His predecessor lived and breathed rugby league, so what is your point?

On the one hand I am not necessarily too concerned that may of may not know too much about RL but brings new money and hopefully new ideas and business acumen. The likes of Wakefiled, London, Castleford, Bradford have all struggled in recent times and perhaps need a bit of a shake up and get somebody to take over who knows how to run a business properly.

My only real concern with the Doc is if he builds something based on sand and it all collapses when he gets frustrated when not winning every pot in front of 50.000 speccys and walks away.

I mean if RU in its unenviable position of being one of the most tedious sports imaginable can generate buckets of cash, admittedly with more support form the 'establishment' we should be able to do something.

Good grief I should learn to proof read before submitting, hopefully it still makes some kind of sense.

The past is important to the game.

If a revolutionary thinker came in and suggested merging Warrington and St Helens into a super club that played league and union I'm sure the dinosaurs would oppose it.

Granted, but we've lived in the past too long and it's getting us no where.

So you don't think Super League is a good product and we have higher attendances than we ever did in the 70s, 80s, 90s and most of the 2000s...?

Odsal pulled 190,000 for the cup replay. And that's not counting the extra estimated 10,000+ who snuck in. That was before Superleague. You'd think that we'd average that now for a home game...

You're being obtuse and you know it, you're a smart person, smarter than the majority on the whole site, you're aware of problems not related to RL, socioeconomic problems and others to boot.
The old way of working isn't sustainable now and you know that as well and if you don't, then maybe you're not as smart as I think you are, despite the majority of your well read, well versed eloquent posts.

I feel I'm being set up, as I always do with your posts, I feel your directing me into a path with no way of escaping, your posts can sometimes be like a game of chess and you're the white pieces.


Do I think SL is a good product, on the field yes I do, off it it would seem an unmitigated disaster with 8 possibly 9 clubs financially well off but how many of those are due to business plans and self sustainability and not just rich owners, how many clubs have we lost/losing or are on the brink, how many crowds beyond SL are 4 figures in numbers.
There's some slight positivity in that the London amateur scene ia flourishing although no one seems to be doing anything about it.

I know Koukash is another rich owner that isn't running a sustainable plan but that is here and now, I'm sure his long term aim is to be self sustainable.

We live in an age in which everything competes for your money, things are at your fingertips, society isn't as tight knit and communities are fractured. Crowds of 100k are unrealistic even for football, the national sport.



I'll give you something Sally you're one of the few that can bring my serious side out on here

1954 Halifax v Warrington.
I don't think it was that many?
Less than 105,000 officially? Estimates at around 120,000 as many scaled a wall.

It's a fair point IMO Ganson's as there is nothing wrong with knowledge based on background and history as it can provide stability through a bit of patience and reality.

Ultimately, Wilkinson ran out of ideas and of course cash. He must have pumped in quite a few quid over the years and just because it was a failed regime can that failure can't be laid solely at his door? I would suggest not, it seems the move to Barton was his last throw of the dice to get 'his' Salford operating on a different leval and raise a bit of interest in the Salford Club .

I get the idea that he was activley looking for investment partners which is quite difficult and I'm convinced that he would have handed over the reigns to someone else without his hand being forced his reputation more in tact.

Without that Wilkiinson orchestrated move from the Willows would Koukash have looked at Salford in the same way? Obviously, his supposed interest in Swinton is based on his love of Rugby League.

I'm all for investment in new ideas and innovation, but, these concepts and stability aren't mutually exclusive and I know who I'd want running our club, someone with a proven vested intetrest and a long term plan than a wham bam thank you mam approach.

It's no sleight on Salford, good luck to them or Koukash but would RL benefit by having every club run this way and we've only seen the positives for now yet he's apparently disappointed before a ball has been passed and the first gate receipts have been counted?

In all fairness, we've still shifted 2,500 season tickets to date for the new season. When you consider many people will have been saving for Christmas, currently experiencing the skint month of January and in addition this season our games are spread out across Thursday's, Friday's and Sunday's thus meaning many people cant attend all games and which therefore makes the cost benefit of owning a season ticket redundant, it isnt infact a bad figure.

Last year we failed to achieve homes attendances greater than 2,500 on 6 occasions.

I anticipate our walk up crowd to be of a reasonable number next season, plus with games against Yorkshire clubs now moved to Sundays to entice bigger away support we should get some decent attendances next season. If we can get off to a good start (first two games vs Wakefield and London) which on paper is possible, then I think the momentum will build and people will be enticed back to watching Salford RLFC.

We can all understand Marwan's dissapointments and frustrations, he's spent a lot of money and obviously expected a bigger response but 99% of our fans are happy with the season ticket sales for 2014. He just needs to remain patient and have faith in what he is doing, the general public of Salford have been built up and let down far to often in the past and this season the club need to prove it's different from previous years. Actions speak louder than a words, an impressive league campaign and reasonable cup run should fill enough optimism for even bigger season ticket sales in 2015.

Agree fully with this, it will take time to build the squad into challengers and the fans will come in time.

Shouldn't we concerntrate more on the inabilty to get 15,000 in our own ground on a regular basis, given that we are now a (more) successful team ?

I say good luck to you, i've been keeping an eye on some of the threads on your board, and hopefully this does start a revival or re-birth or whatever. We need strong clubs.

That said i'm not a huge fan of the Dr and his 'loud noises' approach, i understand why he's going down that route but i think it's slightly misguided in its approach. and i say that from having seen our growth over the previous 15 years, if you bare in mind we were a basketcase of a club in 2000-02, the club went out and did a ridiculous amount of community work in the schools (Wilderschool project adn other events) and despite the poor product on the field over those three years slowly but surely we built the interest up in[u new[/u customers and speccies so that when we did move to the new stadium a lot of peoples interests had been piqued and people were ready to take the jump and get involved.

Now, i know you're not even twelve month down the line under Marwan, but if i were him as well as the high profile signings i'd be letter bombing every street in the surroudning 3 miles, i'd be getting players and community workers in the schools, get the locals involved and be on their minds as much as poss.

this here is the challenge.

As an aside to that, i do hope that those who have bought ST's adn the people that do turn up even if you dont' top the table

you at least have a much more enjoyable season than you're used to.

I pulled the figure from my head somewhere, I'm most likely wrong. Although looking at the photos it looks way over 120,000. Everyone was shoulder to shoulder. From on the pitch all the way up the hill and back. That's a lot of space to fill, especially when everyone is so tightly packed.

Imagine what Odsel could look like with proper investment.?

Like the greatest Speedway stadium in the world probably.....

The issue I have is when you said about the game needs to not live in the past.

One problem I think we have in RL is too much emphasis is given on "new innovative ideas" as automatically great.

Club call thats innovative, not living in the past, must be a great innovation.
Scrapping the juniors and linking up with feeder clubs in the National League, new and innovative.
Split the league in to three, must be good because at least its innovative.

Even Koukash coming in and he has to rebrand his club "Salford Red Devils". Its like we have to be doing some tinkering too look like we're progressive and forward thinking.

There's a lot to be said for a bit of conservatism and steadiness in the game. What works isn't just what's innovative, its what works.

I personally think the game is generally administered better, apart from these silly innovations, now, than it has been in the past. I was blown away by how good the World Cup was and how well supported it is. I think in general the game in the modern era (as in the last decade or so) is better and healthier than it has been before although we're in a lull at the moment because we have a bit of a dearth of talent, we don't have the great players in the game that we did in the mid 1990s or mid 2000s.

Clubs being run badly is a bit of a problem I agree but thats not a new thing, we've had clubs going bust for years. Unfortunately in any business environment you can't have an outside body that prevents individual businesses making bad decisions. In any corporate environment you see some thrive and some get it wrong and suffer the consequences. I suspect though the real problem is that SL has too many clubs - the game can't support that many.

Sally? Obtuse? Quite an astute observation methinks. I wonder how many others would share that opinion?
"Smarter than the majority on the whole site" I wonder how many others would share that opinion?

How many season tickets have we sold this year?

I personally think we are sat on the surfboard waiting for the big wave, similar to where football was 10/15 years ago. Big investers seeing the signs of oppertunism. the clubs with no ambition falling to the wayside (luton, stockport, barnsley, forets) all big premier league clubs that could not sustain the race. Luckily we are one of the forerunners in the race with Wigan, leeds, saints and now Salford. Hull keep playing with it and may now have the owner to back the cause. How many of the premiership clubs are sustainable, how many of them are owned by long term owners. Koucash and Moran are the abramovich and Shiek of super leauge add Lennigan and Mcmanus in there and the signs are there that the game could expand quickly. Rugby Union has and Soccer has erupted beyond anyones expectations. We are going through the same toils as the FA and the Premier League did a few years back. Yes its dissapointing the way the RFL are performing at the minute, but they are under pressure for there future and they need to be careful.
All will sort its self out as we have a great product that as shown in Australia is one of the best in the world and is wanted by major companies like Mcdonalds and KFC

I'm still a massive critic of Koukash. Most people say that he's good for the game....
how ? he saved a small club, just Like the guy at London has done, or the guy at Wakefield did, or the guy at Widnes or...the list goes on. He's not the first to bail out a club and he wont be the last.

his views on the game are the same as the average bloke in the street, i.e. "its a superb game its being undersold and it's run poorly"... not the first to hold those views wont be the last.

His desperation to purchase property/land or stadium is there for all to see especially with the Swinton scenario stepping up a notch. He clearly wants the Salford City stadium and some land around it would be nice!.... The best way to do it is to threaten to buy another club in "manchester" and build them a new stadium and then salford could also play out of it..... "guess what Council you own a big white elephant....told you you should have sold it to me".......

If he is so rich why didn't he offer "serious big money" to buy Saints the team that got him into the game. He could claim to turn them in to the biggest club in the country that wouldnt be outrageous, and he could sell a damn sight more Season tickets


he's largely a mouthy feller with some money hoping to make some money(from the purchase of Land or property.) I'm sure he likes Rugby League, but he was never in the News as much when he was just a race horse Owner, in fact I'd never seen his name mentioned once prior to him buying Salford.
Rugby League has given him a media mouthpiece and he has done nothing much with it so far other than ridicule the game, make it look small time, and moan so much about it it gives him an easy avenue to go down should he become "disillusioned with the sport" and walk away.

People say he has given the game publicity...how...? do people say that about Soccer when Joey Barton goes gobbing off on Twitter?...no they dont they want him to shut up.

Still good for the game? a breath of fresh air....??? I'm not having it, come out with some great ideas, some business contacts, some oil rich sheik to buy London broncos a home.......but come out with something positive other than self ed nonsense........

that Said Salford fans Love him......

to be honest I should stay away from the Koukash Debates I honestly just don't like the feller and I'm going to struggle to look at him through good for the game, dyed in the wool, Rugby League supporter tinted specs

I love Joey Barton on Twitter, some of the arguments ate hysterical.

a lot of the time the things he says are the things everyone thinks but no one will say. The rest of it he's trolling and having a mess about and every one takes him serious.

he did try and buy saints to begin with, Eamon McManus the saints chairman felt he was the "wrong fit for the club" so refused his offer (which apparently, would of seen a return on his investment in the club) - I also know "in the know" saints fans who believe it was McManus who convinced him to buy Salford.

I agree with you on the whole about koukash. I find him too attention seeking for his own good. By saying things like "we're signing a player beginning with h from a team beginning with w" makes him seem no better than an attention seeker on these forums.

Also he said in an recent interview he said 12 out of the 14 teams were in financial difficulty - I'd like to know where he got that from.

He's having a better fist of it than these owners at other clubs though because he has actually got a top class coach and managed to get some good signings and the semblance of a decent squad, so at least he is having a go.

I think he is naive and is going to make mistakes.

To use a football analogy think of Mike Ashley. When he came in he did a lot of publicity seeking cringeworthy stuff like having that Keegan shirt and downing pints in front of the fans, and when things went wrong it really turned sour for him. Also I think some people within the game took advantage of him and poorly advised him. Over time he has lowered his profile but learned to act a bit more sensibly.

Koukash will have to learn the hard way and will go through some difficult moments.

The biggest danger he could get himself in to, is when Salford hit a sticky patch, is to start publicly making statements like "I will not tolerate this failure. I can assure the fans I will take action" as he will then back himself in to a corner where he has to start getting rid of big players or Brian Noble and will make his situation worse.

He has to be able to be calm and rational when things go wrong, Simon Moran had to go through several years of underperformance on his investment but he stuck to his plan.