i was actually at the wembley event yesterday and a pretty good event it was too (they even had McFly as pre-match ent!!!).

Point to note though - this has nothing to do with the RFU at all. It was promoted and marketed by a single club - Saracens.

Yes but a single club that is propped up by wealthy millionaire owners who have pumped money into the club on a scale never seen in Rugby League. I wouldnt be surpised if Saracens lose more money on an annual basis than all SL clubs combined. The RFL simply cannot afford to lose money like that, at the expense of the game as a whole such as grassroots development etc, and it would be wrong of them to try.

Every game Saracens have played at Wembley so far has lost a fortune (dont know about yesterday) and even the Saracens fans complain that the 'additional' new fans only come for the pre-match entertainment, not the actual game. Yes I am sure the RFL could pay Take That a £1 million to play a few song at a match at Wembley and sell the place out but would it really be a wise use of funds? Can they even afford to do so?

Losing fortunes is fine when you have owners with bottomless pockets. Saracens have spent something like £20 million + since they took over. Indeed they lost £6.9 million last year and they have lost over £13 million over the last 3 years alone. Despite all this they still average only average 6,000 and are quite a failure for the amount of money ploughed into them. The Saracens oweners could have paid 10,000 fans £100 a year just to watch them and got a better return on what they have done so far.

No SL club or the RFL has the funds to do these kind of things. Look at Bradford and the trouble they are in over owing £1 million, which in the world of sport really isnt that much. By all accounts they are now quite solvent on an annual basis and this is just historical debt. If they had a RU type backer they would be fine but they dont and few RL clubs do. Even the ones that do dont really plough that much money into the clubs compared to the Rugby Union or Football backers due to the salary cap being so low. 9 Rugby Union clubs lost more than this in 1 year alone last year but it doesnt matter as they are backed by millionaire owners. Comparing RL and RU is simply not comparing like for like.

Exactly, yet people continue to do just that. Try comparing union with soccer and see what you find.

wait and see how many of those 83,000 + turn up at Vicarage Road for the next Saracens game. My bet would be anywhere between 5 and 7 thousand. do we really want a game where the vast majority of the crowd have little or no interest in the game itself? with all the gimmicks they used to promote the game it would be a travesty if they didn't get so many there, it was a bit of a circus really. it might just be me but I don't think that's what rugby league is about. i'm not sure this event can be compared with the 4 nations double header - that was a game attended by rugby league FANS.

How dare you post a reasoned well researched argument! Shame on you!




Tremendous post by the way

That actually has a massive impact spot on. I'm currently PE co-ordinator for the school I teach at, and can say that while it's only an advisory document both the creative learning journal and the statutory framework for pe modules heavily feature rugby union in lesson planning, and unsurprisingly don't mention league. . These are pumped out be those ex-public school boys like Gove et al. Unless the pe teacher happens to be a big league fan, it's unlikely you'll find any school venturing away from union. While they have so many kids only being involved in union there's little the rfl can do. Never mind the influence public schoolers seemingly have in media circles="
How much of a benefit to the RFU is the public/independent school sector which happily churns out rah-rah supporting rich boys & girls itly.'"

Awful typing on my phone but hopefully that was legible

It was! I have the same problem! An iPhone not designed for fat thumbs!



You're spot on with the schools issue. It has a far bigger impact than people realise. Even if it doesn't produce extra players into the player pool it raises a mild interest in people that can then be turned into either full supporters, occasional fans of big games or even just extra TV viewers for the viewing figures. I went to a Comprehensive school in the heartlands. We didn't have a rugby league team because the PE teacher was an ex Union player and so ran Union teams but not League. He wasn't opposed to League, it's just all the sports teams had to be run after school and he only had so much spare time. As a consequence most of my school friends had and continue to have a passing interest in Union and no knowledge/interest in League. Around 7/8 go to at least 1 England game most years. These weren't lads who were raised on Union but gained their interest through school. So Union has gained 7 or 8 international spectators just from 1 school year of 1 school in 1 town.
It probably goes someway to explaining why Union has a relatively lowish domestic attendances/interest but high international attendances/interest.

Now apply that to the public school network with a much higher emphasis on sport and on Union and you can see how it can have a big effect upon their students. Who then grow up to become the political, economic and often media leaders of the country.

what he said..........

RL fans are their own worst enemy...........

Let's not worry about Yawnion.

Good marketing, competitive prices and genuine support instead of all the moaning and negativity. I've no idea why fans go out of their way to not support the support they follow whether it's a Magic weekend or Internationals

Lets not make RL a sport for victims.