On the SL attendances thread last season, the pro-franchising lobby were adamant that franchising, 14 teams and top 8 playoff system had nothing whatsoever to do with the double digit percentage drop in SL attendances. It was the economy, the weather, so-called fans deliberately talking down the game, etc.

These very same pro-franchising lobbyists are now desperately clinging to the view that the new P&R structure is ultimately to blame for the current marginal percentage drop in SL attendances this season, despite the fact the new structure isn't even in place yet and the game still operates 14 franchises and a top 8 playoff system.

They'll be deliberately talking down the game and hoping for poor SL attendances in order to furnish their pro-franchise agenda at every given opportunity. Just you wait and see

The difficultly will be comparing attendances on the split over this years 14 team competition. Almost impossible to compare, so everyone will be picking and chosing next year to suit their pre-fixed agenda.

I'm marginally in favour of the new system, but would have no problem dropping it if it is a disaster.

London Leaving SL is worth about a 7.5% increase in average attendances based on the 26 H/A games played last year. Bradford or Wakefield joining us will probably add another 2% to this.....SL will have a vastly improved average attendance in 2015 compared to any of the previous 19 years.....this will be announced with a massive fanfare by Knock Down Nigel and the Moonies on here will all bow in awe at the strategic genius he is.

The reality is that 12 is about the right number for SL and given the chances of anyone going up/down are minimal with the 888 system, those that survive the cull this year should be able to grow their businesses without the threat of a licence being revoked, safe in the knowledge that they will have a cap twice the size of their championship opponents should they be in the middle 8.

Bradford (and London) has 4 times the cap of Featherstone now - but wouldn't beat them.

The top 4 from last years championship and the bottom 4 from last years SL would have given us Leigh, Fax, Sheffield, Fev, Salford, London, Castleford and Wakey. London were pants last year and yet dealt with the hub cap and grand final winners in the challenge Cup......the difference between full time pro and part time pro is massive.

That's why the Sky money's going to be divi'd up a bit more fairly in future.

Well its pretty easy actually. The system is being sold on the basis that more ‘jeopardy’ will increase crowds throughout the leagues. That’s what it needs to do. If it doesn’t it is a failure. The new system needs to increase crowds from top to bottom so that overall more people are watching pro and semi-pro RL.

My expectation is that the very top of SL will increase quite a bit. The middle and lower will fall quite a bit. The top of the championships will rise but not by as much as the fall in the lower and middle SL sides. The other leagues will largely stay the same.

I wouldn't say it's being split more fairly since the vast majority of tv money is for the rights to broadcast SL.
But I would say it's being split in a better way for the good of the game.

I wouldnt. I think paying more to part-time players, who invariably werent good enough or are too old, to become full-time is among the worst things we could do with that money.

We would have been far better taking that money and ploughing it in to development officers, youth RL and amateur facilities.

I think with your breakdown there you have exposed what I mean.

If crowds across the leagues are up in general, but down in some area's. ie teir 1 up, teir 2 up, teir 2 down.

Everyone can argue success and failure. If crowds are up in general, but down in teir 2 and 3, it's the same issue.

People will argue the average is skewed as the most widely supported clubs will play each other more often. Wigan Saints 4 times a year will boost the average. Also knocking out (London Saints will boost that average).

The World Cup showed how everyone can argue everything with the same data.

Ok so whose turn is it this week???

Saints v London 2014 = 9408 Saints v London 2013 = 9926 -5.3% Leeds v Wigan 2014 = 18139 Leeds v Wigan 2013 = 15524 +14% Catalan v Salford 2014 = 7862 Catalan v Salford 2013 = 6872 +13% Hull FC v Wakey 2014 = 10088 Hull FC v Wakey 2013 =10000???? +1% Hull KR v Widnes 2014 = 7007 Hull KR v Widnes 2013 = 7247 -3.3% Huddersfield v Cas 2014 = 7195 Huddersfield v Cas 2013 = 5733 +20.3% Bradford v Warrington 2014 = 6173 Bradford v Warrington 2013 = 8485 -27.2% 2014 figures www.superleague.co.uk/matchday/results 2013 figures www.rugbyleagueproject.org/seaso ... mmary.html It's a starter for 10, make of them what you will. Rounds 1 to 11 Fixtures (76 in total) Total attendance for 76 fixtures in 2014 = 660000 (Avg: 8,684.21) Total attendance for same 76 fixtures in 2013 = 665777 (Avg: 8,760.22) Cumulative attendance loss = -5777 % decrease = -0.87% The whole fixtures figures, I took from Williams last post then added the figures from this round to the total. That's about as good as I get. Anything more and the experts need to take over.

Saints v London 2014 = 9408 Saints v London 2013 = 9926 -5.3% Leeds v Wigan 2014 = 18139 Leeds v Wigan 2013 = 15524 +14% Catalan v Salford 2014 = 7862 Catalan v Salford 2013 = 6872 +13% Hull FC v Wakey 2014 = 10088 Hull FC v Wakey 2013 =10000???? +1% Hull KR v Widnes 2014 = 7007 Hull KR v Widnes 2013 = 7247 -3.3% Huddersfield v Cas 2014 = 7195 Huddersfield v Cas 2013 = 5733 +20.3% Bradford v Warrington 2014 = 6173 Bradford v Warrington 2013 = 8485 -27.2% 2014 figures www.superleague.co.uk/matchday/results 2013 figures www.rugbyleagueproject.org/seaso ... mmary.html It's a starter for 10, make of them what you will. Rounds 1 to 11 Fixtures (76 in total) Total attendance for 76 fixtures in 2014 = 660000 (Avg: 8,684.21) Total attendance for same 76 fixtures in 2013 = 665777 (Avg: 8,760.22) Cumulative attendance loss = -5777 % decrease = -0.87% The whole fixtures figures, I took from Williams last post then added the figures from this round to the total. That's about as good as I get. Anything more and the experts need to take over.

Well, the O.P’s sacked it off & William’s still sulking because the nasty mods locked his thread.

Hopefully he’ll have a change of heart & let us know the state of play, league table & all.

Come on Salford, hang in there.

Quote ="bewareshadows"Saints v London 2014 = 9408 Saints v London 2013 = 9926 Leeds v Wigan 2014 = 18139 Leeds v Wigan 2013 = 15524 Catalan v Salford 2014 = 7862 Catalan v Salford 2013 = 6872 Hull FC v Wakey 2014 = 10088 Hull FC v Wakey 2013 =10000???? Hull KR v Widnes 2014 = 7247 Hull KR v Widnes 2013 = 7007 Huddersfield v Cas 2014 = 7195 Huddersfield v Cas 2013 = 5733 Bradford v Warrington 2014 = 6173 Bradford v Warrington 2013 = 8485 2014 figures www.superleague.co.uk/matchday/results 2013 figures www.rugbyleagueproject.org/seaso ... mmary.html It's a starter for 10, make of them what you will.'" Hull KR figures are the wrong way around. impressive crowd at Headingley - a full house everywhere but the uncovered terrace from what I could see. Only the usual suspects Bradford suffering significant drops.

Quote ="bewareshadows"Saints v London 2014 = 9408 Saints v London 2013 = 9926 Leeds v Wigan 2014 = 18139 Leeds v Wigan 2013 = 15524 Catalan v Salford 2014 = 7862 Catalan v Salford 2013 = 6872 Hull FC v Wakey 2014 = 10088 Hull FC v Wakey 2013 =10000???? Hull KR v Widnes 2014 = 7247 Hull KR v Widnes 2013 = 7007 Huddersfield v Cas 2014 = 7195 Huddersfield v Cas 2013 = 5733 Bradford v Warrington 2014 = 6173 Bradford v Warrington 2013 = 8485 2014 figures www.superleague.co.uk/matchday/results 2013 figures www.rugbyleagueproject.org/seaso ... mmary.html It's a starter for 10, make of them what you will.'" Hull KR figures are the wrong way around. impressive crowd at Headingley - a full house everywhere but the uncovered terrace from what I could see. Only the usual suspects Bradford suffering significant drops.

Glad you're feeling better.....any danger of you updating the thread you started with the figures for the last few weeks, or is it only positive weeks you can be d posting for?

You're one to talk, since you only poked your slimy nose into this thread when attendances were slacking. After one week I had no replies for over a week.. the straw that broke the camels back. RL Fans is only interested if it's negative.

corrected

I've added the total for the 11 rounds onto the end of the post. Basically we seem to have recovered some of our losses in this round.

Why that is??? Maybe good weather, maybe chance, who knows??

Hopefully with Bradford getting back into the fight it may lead to an upward trend for them for the rest of the year.

Same old 3 teams drag the averages down - London, Wakefield and Bradford. Only one of them played this weekend.

To be fair, the changes we are seeing are hardly anything, the attendances are pretty consistent with last year for the most part.

This ‘jeopardy’ lark isn’t helping those its supposed to be helping though, that much is obvious. Without the huge falls we are seeing at the clubs in the relegation fight we would probably be looking at decent growth.

i think the issue will be that we wouldnt be working with a full set of figures. If however we do see a large drop where i expect to see a large drop, the change will be a failure regardless of what else happens (realistically) because it will open an unbridgeable gap between the top and the rest which would make such a structure completely unworkable.

If the likes of Hull KR drop from C8k to C4k then they are completely left behind by the Leeds and Wigans who could be looking at 18k averages, Saints, Wire, hull etc at 15k averages.

Even if that sees the likes of Leigh etc go from 1k/2k to 3/4k even 5k, the gap between the big SL clubs and everyone else would be too big, and only getting bigger.

for this new system to work it needs to grow the game throughout all levels. it is dependant on more fans watching the initial relegation fight, then promotion competition thing than would watch a mid table SL side being mid table, the big worry is that it puts people off buying season tickets which could be an absolute disaster for the game that it struggles to recover from for a long long time.

Has anyone got this weekend's championship attendances, please?

Quote ="Ganson's Optician"Has anyone got this weekend's championship attendances, please?'" www.sportinglife.com/rugby-league/results

Quote ="Ganson's Optician"Has anyone got this weekend's championship attendances, please?'" www.sportinglife.com/rugby-league/results

Looking at those attendances gives an idea of the potential succes/failure of a Championship Magic weekend

10000???? indeed



The Hull V Wakefield fixture last season was associated with 3 different attendances (10,000... 10,448... and 10,48icon_cool.gif with official Hull FC sources being responsible for declaring 2 of them.

Bill Eve was accused many times on this forum last season of deliberately manipulating and massaging the attendance figures in order to paint the most negative picture. Unfortunately, Smokey and his bandit followers were unable to provide the evidence required for their almost season-long accusations, hence why they eventually disappeared from last season's attendance thread with their tails between their legs.

I do believe that in the example above, Bill Eve made the rational decision last season to go with the highest 10,488 attendance figure which was later officially confirmed by the Hull club itself in a later matchday programme on Page 31 [url=http://www.hullfclive.tv/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/020813-HULL-v-WIDNES-LR.pdfHERE[/url.