Really enjoyed the weekend as a whole and love the venue. We stayed at the Durham Travelodge for the weekend and spent a very nice Friday evening sampling the delights of Durham. A really nice city and we found some really good pubs and the locals were very friendly and interested to know what was happening that weekend (I don't think the event was well publicised in Durham).

Easy to get the train from Durham to Newcastle, superb location IMO for bars, restaurants and good metro links as well. Hope it has found its true home in Newcastle, look forward to going back next year and more enjoyable evenings in Durham and Newcastle.

Joined the A1m from M1 and just straight to Newcastle. What was annoying was there was a lack of signs for St James Park - on the m62 for example there is a clear sign for the Galpharm, on m621 there are signs for Headingley etc. We ended up taking a junction further along we should've. Even then when we got into Newcastle there were no signs for St James Park. Found a car park that turned out to be nearby and a very helpful Geordie couple posted us in the right direction.

It was our first trip to Newcastle for probably 15 years and the various roadworks didn't help either.

Could the RFL look at delaying the weekend by a week to coincide with the bank holiday weekend? It would help to increase the attendance on the Sundsys and not make having the 5:30pm kick off seem as bad for travelling fans. It could cause issues with availability and prices of hotel rooms though...

I had one of the best weekends I have had in such a long time. We arrived by train on Friday afternoon, already there was a great atmosphere in the pubs; the Bier Keller was absolutely bouncing, apologies to anyone who got to experience yours truly 'yodelling' on stage!

The Gate was brilliant pre-match, the bars had gone out of their way to welcome fans. This is the key USP over Manchester and London in particular, they are both huge cities and host a different event each weekend. The last two years in Newcastle, the locals have seemed excited and proud to host the event. The challenge for next year is to make them seem involved, too.

The stadium is fantastic and seems to give the event a real aura. After seeing the scenes at the Scotish Cup game on Sunday morning, I felt really proud to be sat in a big group with Wire, Salford, Saints and Widnes fans, having a great laugh with many the supporters of many other clubs.

As a sport we often shoot ourselves in the foot, but this is an event we really should be proud of. Newcastle is the perfect venue and if we really build on it, we could have one of the highlights of the sporting calendar in another ten years time.

Play off final weekend. Newcastle maybe in them as in the championship next season. Like newcastle should go back next year. No to 9s tournament.

I don't even know where to begin with this, the event has record crowds every year, how is it possibly stale? Do you really think 68,000 people, or even 1/10th of that number would turn up to watch a meaningless 9's kickabout in the middle of the SL season? Use your brain FFS.

Keep it in one place. Try and build support in one area. Moving it around dissipates long term development in my view.
The entire stadium should be blanketed with ads/marketing/promotion for Newcastle Thunder.

Oh and a definite no to a 9's comp. We have to put all our resources into developing the 13 man game.
If the NRL wants to use some of its money to establish an international 9's as our version of 7's then great. But it should be used to develop internationally not domestically. It just draws focus and resource away from the proper sport for what is a side show.

I agree. We need to stick with the principle and the venue.
Look at the GF at Old Trafford, back in 1998 we attracted 42k it's one of the few events where we stuck it out and are now reaping the rewards 75k+ crowds. Would that have been successful had it been moved around to Anfield, Elland Road, Etihad? No, definitely not.

I parked at Heworth.£1.20 all day parking.3.50 all day ticket on the metro to monument

10 minutes on te metro with a train every 4 minutes


. 5nminute walk to the ground.SIMPLES

For me

Etihad
Pros- Manchester easily accessible, fantastic fans zone, more comfortable stadium, ability to move around the ground and sit with other fans
Cons- not allowed food, stadium isolated

St James
Pros- centre of city, can take food into stadium, locals brilliant
Cons- ridiculously expensive hotel prices, having to travel from hotels out of centre, poor fans zone, a long journey home on a Sunday night.

newcastle for me is the best location, city centre right on its door step ethihad was good because you could move around freely, but that was it, nothing close to the ground. bit of o/t www.rugby-league.com/article/375 ... magic-flag well done to cramlington rockets who sold 560 tickets for the magic weekend, probably more than a club who's chairman is throwing insults at an other club for not bringing many to away games

newcastle for me is the best location, city centre right on its door step ethihad was good because you could move around freely, but that was it, nothing close to the ground. bit of o/t www.rugby-league.com/article/375 ... magic-flag well done to cramlington rockets who sold 560 tickets for the magic weekend, probably more than a club who's chairman is throwing insults at an other club for not bringing many to away games

Newcastle for me! The only time I can get to a game in 40 minutes!

Newcastle for me, closely followed by Cardiff. I've been to them all, the stadium has to be in the centre, the atmosphere then is fantastic with all fans enjoying the games and evenings together.

The issue with the Eithad for me is there is nothing around it and because there's lots of clubs in the proximity a lot of people just choose to visit for the day rather than the weekend. Newcastle for a weekend trip was fantastic, the locals embraced everything about the weekend.

Camp Nou - OK, it's a long trip but flights can be pretty cheap as can hotels, major city in a sunny place different culture etc. Should pull in a few from Catalan too.

Unfortunately between Barcelona and Milles there aren't many stadiums above 30k capacity and a local airport.

Personally I've always been put off Newcastle by travel cost and expensive hotels. If it looks like it's going to stay there for years, though, I *might* try it in the next year or two. But it's just a fluke of geography, really; fans in the North-East and Scotland obviously are going to find Newcastle much more convenient. I'm used to travelling up to Wigan for games, and when the MW was at the Etihad, I stayed overnight in Wigan as I usually do. It's not a long journey by motorbike on a warm summer evening, and, as noted, the stadium is in a rather wasteland area of Manchester.

Cardiff (just an hour away) is definitely my favourite, though!

The Olympic stadium in Barca holds 54k. Wire played Catalans a few years back there .

They only sold non alcoholic beer, and didn't tell us either




I'm not a fan of newcastle, the stadium, agree that all the stuff outside and in the local area seems to be geared up to welcome visitors, but watching the game i felt like i was at odsal, that far back and that far up, plus you don't feel like your sat together with your fans, certainly not where warrington have been 'allocated' this last two years.

Surprised at people saying you couldn't move around the ground! You could.

Only the reserved stand had restrictions.

This absolutely, I watched out game with Wakey fans (obv) spent 1st half of next game with Saints fans in same stand.

Then for the Hull derby i spent the 1st half with FC fans, but they were too drunk and rowdy for me and so went and sat with the KR fans for the 2nd half.

It should be held at Hillsborough, easier/closer for fans from ALL clubs to get to as well as consideration for those of us not living in the heartlands and a 10 hour round trip drive to places like Newcastle.
The stadium has the required capacity and if the RFL sort out the games so they don't finish too late on a Sunday as they have this year then using the trains is less of an issue.
I also think the tickets are far too cheap, it continues to devalue the sport, £10 for a concession ticket two full days or £25 for a full priced adult ticket is ridiculous.

whats it done for gateshead thunders crowds? are the geordies going to watch them ?!

not really.

back to manchester for me.

but if we want to continue with this spread the game theme then maybe coventry next... do Ireland deserve magic weekend too?

You do realise that cities pay millions of pounds to host this event? It's not just some whimsical idea from the RFL to give a minor boost to the local semi pro team.

BTW you don't even know what Newcastle (not Gateshead) Thunder's crowds are, do you? Even though it's ridiculous to expect there to be any type of increase or even try to measure any increase based on a single one-off event, they could've received a massive boost and you wouldn't even know, you don't even know what the team is called.

Having it at the emptyhad hardly helped Salfords crowds did it

Regards

King james

If the RFL had any sense they'd get Newcastle and Manchester to enter a bidding war (both cash and marketing spend) and get the cash in, no doubt they'I'll have some other random idea though!

An increase of less than 500 compared to last year? Hardly the record-shattering event the RFL promised. I wonder if the RFL even make any money out of it?