next year the rugby league will make sure one (or both) of the Hull clubs is in the final



we'll fill the ground

From what i saw, there were a couple of smallish patches of empty seats in the upper tier of the Wigan end, there were whole sections empty in the Leeds end.

Can't tell much about the sideline where the teams came from, I was on the front row by the corner flag.

If thats the case then the actuall attendance is lower than the one given out?.

Is that a valid excuse though. Your team is in a major final with a chance to win something and nearly did. I dont see why any of the last CC final results should stop fans going. Thats a weak excuse and Leeds should have taken more!!

I remember the 80's. Recession was on, miners strike etc.. & Wembley would sell out with neutrals alone if the rfl hadn't held back the competing sides allocation. Now the two best supported sides cannot sell out Wembley with all their glory hunters despite Super Leagues increased crowds.
Maybe having the sport run by a bloke that took a club into administration and a guy from tennis was not the way forward

I'd say so does anyone actually believe that there were 78,482 in the ground yesterday....I don't.

I wonder how much of the 'attendance' was made up of Club Wembley , Tickets for Heroes , groundstaff , the entertainment , the kids teams and their parents on freebies etc etc etc .
I have always said that attendances should be counted by actual turnstyle clicks that have been paid for .
I think as things stand you can sell 10k season tickets for a 10k capacity stadium , hold an event in said stadium , and however few people actually turn up the attendance will be 10k because that is how many people have tickets for the event .

I have mentioned elsewhere about a large block of seats directly in front of me been empty because the roof was leaking . I guess it won't have been the only one .

The attendance was poor, given that the 2 teams involved have the biggest average in SL. It would appear that many who follow Leeds have become a little aloof after a short period of success and couldn't be bothered to support their team in what they thought was probably going to be a proper hammering.

There were never 78k in the stadium. Not sure how many club wembley seats there are (lets say 10k?) but it was less than 20% occupied. At the Leeds end, there were blocks of empty seats all over the place.

My guess is, that the official attendance assumes that all club wembley seats get taken (as they have effectively been sold for the event) and its the other empty seats that make up the non attenders.

I'd say about 70k.

Club Wembley can't be counted towards the attendance otherwise it would of been announced as a 90k sell out last year

Capacities of tiers: Lower tier: 34,303; Middle tier: 16,532; Upper tier: 39,165

Wigan end to the right, Leeds end to the left. The North Stand (from where I took the picture) was pretty much full.

[url=http://img607.imageshack.us/img607/9004/dscf0738v.jpg[/url

Wigan took over 30k. Leeds took just over 20k. Why blame Wigan when they clearly took more?

Because no-one can stand the fact Wigan have won ANOTHER Challenge Cup.

Agree 100%. To take 30,000 to a Challenge Cup Final is outstanding IMO, I bet that's not been bettered by any club in the last 30 years, whereas 20,000 isn't great for a club in as big a city as Leeds (Hull took 25,000 in 2005 IIRC, and Hull is only 1/3 the the population of Leeds).

As a matter of interest, where do you get these figures from?

[uLeeds End. [/u









Very poor.

didn't notice so many spaces when watching on tv.

RL in this country is in (slight) decline for me. 78,000+ is a decent attendance, due to various factors the sport can't really expect to sell out Wembley every year anymore

Hopefully we can pull 40-50k for the double header later this year, i will be going with 5 others but i am pessimistic about a big crowd and we might only get 30-40k which would be embarrassing.

As has been mentioned, the Club Wembley idea is appalling. It should have been limited to the guaranteed sell out games (so, football) and maybe given CW members a 'limited time' priority booking to secure their seat for all other events.

Having the middle tier half empty, irrespective of how many fans both clubs take, looks awful.

Wigan sold [umore[/u tickets than they were allocated by the RFL, ergo, also sold their allocation a la the 2010 finalists.

Leeds did not.

Wigan is a relatively small town compared to the sprawling metropolis City of Leeds.

Wigan have a Premiership football team where over 17,000 attended some two hours before Saturday's CC Final KO. Leeds does not have a premiership football team as a distraction.

The NW sport loving population have the added distraction of 6 other Premiership teams where people choose to spend their hard earned.

Leeds/Yorkshire do not have such distractions.

Finally, the official train provided by the club did not arrive, as planned, and reports are already filtering through of a number of ticket holders who simply did not make it to the game.

IMO the main factor in our failure to sell our, i.e. Leeds', allocation was down to being written off in all the media. That didn't put of most of our regular fans, many of whom predicted a close game, but it doubtless put off many of the additional 15k casuals who are needed if a side is to sell all their tickets. Conversely, demand at Wigan might actually have been inflated at the prospect of an easy win.

.... great argument. Leeds Utd get no fans amirite?!

OMG are you for real

How many were at Elland Road on Saturday?

I'd love to know where posters think another 35,000 people would've fit on Saturday...