Ellis’ takeover of the club that was completed after the end of last season.
Wealthy backers are like fairy godmothers to football and Rugby League clubs.
And Matt isn’t the only one to have appeared over the last year or so.
Mike Danson, whose wealth is probably off the scale, has bought Wigan (and Wigan Athletic), while Martin Jepson has linked up with Castleford and Jeremy Levine now has a controlling interest in Sheffield Eagles, which is allowing the Eagles to dream very realistically about having a new stadium in the Steel City, which they will share with Sheffield FC.
That surely promises a great future for Rugby League in South Yorkshire, especially when we look at Doncaster’s progress into the Championship this year.
The two South Yorkshire derbies should be worth going a long way to see in 2024.
I just wish that every club could attract backers like those I’ve mentioned.
Perhaps someone should set up a brokerage organisation to introduce wealthy individuals to clubs that need their help.
