The attendance and the turnover.

And the stadium now - North Stand condemned.

Hey ho fiddly dee

and how far away are they from turnover and attendance? I cant think they are miles away from either?

and the north stand? are they close to sorting that?

also when did Barrow say they werent applying? i thought they had said they would?

Agreed, although you do go some way to explaing the on-field perfomances below......development.

see above



...sorry, but the matchday experience itself is great.....


no argument from me on these points....

got one thanks (for now anyway)

has been said before...on more than one occasion



1.5 million a year or 30k a week.......bad management is rife at the club and has been for many years. That said, se your point about a rich benefactor......

Quins will survive but I really hope the RFL make it clear what they have to do in the next 3 years. No wishy washy criteria...give them a total that they MUST spend on marketing (not community schemes...MARKETING) and give them a target of 40% increase in gates by 2012 or it's curtains. We really have had enough time to get it right......they need a fire lit under them IMO.

Interesting.

I stand corrected. Who is funding the stadium?

Yeah no worries, never took it as you were. Yep, we're more annoyed than anyone waiting to find out, hopefully these next few weeks something major will happen.

Makes you wonder though why our sport struggles so much. A comment is made on a BBC tv sports program and it takes 3 full days before that comment makes it's way on to it's own interweb site. (I'm guessing the BBC are using Tiscali?) There's just so much that needs improving in our game (ok, we can't effect poop journalism) and it's just a shame the RFL seem to have a good idea (franchises) but could severely damage our game if they do not get things right.

Even if they are close on those counts - they can't realistically apply and then compete for SL until we get a backer(s). I'm not interested in suffering at the foot of the table. I had a gut full of that in 2003.

I can't find the link now



Think it was on Sportinglife.Com somewhere.

If one of Cas or Wakey get the boot then they only have themselves to blame. I like both teams, I really do, but long-term you really have to question the value of having two - really rather poor - teams in such close proximity. The craziest thing is if they did get their act together and agree to a ground-share a lot of the problems for both teams in terms of crietria would disappear - tick in the box for ground and probably better financials as well due to shared costs. Had one or other actually got going on a new ground, I may think differently, but TBH all the announcements to date sound like a load of horse-pooh.

I'm not suggesting the clubs need to necessarily merge, but both seem to be getting lukewarm support from the council, who obviously would prefer to have to help out in the development of one new ground not two.

I understand issues with Quins but like it or not they are key to the broader appeal of the sport to broadcasters and the like. Without them, Crusaders and Cats we'd be struggling to get any sort of deal out of Sky going forward.

I don't really see why it's a given that Quins are safe and that we need them from a point of view of the Sky deal.
If it's simply a case of putting Sky dishes on roofs in the capital then I don't see the link. If there was that much enthusiasm for Quins down there people would be going to see them in numbers, not tuning in to the odd broadcast.
I don't have my flat cap on here, and I really have no gripe with Harlequins as a club, in fact I'd love to see them as a real force. It's just this assumption that I question.

This is a proffesional observation....not an assumption.
SKY....when they go to agencies will say we have an audience of X. The client, say, DELL, will say how many of X reside in areas A, B & C?
SKY will then say that they have 50% in A, 30% in B and 20% in C. Then they will ask for viewing figures for various programmes.....in A, B & C. (the client/agency think they know how much the residents of areas A,B &C have to spend on their product)
Now getting slightly wound up with all the questions, SKY will produce viewing figures in both domestic and commercial (pubs) venues and RL is a great filler....in that if Publican Mr Smith is paying 2k a month for SKY, regardless of if the wendyball is on, he will have the tv on in his pub and if it's RL he's showing, then that adds to the figures for "viewers'.
Now...stay with me here.......as much as London and the SE has no "walk up and pay at the door" value as a fan based sport....to your media planner (who loves stats BTW.....oh he also lives in the SE of England/London), SKY sports becomes a better viable option......

...so there you have it! SKY want a pro london RL team to help them sell advertising.....it has nothing to do with them being a fan of the sport, jellie eels or an unatural affinity with pearly queens.
It has SFA to do with dishes....it is all about ad spend.
That said, Quins have no god given right to a place in SL and I suspect the above reason is one of the causes for them being apathetic when questions are asked of the club.
As I say....3 more years but DEFINED targets set for them.....on both new fans and EFFORT in attracting them!

Thanks for the explanation, good to get that kind of insight. I'll be sorry to see any club drop down, but the door has to be open for the NL1 clubs who are making strides to get in.

As I prepare to be shot.....again by the apologetic quins faithfull.
I would have no complaint if Quins went....I would refrain from loads of [size=200I warned you in 2002 posts[/size and would be sad to see the club drop down, but it is the fact they are losing 30 to 50k a week, with the squad they have (mid-table at best but nowhere near cap) and the total lack of anything resembling urgency in the marketing department that winds me up.
As a business, Quins RL well me be a future case study used by people trying to avoid running their businesses into the ground

The only clubs fit for Super League at the moment are Hull FC, Saints (when they move), Warrington, Wigan, Leeds, Catalans and Huddersfield.

The rest either have a ground issues (Bradford, KR, Cas, Wakey, Salford, or embarrassing attendances (Crusaders, Quins, Salford - again).

If the RFL want to be bold, they should have an elite competition of the A-rated clubs, and a secondary competition of the clubs close to being Super League ready, split the deal with Sky between the two competitions and promote those who get their house in order to the elite competition when they're ready.

The problem is that there would be uproar of a mass culling of Super League clubs from fans. It's much easier for them to kick out one team other SL fans see as the weakest (Wakey usually, or Cas or Salford to some) when in truth they're not really any worse than the likes of Bradford and Hull KR - both of who have poor stadia, poor youth development and hardly awe-inspiring performances on the pitch.

Personally, I think a club should come in to replace one it's better than. I would say Widnes are better than Wakey, Cas or Salford purely on the basis of stadia and a fully supportive Chairman and would have no qualms about that change being made (although would be gutted to see Cas go, especially since our youth development is outstanding and would undoubtedly be hampered in the lower tiers). I would have serious issues about rushed expansion. Crusaders should have been given three years in the Championship and would have been a stronger club for it. Super League shouldn't be the breeding ground to get clubs up to speed - it should be the place where the ready and the elite battle it out - the Championship should be where clubs get up to scratch, and those clubs need the financial support to do it.

You haven't established that having a team in London will actually affect the number of SKY viewers who watch RL in the South East. Do you believe that this is the case? Is the effort to establish RL in schools in the area having an effect on what the youngsters watch when they grow up and leave school (and stop playing sports)? This is probably a question to which the answer is unknown, but it was meant as a genuine question, not a dig at anybody.

This just isn't true. C grade is the lowest grade you could get, there was no ungraded option. So therefore a C grade is as good as ungraded.

Why do we have to be? All we have to be is better than the worst and we are comfortably.

You've shown how little you understand. We don't get poor crowds in the National Leagues, only Castleford have averaged more than us in this league in the last 15 odd years and they were for one-off seasons where they went straight back up. So that includes, Wakey, Salford, Hull KR, Huddersfield and all the rest who've had a shot at it.

We are currently on a winning run of something like 8 games in the Super League Academy U18's, including beating Wire, Leeds, Saints etc. Sure we'll produce some youth from them.

We didn't go bankrupt on low crowds and actually had the 7th highest crowds out of 12 clubs when we were in Super League. Comfortably higher than Salford, Wakey, Quins and Huddersfield at the time. In our final year we nearly averaged 7,000 despite getting relegated. We went bankrupt trying to get back into Super League, we actually turned a profit one year. The administration took a gamble that being in Super League would be more beneficial than not being in Super League when licensing came around. Can't see where they were wrong to be honest.

Put it this way, if Widnes had stayed in Super League at the expense of one of the clubs coming down would people really be saying Widnes should be replaced by Salford, Wakefield or Castleford? We wouldn't even be in the running to go down.

The thought that occurred to me as I was eating my boiled eggy this morning was that as Saints are being allowed to play at Widnes while their new ground is building, if Wakey manage to get planning permission for their new ground, have the diggers in and a ground share agreement with Barnsley in place while the new ground's being built before the application deadline, then the RFL can't exclude them on inadequate facilties. I foresee thing getting even nastier and messier than we all imagined!

Well said mate.Fans are only having a dig at Widnes because we are a threat to them.If teams like Wakey,Cas,Salford,London,Crusaders etc spent 4 or 5yrs in the Championship their attendances would plummet.Widnes have had close to quins,crusaders,and Salford attendances in this league.If was in Superleague i know several fans who will come back to watch Widnes.It is hard to pay £15 to watch a game against Batley,keighley or Toulouse with no away support.Does not help as the quality is not as good aswell.Give Widnes a chance then O connor can spend his money, and see our attendances get upto 7-8000 on average.

Could there be fatalities i wonder



Leiutenant Columbo would eat Ted Richardson for breakfast.

Agree completely. it seems like they're almost trying to bring a form of P & R back to keep Championship clubs interested.

Gimme a Q
Gimme a U
Gimme an I
Gimme an N
Gimme an S

wakefieldwildcats.co.uk/2010/08/ ... statement/

wakefieldwildcats.co.uk/2010/08/ ... statement/

So if whoever gets kicked out of superleague, are you going to jump on the hate crusaders band wagon too(presuming the saders are not kicked out of course).

I don't think there is a hate Crusaders bandwagon, a skateboard maybe but not a band wagon. The vast majority of posters on here have been very supportive/complimentary to the Crusaders.