Exactly. Plenty of people who aren't regular watchers of live rugby league will attend a game like this purely because its seen as a 'big' event - watching international sport at the national stadium.

I got a couple of mates to go watch GB v Aus at the old wembley who had never seen a live RL game before and as far as I know never have since. Even though they didn't understand the rules they were caught up in the excitement of being at a live sporting event, supporting your country in the national stadium.

This obsession with 'targeting ex-pats in London' is just absurd. If the ex-pats are fans of RL, it's likely that they will already be going. If not, then they are no more likely to buy tickets than anyone else in London, and marketing specifically to them is just a complete waste of time and money.

My tickets for Aus V NZ arrived on Thursday, so I imagine some time next week for yours.

Exactly mate.

I dont expect a 10 quid ticket but I'd like to have the choice of say a £25 ticket behind the posts on the middle or upper tier then having to pay £35 or £45 to sit on the touchline.

I think they should have made the whole stadium available at £10 a ticket up until kick off and I think we'd have got 70,000+. That would have made a statement and helped us get international Rugby League back on track.

Missed opportunity IMO.

It would have made a statement, but what sort of statement? That international rugby league is an inferior product and not worth paying for. Personally I dont think any tickets should have been sold for £10, why should going to watch England and Austrialia cost half as much as going to watch Wakefield? If a reasonable amount of money is spent advertising in London, people will attend the event and be willing to pay to do so

Brilliant.

Fancy pointing out what's wrong with what I said? If I suggested targeting Northern ex-pats, you would laugh and say it was stupid, yet that's the exact same principle as what you're suggesting. Not all Aussies are RL fans. The ones that are probably already know about the game.

It's actually a very cost-effective policy. If you pubilcise it to their press it becomes a social event and so you get the non-RL fans going too (alot of the Aussies / Kiwis in London are middle class and tend towards Union). But if its a day out with the community they'll go (just witness the number of Wallaby shirts you'll get in the crowd, rather than just Kangaroo ones; for the Kiwis it's usually more pronounced - almost exclusively All Black's shirts). You must remember we are talking about an international competition here - so the more support you can build for each team, not just England, the more vibrant the competition and the better it'll look on TV.

When NZ played OZ at Harlequins in 09, it looked pretty fill of Aussies and Kiwis to me. If you don't advertise the game, how are they going to know about it. If you think we're going to get 40k in Wembley just on the hardcore league fans, then your living on another planet.

We have to try and entice neutrals to the game. People who might not have watched rugby league, but love sport might go to the game becase it's OZ v.s Eng at Wembley.

I don't watch or play Cricket, but when OZ play Eng in the ashes, the grounds are packed full of supporters.

There are hundreds of thouands of Aussies and Kiwis in London. Even if 1% of those are tempted by a special offer in their media, that is a fantastic return.

I'm unsure of any media that is aimed towards Northern ex-pats, nor any specific northern ex-pat community that could be targetted, so that is irrelevant.

I suppose it is a waste of time the RFL sending out promotional material during the season to supporters who have purchased tickets online in the past before too?

does anybody know how many tickets have been sold,and can you pay on the day?

There are millions of people in London. If we market to the whole of London and 1% take it up, then we'll sell out Wembley. Obviously that's not going to happen, but you understand my point. Aussies and Kiwis that aren't already RL fans aren't any more likely to attend than any other demographic, so making concerted efforts to attract these people in favour of other demographics doesn't really make sense.

It was an analogy. Like Aussies, you would expect that a Northerner would be more likely to already be a fan of RL than an average London resident. However that doesn't mean that all Northerners are RL fans, or would want to attend the game. And those that are already fans would likely know about the game anyway, without the need for specific marketing towards them. What I'm trying to say is that there's no point targeting small demographics based on the off-chance that they might already be RL fans. If the wider public know that the game is on, then any ex-pat RL fans will naturally be likely to attend.

No, that's not the same at all. Attempting to encourage those that have shown an interest to attend more regularly isn't anything to do with this, and if you think that's what I'm talking about then you are spectacularly missing the point.

Exactly. There's no requirement for these people to be Australian or New Zealand ex-pats, and they are no more likely to go because they are Australian or New Zealand ex-pats.

Okay then.

So you don't have any answers to anything I've said, thanks for clearing that up. I just hope the new identity of the London SL club doesn't fall into this trap like the old London Broncos did when they tried to make things Australian-oriented and completely failed to attract any substantial level of support, either from locals or the ex-pats. FWIW I'm not saying don't market to ex-pats, I'm saying don't market solely to ex-pats while ignoring the wider population. There are millions of sports fans in London that are just as likely to attend as the small minority of ex-pats. Placing all the emphasis on trying to attract a very small group based on poorly thought out assumptions is just stupidity.

OK.

Anybody know of any cheap rail deals on the day?

Travelling from Wakefield

Very disappointed that the RFL have done nothing (that I know of) with London schools. Given that there would otherwise be 40k+ empty seats it's the perfect chance to get 11-16 year-olds, most of them priced out of any other live sport, favourably acquainted with the game by giving away tickets.

It would also let London-resident parents and potential ticket-purchasers know about the existence of the match, which, to be honest, they otherwise wouldn't.

Agreed. Never too late though, send an email to all schools with vouchers attached, all schoolkids get in for £5 if the schools organise it.

This idea could still work, get the email out there this week ahead of half term and have a school trip to Wembley sorted for when the kids go back to school! Good performance from England and a few of the kids could be hooked!

I think I've spotted flaw in your plan

Never understand why the RFL hold matches at places like London and Cardiff and then don;t do all they can to fill the place with locals.

Well their plan has been to sell £10 tickets for a spell way before the game, only open one tier which means only £35+ tickets are left and do no marketing work in the south to promote the game meaning the crowd will no doubt be 95% made up of people from the heartlands.

Unless they pull something out of the bag in these next couple of weeks they may as well have taken these fixtures to Manchester or Liverpool.

Strange set of people down at the RFL.

28,000 tickets sold. So 14,000 for each game. An utter embarassment as usual.

Is it perhaps time to just hold our hands up and admit international league has no future? There aren't enough professional leagues to support more than England, Aus & NZ. Why not just admit that is the case and focus on the club game or regional game instead?

if has you say only 28000 tickets are sold were do you get your info from i rang this morning and they have not started to print the tickets yet let alone know how Meany they have sold they will be sent out 5 days before the game

14000 for Wales v New Zealand 3 weeks before the game which isnt even been played in Wales is pretty impressive, get us in super league!

Also there was only 23000 when England last played Austrialia over here in the group stage so only 9000 more to match that number