The moron has that many chips on his shoulder, i'm surprised he's not got shares in McCains.

If no sponsor is secured again, would it still be possible for Big Nige and Co to insist on it being called the Blue Chip Super League?

If only to provide an appearance of credibility.

Frankly the damage done by giving the lead sponsorship away for absolutely feck all was so easy to predict (in the same vein as giving away cheap/free tickets to rugby league fans)
Devaluing the product to such an extent as the idiots in charge have done will continue to ensure RL will struggle into the future to survive financially.
That these overpaid buffoons running the game & those with only half a brain cell couldn't forsee what would happen is just another realisation our sport will always scrabble around the bottom of the barrel for sponsors.

The long held view by the vast majority of the population (if they've heard of it at all) that the sport is run by whippet owning flap cap, chip on shoulder Northerner's and followed by such is alive & kicking and will never go away. We are so unatractive with regard to our 'stock' it makes me weep. We're small potatoes and always will be, we've had our chances to make an impact nationally as a sport and to increase the 'worth' but have been let down badly.
Let down by the so called fans whom complain about spending a measly £20 or so to watch a game every other week (or less if god forbid buy a season ticket), let down as badly by those that run the sport.

It was fantastic that we had great numbers at the World Cup but what would have been the attendances if the ticket prices had been full price?
You've no-where to go, you try to charge full price after the fact and people grumble and don't turn up because it's too expensive. There are some fans who would pay whatever but seemingly these are few and far between.

You make me sound like captain positive!!!!!!!

lol, I actually enjoy reading your posts, whether they are accurate/my way of thinking or not. People on here tend to forget that a forum is exactly what it says on the tin and try to dictate what can & can't be spoken about and in what tone or only in a way that suits an 'agenda' or fits in with their narrow viewpoint.
I'm just stating facts as I see them, sad as that might be.

I love RL, it's in my blood which is probably true for most on here and despite the best efforts of the administrators of the sport to turn fans away with their incompetence I'll stick with it til I die.

I do find it hard to get to Hull's home games but that is a moot point, I don't baulk at the cost of a ticket (Last season it was £24 for the East stand) but find it incredible how those running the clubs/RL manage to implode at times with short-sightedness and rash, ill thought out decisions that will & have had far reaching negative effects, some of which are all but irreparable.

Correct. Those 9 SL clubs who voted for the Stobart deal (Wigan, St Helens, Warrington, Catalans, Widnes, Bradford, Huddersfield, Wakefield and London) ought to lower their collective heads in shame.


Indeed, Big Nige and the RFL do share some of the blame but let's not forget those 9 SL clubs who voted for the devaluation of sponsorship to it's current value of £0.


I reserve special contempt for those 4 SL clubs who not only voted for the Stobart deal, but who also walked out of the meeting on restructuring last year whilst placing 100% blame on the incompetence of the RFL with regard to commercial management and governance. Those 4 clubs worthy of the contempt of everyone are... Wigan, Warrington, Catalans and Huddersfield.


The vast majority of the population would not be far wrong either.


Correct. The modern day fans of Super League love their discounted tickets, particularly season tickets. Ask them to shell out anything approaching full price for important knock out fixtures in the CC or important elimination SL play-offs and they stay at home en masse. That's how much they love their product. If it ain't discounted, they ain't interested.


Tickets for the RLWC were heavily discounted to begin with when they first went on sale, and the fans of the game still refused to purchase any. Of course, the usual excuses came to the fore... RL fans are notorious for purchasing at the last minute, blah, blah, blah. The fact remains that ticket sales for the RLWC were extremely slow and didn't take off until adult tickets were priced at between £5 and £7.50.


Indeed. Congratulations to the RFL for the further devaluation of the game by establishing future international fixtures and events at the bargain basement discount level. Good luck in your attempts to charge more realistic prices at future international RL events. RLWC legacy by plenty!

Billy! You make me seem like field marshal positive!!!!!

Being a bit of a positive young upstart at only 35. I do always wonder about what this golden era was when the game was better than it was now. As I say I am young compared to some. So I naturally assume that there where days gone by when top flight RL attracted huge crowds and enjoyed wonders we can't imagine. Then just today by chance I came across the rugby league project website. Now consistent figures only go back as far as 1980, before then it's very patchy at the moment. From my own experience I've never known attendances be as good across the board. Well low and behold it was not my imagination, the trend certainly at my home club has been up up up, maybe not year on year, but certainly over a period of years. In the early 80's even Wigan Saints derbies did not pull in regular huge 5 figure crowds (which nowa days are the expected) and the cost was certainly no where near as high. So I can only assume the negative spin about RL fans not turning up is in comparison to some by gone era pre my own birth. Yes there are issues, but this is not RL's darkest days, it's not even close to twilight. A link for those wanting to check their own clubs figures.... www.rugbyleagueproject.org/match ... 0tLS0tLS0t just check via stadium

Being a bit of a positive young upstart at only 35. I do always wonder about what this golden era was when the game was better than it was now. As I say I am young compared to some. So I naturally assume that there where days gone by when top flight RL attracted huge crowds and enjoyed wonders we can't imagine. Then just today by chance I came across the rugby league project website. Now consistent figures only go back as far as 1980, before then it's very patchy at the moment. From my own experience I've never known attendances be as good across the board. Well low and behold it was not my imagination, the trend certainly at my home club has been up up up, maybe not year on year, but certainly over a period of years. In the early 80's even Wigan Saints derbies did not pull in regular huge 5 figure crowds (which nowa days are the expected) and the cost was certainly no where near as high. So I can only assume the negative spin about RL fans not turning up is in comparison to some by gone era pre my own birth. Yes there are issues, but this is not RL's darkest days, it's not even close to twilight. A link for those wanting to check their own clubs figures.... www.rugbyleagueproject.org/match ... 0tLS0tLS0t just check via stadium

Out of interest what have sle stopped doing since losing the 1.2million pound a year Engage deal? What cut backs were made as I see little difference between now and three years ago in terms of media, marketing, club grants or the other things you would think this money would have been spent on.

Not saying having the million a year wouldn't be a good thing but wondering if it really would make much difference in the big picture?

Dont encourage him!

If it was £1.2m it just means each SL club plus the other SLE stakeholders get about £75k less each in central distributions than they otherwise would. Absolute peanuts in the overall scheme of things, and a topic which gets much more discussion than the matter merits in pure financial terms.

Absolute rubbish, you've completely made that up and I can guarantee you've got nothing to back those claims up.

I went to 6 games and intended on going to more but due to work & family commitments I had to miss a few. Because of work and family, like the vast majority of RL fans i'm sure, I bought my first tickets something like 10 days before the competition and picked up tickets for some games in the week leading up to them. The fact they were discounted was a nice bonus and nothing more, it had no effect on whether i went.

Your holier than thou "i'm better than the rest of you" attitude is usually funny in a cringey, point and laugh way but you're obviously at that age where nothing will ever be as good as when you were a lad and it's just embarrassing to read day after day.

The RFL should be praised for what they achieved with the world cup and it's people like you, still living in the past, who're holding the game back, not the people running it.

Fame at last, and in such impressive company as well

Blue chip on both shoulders. :p

Set to be announced this week hopefully

Having had a look at what current energy companies are not in the sponsorship market in some form or another the only one i could find is called FIRST UTILITIES based in Warwick so my money would be on them if so a nice brand to have on boardicon_smile.gif

Lets get one of the fracking companies involved

TOTAL FRACKING SUPER LEAGUE



Or you could lose the ' R ' from it if you wanted?

, the cockney version

There was me thinking that a 12% drop I attendances in 2013, combined with the lack of a title rights sponsor, the Bulls bail-out saga, the London Broncos playing musical grounds, Wakefield teetering on the edge, the SL chairmen split on exactly what they want from the governing body and commercial rights, the loss of sport England funding for the game, the poor attendances at Challenge Cup games and Exiles matches, not to mention reluctance to pay full price at Play-off games were all down to an inept and toothless governing body.......but now, apparently it's YOU!



Billy.....you ba5t4rd.

All those seemingly insurmountable issues in the game shall be washed away and spin-dried by waves of positive and euphoric announcements to the media. By the end of this week, the game shall be unified and united behind a newly agreed structure... a blue chip energy company shall be sponsoring Super League to the tune of several £££million... Sam Burgess shall be declared winner of the Golden Boot best player in the world award... Danny Brough shall be named in the World XIII... and Bradford Bulls shall go a whole week without one of their barrow boys in shining armour threatening to quit the club.

all thoroughly believable and possible...




now you are 'avin a "tin" mate...

And Gutterfax will still be on my blocked list

Thought i was right FIRST UTILITIES SUPER LEAGUEicon_smile.gif

nothing been announced?

WHO??