Quote: Pumpetypump "Magic should be MAINLY about Rugby but to pretend the immediate surroundings of the stadium aren't a huge factor would be naive. Anfield is completely inappropriate for a magic weekend because its in the middle of nowhere.
To me though, the question is less about why Anfield, and more about why not Newcastle. What on earth does a venue have to do to keep the weekend permanently and why are we obsessed with moving around all the time? Newcastle council have been extremely friendly, the ground is in a good location AND just as importantly, the whole thing helps support a local RL side in Newcastle. The obsession with being nomadic is one of the weirdest things about RL in my opinion. I'm a genuine expansionist, but we've been taking things on the road to bemused and disinterested people for as long as I can remember and I don't think it's furthered the sport one bit.'"
I agree it’s done nothing taking things on the road but it’s because we never follow up with a long term plan. It’s a case of we take an international to Coventry and then nothing. No help and support for the local club, no consistent events in the city to establish a following or profile. We then just move on. As if it never happened. And funnily enough the people in that area treat it the same way.
We have such a scattergun approach to our events, it’s bizarre. They should be used as part of a consistent strategy to expand the sport in this country. We don’t have the finances to do widespread expansion. We need to target a city with events and both financial and non-financial support for 10 years.
If, for instance, we did the below:
- Hold Magic Weekend at St James Park every season
- take at least 1 international per year to St James Park
- take the Cup Semis as a double header consistently to St James Park
- provide central assistance to and rebrand Newcastle Thunder as Newcastle United RLFC, playing in black and white stripes
- have Newcastle United RLFC play before the Magic Weekend games and Cup Semis at St James Park
- work with Newcastle United to provide Newcastle fans with discounted tickets to both events and Newcastle RLFC games (if Barcelona FC can help promote a Catalans game then anything is possible)
Then I don’t see why we can’t make significant progress in a major city in the country. You don’t bill yourselves as a competitor to the football, you’re a complement to it and embrace it fully.
But it requires consistent time and investment. Something which I have never ever seen RL do in this country.
We wonder why we’re lagging behind Union, that is exactly why. They put consistent time, effort and investment into their internationals and its paid off massively.
We don’t have the finances or other benefits Union had, but we still don’t do anything like what we could with what we have.
We essentially taken the approach of we’ve got £100 to spend so we’ll buy 200 x 50p’s worth of stuff. Which essentially is worthless in the long run. We need to target the £100 and get something worthwhile for it.
