Not to any great degree we dont. We dont focus on or target those areas. this is a very very small part of it.
certainly more than they would if they were called Hull.

really?

But they werent always like that, which rather than invalidates my point, supports it. NFL clubs chose to represent large cities or large geographical areas to promote growth. That growth is why they are one of the biggest sport leagues in the world.
but your opposing argument is that they would support these same teams even if they were simply named after a relatively small areas. Even some of those do have large population centres. Like perth,
Yet thats what they do in New York with the Giants, Jets, Knicks, Yankees, Mets, Rangers, Islanders, Red Bulls, City FC, In fact all bar Brooklyn Nets who had spent 35 years in New Jersey.

In fact, London, in soccer, is pretty much unique the world over in branding their clubs after smaller parts of the city and that is mostly to do with their ages and the environment in which they were founded.

Again, that completely contradicts what you're trying to say. London are also unlikely to get very many supporters from outside the area in which they're based regardless of name.

Maybe, but there probably wouldn't be anywhere near as much local interest in Hull.

Yeah, that and the fact that it's the biggest, most popular sport in the richest, most powerful and third largest nation on Earth.

No, that isn't my argument at all. But there's a huge difference between naming a team after Rockhampton, a small and relatively insignificant place with a population of 60,000, and naming a team after Barnet, which has a population of 330,000 in the middle of a city of 13.5 million. A club named 'Barnet' would represent the third biggest population centre out of any team in Super League after Leeds and Bradford, and would also be bigger than any in the NRL apart from Melbourne, Brisbane, Gold Coast and New Zealand. Barnet alone has a bigger population than the geographical region of North Queensland.

What you're failing to acknowledge that these 'suburbs or boroughs' are far larger than most cities in their own right.

But again, you're missing the fact that sport in the USA is completely different to RL in the UK, both in its scale and nature. And that most of those teams play different sports. AFAIK, New York is only represented by two clubs at each sport. Which makes sense given the size of America and the population spread that needs to be covered. There are 30 or so teams to go around 320 million people. But what you're talking about in the UK would be a London club representing a population four or five times the size of all the other teams combined.

So you think it would be more logical if all the soccer clubs in London were just called London?

So I say I don't like the 'London' moniker and the usual suspects start shouting "that's not why the club's in trouble". Except that I never once said it was the reason the club's in trouble, but don't let that stop you refuting a premise I never put.

I still don't like the 'London' moniker, and never have.

Why??
It doesn't matter what the rest of the country think, if we're serious about building a local support base and not relying on away fans turning up (I grant you, given what's gone before that's a big 'if').

Quote ="SmokeyTA"People don't associate themselves with a direction. '" Many do. onedirectionfanclub.com/ Quote ="SmokeyTA" People dont think of themselves as 'The south'.'" Some do www.thesouth.co.uk/ they're playing Gawsworth Hall on Friday. And Bingley Live on Aug 31

Quote ="SmokeyTA"People don't associate themselves with a direction. '" Many do. onedirectionfanclub.com/ Quote ="SmokeyTA" People dont think of themselves as 'The south'.'" Some do www.thesouth.co.uk/ they're playing Gawsworth Hall on Friday. And Bingley Live on Aug 31

FA



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How on earth does it? Harrogate and York are nt in Leeds. It is entirely irrelevant to my point.
it doesnt need to have more than there is in Hull. Just more than there would otherwise be and it is the obvious right way to go.

And to repeat, Them making a conscious decision to target large populations with city or region teams were one those catalysts for that growth which made them the most popular sport.


But you are arguing that those who want to watch RL, but were one of the 13.2m people in London but not Barnet would watch Barnet anyway even though they had no affinity or affiliation to Barnet. So Why wouldnt they watch Rockhampton? If the name doesnt matter and they would watch anyway why would you rename the Auckland Warriors the NZ warriors if it wouldnt attract more people?

If the name didnt matter and those in north queensland who were going to watch the cowboys would watch anyway, why are they the North Queensland Cowboys and not the Townsville Cowboys.

Its irrelevant how big they are. We want the club to be as big as possible. The principle is the same. It doesnt change with scale.

Every other sport in the world doesnt look to clubs representing suburbs, every major sport in the world looks to its biggest sides to represent cities, larger regions or are none-geographical, the only exceptions are those which grew out of amateur sport and we are talking centuries old.

Why are we different? What are all they doing wrong?

And? are we in a position of Londons Club being too big? Why wouldnt we want each club to be as big as it can be?

Everyone else in the world seems to manage pretty easily.

Quote ="Ferocious Aardvark"Many do. onedirectionfanclub.com/ Some do www.thesouth.co.uk/ they're playing Gawsworth Hall on Friday. And Bingley Live on Aug 31'"

Quote ="Ferocious Aardvark"Many do. onedirectionfanclub.com/ Some do www.thesouth.co.uk/ they're playing Gawsworth Hall on Friday. And Bingley Live on Aug 31'"

To be fair, I'm loving Headhunter and Smokey arguing, leave them alone.

I thought they were they same person. Maybe they are...

Back on topic. RFL get involved, help the London club find a decent venue and market the living day lights out of it. Also, again, enjoy the championship, it's a fantastic league, more so next year and hope you all visit the Shay!

The Club's biggest and most enthusiastic attendances were when they were called Fulham and played at Fulham.

Leeds get support from Harrogate and York despite being called Leeds and being based in Leeds. Obviously there aren't as many fans from those other places as there are from Leeds, but based on your argument there wouldn't be any at all.

In relation to London, the argument is the same, they also wouldn't get a huge amount of support from outside the local area. A team called London based in Twickenham would still get the majority of its support from Twickenham and not from East London or North London.

Obviously if the net gain was higher then it would be the right move, but I don't think that would be the case at all. You're neglecting developing a local base in favor of targeting the huge area of London and getting completely overwhelmed. RL in London is a drop in the ocean, decreasing the size of that ocean is likely to make a far bigger impact.

They haven't gone from clubs the size of London (or other RL clubs) to huge entities overnight because they 'targeted large populations'. American sports are operated on a franchise basis by billionaire owners, many of them have been relocated thousands of miles to opposite ends of the country. It's nothing at all like RL and completely irrelevant to this discussion.

There's a huge difference between Rockhampton and Townsville and Barnet. Townsville and Rockhampton are relatively remote, isolated places that probably couldn't support clubs on their own. Barnet as you've said is a suburb, with a population more than big enough to support a club and also a huge population in the immediate vicinity. Your argument is completely ignoring the different nature of these places. It's like trying to compare Fulham and Whitehaven.

So this entire argument is based not on logic, but on the arbitrary measure of whether something is a 'suburb' or not. And the fact that 'other sports do it' despite the only relevant examples (soccer in London and RL in Sydney) being operated with clubs based out of suburbs.

We do, we want as many strong clubs as possible. But 13 million people is far too big a catchment area for just one club, especially in a sport the size of RL. Even the aforementioned New York Giants and Jets playing in the biggest, most prestigious and well-known sports league in the world don't market themselves to that many people. For such a club to grow to a level relative to the likes of Wigan or St Helens would mean they were playing in front of hundreds of thousands of fans every week. It's just lunacy.

12 clubs all called London FC. Great.

The new Perth NRL team will be called west coast, not Perth or a suburb of Perth. The reason, to appeal to the whole state not just the city or a part of the city. Would be silly to not call a team London.

Actually......after a while the crowds and enthusiasm drifted away to the extent that Fulham couldn't be d. Another example of erecting posts, announcing KO times and trusting Kevin Costner MArketing to do the rest.....and the biggest average attendances for londons pro RL team isn't fulhams, but Te broncos in year 1 of SL

Population of Western Australia: 2.5 million.

Population of London: 13.6 million.

Don't think that's right. What do you think the two figures are i.e average attendance in first season as Fulham (2nd division by the way) and in first season as London in Super League?

Were you there at Fulham's first season matches to feel the enthusiasm==>
First match v Wigan (nearly 10,000)
Challenge cup match v Wakefield (15,000)
the night before Wembley when Fulham beat Bradford (then Champions) with an Ian Van Bellan drop goal (sic)- 13,000 I think?

Actually the crowds weren't ever that good at the Cottage except for a few 'marquee' fixtures - the gate for the first game against Wigan of 9552 (of whom probably the odd 552 paid!) was followed by 5589 for the next one against Swinton and this when the club was getting good publicity in the London media. Ernie Clay openly admitted that he'd started the club to 'make some brass' and by the middle of the second season rumours about our future were already starting to circulate. I was told by a committee member during the Chiswick era that when Roy Close bought the club from the liquidator it had been carrying debts of around £750k, although a lot of that was apparently owed to various legal companies.

You're mixing up enthusiasm and free tickets to marquee games.......once the free tickets dried up, so did the enthusiasm......

You haven't said but it sounds like you weren't there. I was.

I suspect you are making this up about free tickets. Doesn't sound right if Ernie Clay did plan RL to be a new income stream.

I paid to get in to the first match v Wigan. All the Wigan supporters did I think. Both seated stands looked pretty full that day and weren't free. The kop was full of Fulham AFC supporters - so am guessing that Fulham soccer season ticket holders got in free to the terraces for the first match (and really were won over during the course of the 80 minutes giving the team a rapturous ovation at the end).

The 15,000 crowd v Wakefield in the cup was "all pay" as was the eve of challenge cup final challenge match v Bradford (13,000).

Do you know that there were free tickets handed out during Fulham's first season, or are you just guessing? Don't know too much about marketing history, but did clubs hand out free tickets in the '80s ? I was working in West London during the Fulham/Chiswick years........never got anywhere near a freebie, always paid on the gate, Craven Cottage and Polytechnic ground.

In fact Cup games have to be 'all pay' anyway. The Challenge match on Cup Final Eve was all pay (to be pedantic, the gate was 11926) with the result (three points for a try, then) Fulham 20 (tries - David Allen 4, goals Iain MacCorquodale 4); Bradford 8 (tries Derek Parker, Dennis Trotter, goal Keith Mumby). One of the best match days at the Cottage with a great atmosphere - one highlight was referee Ronnie Campbell going over to the Bradford bench in the second half and giving coach Peter Fox the choice of substituting Jim Fiddler or having him sent off! Oh, and van Bellen never dropped a goal for us, although he scored 4 tries.

Fulham had the best crowds????? lmfao!

Only on 4 occasions did they top 10k, in what...10 seasons. Their best season was 6k average, which I believe the Broncos actually bettered a couple of times.

Not that I care, I never went to a single Fulham game, and if London changed their name to anything else (with the possible exception of QPR) I'd stop going, it's that simple.

I like being able to yell "C'MON LUNDUN!" 'til I'm ho. I will be available next season if we still have a club and until such time as the lights may finally go out. On a positive note a Euro-Millions winner, Oil rich Sheikh or Russian Oligarch may take over, buy Loftus Road when the R's move to their new stadium and have magnificentley successful marketing campaigns that see the place packed week in and week out!

Ooooh....you were there so you must be correct


The enthusiasm of that first season saw 3 or 4 bigish crowds and plenty of not so big crowds.....at least one of your sometimes exaggerated crowds was a challenge Cup tie which would negate it from the championship/SL average attendances that we discuss on here.....so your hanging your hat on a season that no definitive figures actually exist for. What we can see is that the following year they averaged 4,500 or so.....in a higher division.

On the other hand, SL 1 delivered 5,700 or so as a Home average......the club have only ever INCREASED crowds at one venue, which was Griffin Park where they left with a higher average than they arrived with.

This is all and wind anyway. The demise of this club has little to do with names, location or any other insane theories (usually contributed by folk who have never been south of Watford in their Lives for anything other than the Challenge Cup Final)......

I know for a fact that Hughes "invested" £10,237,637 into the club in 5 years between 2008-12. The club in this period turned over £20,000,000, so basically, £4,000,000 a year of fans, Hughes, RFL and SKY money was spent on 42 SL wins from 135 attempts (31%). Since then he's delivered a win ratio of about 10% in a season and a bit.........and that will include another £2,000,000 from him last year at least.

Of the £20,000,000 spent 2008-12.....would you care to guess how much they spent on Marketing the club?.......don't bother. £976,656 (0.048%) is what they spent over 5 years.....£195,331 a season or £15,025 per game. In that 5 year period, they SHED 40% of their fan base and lost 50% of their season ticket revenue.......No matter what you called them or where they played, with that "business model" they were never going to end up anywhere other than in the shi**er.

Your maths is wrong again.

But my point is valid.

probably, but you do it no favours by over egging.