Hi there,
Looking forward to the game...which I think you will win based putrely on you need it more than we do......and I happened to see this thread.

Whilst I can understand that fans of any club will feel threatened by expansion teams such as us and the welsh, pointing out weaknesses only highlights your own shortcomings.
To prove a point about away attendances, with each team having 1 home game left this year, would anyone want to hazzard a guess at how many of Crusaders away games this year have resulted in the lowest gate for the home team? I'll save you the trouble of hopping over to SLSTATS....the answer is none...nada....nil!
As it is, Quins (Leeds/hudds/celts/Wakey/Salford) and the Frogs (Quins/Bradford/Castleford/HKR/Wigan) are even on this score with 5 worst gates each........followed by Wakey (2- Frogs/FC)) and then Salford (1-Saints)) and Castleford (1-Warrington)).
Temper this with Quins being present for the 2nd biggest gate at Wire, 3rd biggest at Wigan, 5th biggest at Saints and 6th biggest at FC, do these stats prove that:
A/ Quins fans travel in huge numbers but only for 4 games a year ....or
B/ The clubs concerned know that the taxi is coming and therefore Market the game accordingly.

Take your pick, but as others have pointed out, away fans don't count for much in the new licence system.......


As I said, looking forward to getting up in the middle of the night and listening to the game...should be a good 'un and if you're lucky, we might smuggle your coach into the taxi on the way home

Well I'm watching!!! Your place is supposed to hold 15,500 and there is a strong St's support present yet the ground is still less than half full. So as I said earlier, your increased support this year is visiting support.

Hence credit to the travelling support...a statement which isn't reciprocated for your away games sadly!

5,374 tonight.

Before the match started it said on sky that Saints would bring between 2 and 3k to the game because of the locality of St Helens. That makes about 3k home support at max. BUT dont forget they are doing wonders for the match

I've seen that saints brought 3600, not sure if thats spot on.
Even so 3000 for a home game which could have seen the welsh finish in the top 8.

Actually licensed to hold 10,000 but don't let the truth hold you back.

Maybe so but 5,300 is not excatly great given the circumstancs surrounding the game and given the locality of the traveling away support.

When you compare this to the 5,500 at cas today and the fact that the away support was maybe 40 (fair play for coming all that way on Sunday) it would suggest core support is clearly in Cas's favour yet we are being touted as the club to drop down a league.

Expansion for the sake of expansion - explain to me how this is a benefit to British Rugby league

So given that most Saints fans generally agree they brought about 1000 fans, Cas managed just over 1000 more with how many years head start?

I can understand your frustrations at staring down the barrel of the gun but given your overall average is only 900 more than Crusaders it's hardly that compelling when you've been around 81 years more is it?

Our crowds have gone down this year,time will tell if yours does,but expansion teams dont have a good record on this...Quins,Paris,Gateshead etc. When the special offers,and free tickets to locals end that will be a good time to judge.

Ps. congrats on your season though.

Cheers and despite all the ill thought out crap some spout on here (not you I might add) I do hope you survive.

Your actual average home gate (per the attendances given on Sporting life) is 4,705 compared to 6,616 at Cas. That would actually be 1,910 difference but hey who's counting the extra 1,000

However if you consider that your first game was the super league launch and against Leeds at home and every man and his dog was given a ticket one may argue that this somewhat distorts the average. If this is removed the average attendance falls to 4,236.

Now one for fair comparason if cas knock out their highest attendance the avegare is 6,459 which actually changes the difference to 2,224.

So on that above not convinced how you get to the 900 difference.

Again dont let fact cloud your judgement at all.

Plus a number of games the official attendance has been revised once annonced over the PA system. For example the Cas game at neath (all so Quins) went from 450 odd to nearer 1500. Where the 500 fans disappeared to i dont know - its quite a lot of ticket stubs to suddenly lose.