So anyone who doesn't agree with you is "backward thinking" and "scared of change" are they?

I wonder if you would be backing this "if you build it they will come" approach if you had money invested in one of these clubs? For existing shareholders, will the merged club instantly be worth the same as the sum of the old ones? Given the ill feeling between the two, would you really be so sure, with no market reseasrch, that those disgruntled fans wouldn't just toddle off and watch Leeds United? Or keep their cash in their pockets and watch Sky?

Neither of us can actually prove our position here, but you'd be more credible if you acknowledged that and dropped the evangelical stuff.

Out of interest (and in the spirit of reasoned debate) you have referred repeatedly to "2 badly run clubs." 2 questions, who will run the merged club and make it so much better run, and wouldn't getting the existing businesses run better be worth trying before something as radical as a merger?

I'm honestly not against change, it's actually what I do for a living and I love my job, but I am alwayd careful of avoiding the coalition government's ruse of conflating the case for A change with the case for THIS change.

I want to see players of that ilk in super league. Then again I want to spend an evening defiling Charlize Theron and Scarlett Johannsen. The question is should we react as a sport to the strength of the Aussie competition and the potential of a player drain and, if so how. Whether your or I think it's "better" is academic. Was it better in the 1980s when some of the best Aussies ever came for short terms stints to play in the Stones Bitter Championship? Whatever Keith may say, it was not.


I would argue that Watkins is not the only top notch centre to come through the system in the last 15 years. Chev was just as huighly touted as a junior and did much more, much earlier. Don't get me wrong, I think Watkins has massive potential but he's not yet "there".

Again, I disagree. To simply dismiss Leeds success as being due to the catchment area is missing the point. The catchment area was the same size in the 1980s and 1990s when Leeds criminally ignored junior development.

What gives Leeds an advantage is that Juniors see the set up and see Leeds give jnuniors an opportunity that other clubs haven't done. That is why players like Sinfield are attracted from Oldham, Watkins from Manchester, Burrow from Castleford and Singleton from Cumbria come here

That can be achieved through the awarding of the next license to one of the existing SL teams (if either are deemed suitable) as a viable alternative to merger or the threat of a twin expulsion.

The 'Wakefield/Castleford district' SL team should then be well placed to get the undiluted pick of the local juniors and attract maximum investment from the business community.

If the area isn't deemed to be big enough, wealthy enough etc to support two teams the RFL should ensure they only award a future license to one. IMO that's the way to achieve the end goal without going down the merger route - unless the clubs actively wish to go that route.

The problem is tvoc, Wakefield will have the ground, Wakefield is the bigger city. However, Wakefield is poorly run, just like Cas. On the other hand, what Wakefield can not come close to, is support of it's team like Castleford fans. They are much more passionate and turn out in better numbers when it works for the team.

Hence, putting both together, you get a good base facilities, joining the better players of two teams, and because it will work on the field, the supporter base will be what the game requires.

Cas will not get a licence next time around, they are completely on there arris on their own. Wakefield should never have had a licence last time around, and were saved because of the Crusaders situation. You go with just Wakefield and you still have the one existing club holding back the rest of super league on the cap.

In terms of attendances Wakefield overtook Castleford last season. Wakefield's average home SL Regular Round attendance was 8,172 and that's higher than Castleford have ever recorded during the SL Era. So far in 2013 Wakefield are showing an average of 8,160 (impressive retention of last year's increase in the current economic climate) and they've yet to receive most of their traditional higher gates when Leeds, Castleford and Bradford are the visitors.

Over at Wheldon Road Castleford's crowds are down to 6,710 in 2012 and continuing in the same direction in 2013 to currently averaging 5,975 after hosting two of their bumper opponents in Leeds and Wakefield. The last two home crowds (3,222 and 3,986) I imagine sent shock waves through the club.



It's all theoretical though. Huddersfield and Sheffield combining playing squads had very little impact on the field in 2000 - you still only have a 1st grade squad of 25 and a match-day 17 available. It could work to some degree on the field but it would need both clubs to come together and work as one off it as well and it would need the backing of the fans.

You may up for this but are they?



The next license awarded to the Wakefield district (and there should be a maximum of one) should go to the club best situated to take the game forward in that area. Any quality players and quality juniors will hopefully then gravitate in that direction and the necessary commercial income streams can be attracted without being diluted by the presence of another SL club on the doorstep.

Yes to one competitive SL team to represent the Wakefield area, no to merger.

I agree. Both clubs are running at lower than their potential whilst the other is there, like Siamese Twins. Give the more sustainable one a license, and see where they go from there

Pesky things, them facts eh.

Wakefield are outperforming Cas on and off the field. They have absolutely nothing to gain from a merger, particularly once the only decent player Cas have is playing in the NRL.

Any gain they make in picking up fans from Cas would have to be balanced against any loss of current Wakefield fans.

It's not even like they could cash in on selling the Cas ground, as that's already the issue that is preventing Cas from relocating IIRC.

It's important to recognise that Wakefield's increased home attendances over the past couple of seasons are due to heavily discounted season ticket sales where the average price for an adult works out at less than £10 a game, less than £4 a game for young persons in the 16 to 21 age bracket and less than £2 for juniors under 16. It will be interesting to see if their current attendances hold up if they have to start charging a lot more for season tickets. Attendances have slumped dramatically at other SL clubs when they've had to raise season ticket prices to more realistic levels.


Castleford's home attendances are currently 7.45% down on last year which is a mid-table position in terms of decreased SL attendances this season when compared to the same SL fixtures last year..... rlSEE HERErl

To answer your points Chev made his debut under Murray - who left the club in 1999 so it is close to 15 years between the emergence of Chev and Watkins.

Leeds is the biggest club - it has the largest amount of money to spend on youth development - so its facilities will always be more impressive than the likes of the teams I mentioned. The catchment area means higher crowds, more revenue etc and the knock on effect of that differentiation between Leeds and any other SL club in Yorkshire.

The whole 'let's give a licensce to a Wakefield-district club' is really the kind of crappy half-baked compromise that has gotten us into this mess in the first place. Cas fans won't go and watch the current Wakefield side. Because it's Wakefield, because it's the same players they were berating last season, and because Cas themselves still exist. Forcing Cas out of the league into the Championship will kill them off in the long run, but it won't do anything to help Wakefield. Especially as the message given to Cas fans will be that Wakefield are responsible for Cas's plight, only deepening that emnity and further undermining the possibility of a sustainable club.

The only way a Wakefield-district side can work is if it is actually a Wakefield district side, which means getting all fans in the area to have a stake in it, and making it recognisably different from the previous club. It's odd that the people on here decrying the Hull-Gateshead and Huddersfield-Sheffield mergers, which effectively constituted kicking one team out of the league and keeping another in, are now advocating the exact same thing, just with the word 'merger' taken out!

That means you need real representation in the side, you need to be seeing players you were seeing last year play this year, and generally to feel that the traditions of your club are being respected as much as possible, to give you something to grab onto, and form the relationship with that club that turns people into lifelong supporters. That can't, and won't, happen by just giving Wakey a spot in SL and kicking Cas out.

As for saying 'well, they can't keep all their stars'. True, maybe not. But even if you assume that 20% of their current fans point-blank refuse to come to the new club, that still adds up to over the 10k threshold that needs to be seen as the benchmark of a new club. And while they might not be able to keep all their stars under the cap, they'd certainly do a better job of keeping some of them, and of challenging for silverware, than either the current two clubs would.

Is Kallum Watkins going to play for this new Wakefield District club or something?

You talk a lot of sense.

Your point stands in many respects, but watkins made his senior debut in 2008, so their emergence was separated by 9 years. Your figure for the gap is an over-estimate of 50%, which seems a large enough error to be worth calling attention to.

Yup, in the NRL, alongside the new Doncasterfield Dragon-eagles. Exciting times.

Yeah and they could call it the Rhubarb Rugby Club and all the folk from across the land, near and far, shall flock to the great spectacle that is Rhubarb Rugby and all shall be happy and gay in the land.

Mate, seriously, you are far too optimistic. It would take years, nay generations for traditional Yorkshire folk to change to a rival (even if only in part) team. By which time the new club would be well bankrupt and nothing but a distant memory - much like Huddersfield/Sheffield Giants are now.