Quote: SmokeyTA "Man Utd aren't in Manchester. But they don't hesitate to sell themselves in Manchester. They don't look at Trafford as their fiefdom. They will go in to Salford, Bolton, Wigan, Stockport, Cheshire, Bury (and much much further)
RL clubs are locked in to a view that Salford sell in Salford and that certain parts of Wigan is for Wigan and certain parts are for Leigh yet there are 200k+ people in Bolton next door where we aren't making in roads, there are people in Stockport and Bury and Trafford and Manchester where we don't make in roads. There are 2.5 million people in greater Manchester and we have clubs fighting for the same couple of thousand fans.
I'm not saying it's just those areas, there are 2.2m people in west Yorkshire and we have Wakefield and Cas fighting over the same 100k market. On other threads we have people arguing over whether Rothwell and Wetherby are 'really Leeds' and whether they're fighting with cas and Wakefield for the fans in garforth. There are people who complain that Leeds advertise in beeston or holbeck because South of the river is hunslet territory.'"
Interesting post this.
I'm from Bolton and from a non-playing background, from a family that also never played or followed any RL team (no rugby of any code was played competitively in Bolton schools during my time due to an accident in a scrum that left a boy with a very bad neck injury).
My point of contact with the sport was 1980's televised Challenge Cup finals and the era just before Wigan's dominance of them. We also had a school visit from Des Drummond while he was at Leigh which was the only sporting professional of any kind to visit our schools.
Unfortunately it didn't turn me overnight into a fully fledged Leigh fan, but I've maintained an interest in them ever since and have seen them play a dozen or so times. I could never get behind Salford who I equate to being not only a Manchester team (there's a lot of civic rivalry between proud Boltonians and Mancunians), but specifically a Manchester United associated team.
There are a lot of Wigan fans in north Bolton and thanks to one I got an introduction to going to St Helens-Wigan derby matches at Central Park in the early 90's where to their dismay I nailed my colours to St Helens mast as I couldn't stand Wigan's dominance of the sport.
As an adult and someone from a non-heartland the things I love about RL are the fact that it's a summer sport, the tickets are easy to get hold of compared to soccer and following your team home and away (with the notable exception of one or two teams) is easily done again compared to soccer and the media coverage hasn't reached saturation point like soccer.
My main criticisms are the idea that liking RL is somehow incompatible with liking other sports, the incessant gimmickry, changes by the governing body to competition structures, the idea that traditional clubs should be allowed to wither on the vine - why throw away so much history?
