My name is Coco and I'm a sadoholic.

Had some time on my hands recently and was looking at the crowd figures for this season and last.

Overall a drop of 10.3% on last year for all games. Explanations include the economic situation and in the inclusion of two poorly supported teams but I don't think this completely explains the situation at Trin.

Our crowds are down 17.2%

but if you look at like for like fixtures a possible explanation arises.

You can't blame the new teams because we haven't played Celtic yet and Salford was our 2nd highest attendance this year (after Cas).

From looking at the away games (and home game with Quins) I don't think you can blame the Trin faithful as these figures have stood up well. (2nd biggest crowd at HKR after the local derby).

The big difference is in the "well supported" teams visiting Belle Vue, especially Leeds and Bradford, but also Hull (5037), Wigan (5521) and Saints (571icon_cool.gif.

The crowds for Bradford and Leeds were down by over a third from nearly 10k to 6.5k.... 7000 fans missing for just those 2 games. Huddersfield down 20%, Wigan down 14% Hull down 12%

Six teams have actually increased their home attendance, Bradford (5.7%), Cas (0.8%), Catalans (10.4%), Sts (15.3%), Huddersfield (2.9%) and Hull KR (0.6%)

why are these fans choosing not to visit our Belle Vue "Palace"?
The new stadium can't come soon enough.

I can see your point but we shouldn't be relying on away fans to boost our attendances the Wakey public should be getting off their idle backsides to support their team.

I have a hunch that we over inflated last years crowds in the run up to franchise decisions and now were recouping the money or just reporting a true figure, either way it would explain the reduction. I also remeber thinking last year that some of the crowds we were reporting didn't look quite right.

Sure the recession doesn't help either.

The ground is also probably a major factor for the lack of increase home support.

During the last 20 years the population down our end (Stanley) has increased dramatically and the demographics have also changed significantly.

Many of the incomers are middle class outsiders with no affinity for RL or Wakefield itself and are more likely to associate themselves with the city of Leeds the closure of the pits and massive growth of Leeds as a cosmopolitan business city have added to this..

RL is perhaps still seen as a working class sport (BBC

) and the facilities at BV are not exactly conducive to attracting this new clientele. A big selling job is required but a new stadium ( in Stanley) would make it an awful lot easier.

maybe too any big home games were on sky this year?

leeds, saints..etc etc

I reckon our coco has it spot on.

Faced with difficult financial times if there is a choice to be made about which games to attend, the home ones, especially with season ticket deals around, are the ones folk will go to. The away games become a luxury, and folk will think about the game, the travelling and the condition of the viewing areas and surround. When added to the fact that some of these games are on Sky - we're stuffed.

Like it or not, our crowds have been artificially inflated by big away attendences by Hull, Bradford, Leeds and HKR. I would certainly hope that HKR's will hold up - even if it is on Sky - with it being the last league game and them celebrating a good season.

Tough times - and I don't see any easy / quick answers - until we know exactly when we are moving - then we can really drive home the benefits of getting on board the Trinity Rollercoaster!

Yes hopefully there will be a minimum of 200,000 there to cheer their team on.

Best get Balfour Beatty to build us a temporary extension then!

I can remember the days when we used to be one of the RL clubs who could always draw big crowds and I have often wondered where they have all gone. There is no doubt whatsoever that the state of Belle Vue is a massive handicap. Visiting supporters seem to be staying away and who can blame them. Bad weather and lack of modern facilities can also affect the numbers of casual supporters that attend the odd game or so.

However when you stand high up on the boxes and look at all the chimney pots that surround the ground then ask yourself what proportion of those households watch Trinity I bet the true value is extremely low. Likewise in the city centre as you walk around it seems there are very few people that are actually speaking English. I know the PC brigade on here will not agree with this but the demographics of Wakefield have definitely changed.

Although I wonder if they are being counted in properly. Quite a few people this year have thought that there were more people there than were announced.

If that's true it's pretty shortsighted, I don't think the RFL would be stupid enough not to spot that impressive attendances only come in years where a franchise decision is made.

Then again...

I think that hope my be a bit optimistic, I reckon there is a decent chance that HKR may be cemented in 4th position by then so effectivly little (other than momentum) to play for. Maybe their fans might just hold on to their cash for the extra cost of the play offs - I know its the last league game but its not their last game of the season.

I suppose, from a financial point of view we could do with either Hudds having a case of Wembley-itus and their league form failing so KR have a shot at 3rd, of the wheels coming off KR and us winning the next 2 leaving it a possible showdown for 4th or 3rd spot - that could swell the figures.

is coco the fullback a tribute band for hot chocolate?

sorry



next year with any luck attendances will be up with this years success

Regards the crowd fiddling and under reporting it i know for a fact it has gone on in the past although it was some time ago maybe 15-20 years, i am unsure firstly if any of that administration are still at the club and if you could get away with it in this day and age where everything seems to be scrutinised so much more.

helpful!
youd be a great reporter in south africa!

why would they ever need to fiddle? there is no way of saying who has paid what price for what ticket or whether they got it free. makes no sense

I believe it is due to tax. There has to be some way a club has of calculating and declaring the gates from each game.

All i can say is that the club owed, or maybe a director at the time to be honest unsure of exactly who had generated the debt, a member of my family a significant ammount of money, enough at the time to put the club/or him personally in a bad position, the member of my family got his solicitor involved and after a bit of a stand off he was told to go to the club the following Sunday at 8 p.m. and he would be paid.

We were at the game on that Sunday, although to be fair i cannot remember which exact game it was and when the crowd was announced there were many comments made about how low it seemed.

The person went to the club as arranged and was handed a plastic bag containing £5 notes and the odd pound coin etc that had clearly been taken straight from the gate and whisked away prior to being officially counted and registered.

To be fair though at the time i do not think Wakefield were alone in announcing lower crowds to avoid paying tax on it and ensuring that the cash excess went towads players bonus' etc.

i understood the inferrence the point i was making is why would they ever need to do that? there is no exact corellation between the attendance and the gross gate receipts due to the points i raised previously.

its all right its ok doesnt realy matter if your old and grey...etc
new tricks episode am i right?
did denis waterman flirt with some 30 year old woman and then braian lane solved it by finding the discarded carrier bag and dna ing it to find it was oh god knows?? the woman who leaks all danny brough rumours?
cant wait for next week UCOS tries to solve the bog toilet mystery!

No idea not my field of expertese but i would assume you have to provide evidence of gates when being audited for example including the evidence of where the gates come from ie make up of season tickets, punters and freebies etc.

i would be very shocked if a club could simply declare what they wanted and not have to justify it in some way to both the RFL for sallary cap purposes although not in the last year with the change and also other financial institutions like the government for example.

? I have no idea what you are talking about but if you are calling my a liar fair enough i have nothing to prove or disprove just stating that to my knowledge it does, or at least has gone on in the past and I am sure Wakefield will not have been the only club to have done it.

not calling you a liar at all mate!
just love the whole image of bag of fivers leaving belle vue in some supermarket bags!
it was a lovely story and well told.
have you got any more??

Plenty but we will save them for another day, i mean its nearly bed time so surely 1 story is enough.

And it was only 1 bag by the way

boooooooooooooooring

Oh give over, you lot started it