Fair enough, but (and this is a serious question, not a dig) why did things fall apart then? I.e. they were therefore much stronger all-round 12-14 years ago compared to now, they'd broke into that elite group of clubs like Saints and Wigan, and had a glorious chance to become a big name in SL. How did it all get to now where they're out-supported by every club in SL despite having a city of 8 million people to draw from?

Yes...we did it in 3






shame on them...only took us 3 years






What kept them,.....we did it in 3




Pah...pathetic.



Not bad at all for a team full of aussies

Yes but London had a squad of 17 Aussies compared to our 8 or 9.



Tbf that whole era was a joke - London should never have been fast-tracked to start with. Sure they did well for a few years, but IMO a club like Keighley could have done more in the long-term, e.g. they were getting 3000-5000 for some games in (what is now known as NL1).

Yes, with a team of 17 Aussies, not 8 or 9

You didn't earn it though - you was handed a lot of it e.g. a place in SL, rather then achieving it through promotion like we and our neighbours across the city did.



So what happened then? Why did it come to nothing in the long-term? + why did you only sell 9000 tickets for a Challenge Cup Final in your own city? If we reached Wembley we'd bring double that.

Couple of points.
London were included in SL because SKY wanted them in. The Club didn't apply...they were invited to join. What would the reaction been if HKA had been invited to join...would they have turned it down on principle? Like fx89k they would


Next up...your preoccupation with our lack of fans. Seriously roofs...I get grief for banging on about it on the quins board...what excuse do you have?
Lastly...you asked earlier about achievements of Directors etc.....I would think that Tony Clubb running in 4 tries for England (one of only 12 players to do so) and LMS being snapped up by St Helens sit pretty well with anyone at director/board level at the club. Just because you can't see 8,000 fans at the stoop for a league game doesn't mean the game isn't popular down in London and the Home Counties....there are plenty more where Clubb and LMS came from...it's all about building for the future

Now I know you're drunk....only 18,000 tickets....surely a mis-type....you meant 1,800,000

You've got 10 Aussies. And unlike London, whose Aussies are going down (and are now at 3), you lot are getting more and more. You can talk about your crowds being an achievement all you like, but you could compare it to the players produced by Harlequins pretty much from scratch (not from a ready-made amateur set-up like we have in Hull). THAT'S an achievement.

Keighley in SL would (IMO) be getting crowds not much different than Cas/Wakey/Salford.
Oh, and it's known as the Championship now, not National League 1. I know you lot are big boys in Super League now, but you should still remember your roots (you bang on about them enough!

)

I think it was to do with Richard Branson pulling out. You can talk up Hudgell all you like, but no-one has had a chairman like Sir Richard Branson in SL!

London might have around 8m people, but you've got to remember it's a lot different to Hull. It's not like you can pop across the city in 15 minutes. It can take longer to get across London at good times than it can to get to Warrington from Hull. Quins is only easily accessible by a fraction of that. And that's not to mention the other much more popular activities in London (such as football, rugby union, the theatres, some of the world's biggest tourist attractions, etc!).

I think we had 12 two years ago so actually ours are going down too.

so you are suggesting Gutterfax that in fact we should have pushed to have 17 Aussies in the squad when we were promoted then we might have been as succesful as Quins RL? Damn if we'd have known that was the formula of success we wouldn;t have waited this long to fill the roster with overseas players!

Is he here yet?

I think the obvious reply to that would be: as a heartlands club, it should not only be easier to produce your own players, but it should also be easier to attract English players (since they're only down the road).

How come heartland clubs are deemed to have an advantage in attracting English players because of location but this whole thread (and others) is about how so many players are happy to travel half way round the world to get work? For people like Stanley Gene he could barely speak the language, that wasn't a short trip down country it was whole different culture!

In that context is 200 miles (35 in the case of Crusaders) really such a barrier?

Perhaps the question is better asked to any number of northern muppets who've come down and then gone home before completing their contracts because they miss their mums?

But making comparisons with people coming thousands of miles is a bit facile, [uany[/u club signing an overseas player risks them getting homesick and going, although the sheer effort involved in uprooting in the first place makes such brain farts less likely. Besides one needs to consider the relative value of the opportunities available, someone like Stanley Gene had a choice between staying in PNG which is developing country, or moving overseas to be a professional sports person, and realistically he wasn't NRL first grade regular material so UK was almost certainly his best chance of a better life. Similarly for some average NRL players it is their best offer of maintaining a professional career, whereas for others like Kolpak stiffs and past it NRL players it is their only way of maintaining a professional career (the NRL isn't falling over itself for Willie Mason - his career has been in freefall for several years - although I'm sure someone would have given him a contract of some sort).

Domestic players are a different proposition; London and to a lesser extent Wrexham have the disadvantage that the mature established player pools in the UK are located in the north of England, which more often means players reloacting. I'm guessing that a Hull based player is not going to spend up to 6 hours every day doing a return trip to Wrexham, although a player based in Widnes or Warrington might be prepared to spend up to 2 hours a day doing a round trip for work. The offer of a contract with Quins or Crusaders has to be weighed against the opportunities available closer to home even if that means playing at a lower level or for less money, the money is especially a problem for London where rents and house prices are generally much higher than most other places in the UK (other living costs are less skewed than popular myth - unless you insist on shopping and socialising in only the trendiest establishments).

I'm all for seeing BRITISH players playing in BRITISH teams but it's all about results.

Harlequins have 3

Hull KR have 10.

Which team will finish higher up the table this year?

I'll give you a clue.



It won't be Quins.

Saints have 5

Hull KR have 10

Which team will finish higher up the table this year?

I'll give you a clue.



It won't be Hull KR.

I'm not so sure. Royce Simmons... Justin Morgan...

Hmmmmm

Or, in a nut shell...

You don't have to uproot if you're in the north, and if you do it's not that far home. This being a VERY attractive thing to a lot of players moving.

You finished 11 points behind us last year when we were crippled by injury, I wouldn't hold your breath.

I think this season will be very interesting for both clubs. Either one could finish in the top 5 or the bottom 5. I can't wait to see how it pans out.

Saints to finish in the bottom five? Yeah right!

Saints haven't finished outside the top 5 for 17 years, and have made the last 5 GF on the bounce, but you think we might finish in the bottom 5 below one of Quins/Salford/Wakey/Catalans/Cas?

Give over.

wishful thinking?

so you was the only team crippled by injurys was you i think we was one of the worst hit at the back end of the season but oh yea i forgot only saints wigan and leeds had all the injurys how silly of me

No, you probably had some too, just everyone was busy talking about the big clubs who might win something.