newspapers are dying out and being replaced by new forms of media. the rfl needs someone with forward thinking. even sport on tv isn't assured of its place in the future. things like facebook live and fan made broadcasts are where sports broadcasting is heading

The NFL has got it spot on IMO by streaming Thursday night games live on Twitter.

interestingly some clibs dont like even press conferences streaming live never mind anything else.

Something needs to be done and done soon and also done properly.

To attract consumers the product needs to be good. At the moment our product isn't, if we are honest. Second, to get lot's of interest there needs to be a demand. At the top level in this country rugby league is a sport played predominantly in the north of england, therefore demand will always be limited. Fans won't even turn up in the heartlands, at the games most famous clubs. Week in week out games are played on sky in front of practically half empty stadiums.

Can they do better? I'm sure they can.

But will it be like banging your head against a brick wall? Probably.

Yeah ''something'' needs to be done. 'Someone' needs to do 'something'.

Like what?

Perhaps being more pro active for starters would help.
What would you like to be done?

Id like clubs to actually pull their fingers out and market themselves. Community engagement is generally poor from our clubs and marketing seems to consist of sticking a sign outside the ground and sending emails to people who are already going.

We also desperately need to start working together as a sport.

I get that clubs aren't going to advertise other teams games but they can advertise and sell tickets and travel for big events like Magic Weekend, Big Bash, Cup semis, Cup Final, Grand Final etc and of course for internationals. Looking at the clubs you wouldn't even know that the 4 Nations was taking place.

The clubs can whine all they want about the RFL, when they're only getting a few thousand people in to watch then there's plenty that the clubs can do to get more in.

We have talked about match awareness that clubs should do to make the locals aware of when they are playing at home who ther playing at home and KO time and admission prices. Some clubs do others just hope that fans turn up, or it seems to me they do.

Believe it or not Wakefield advertise Magic Weekend, The Challeneg Cup, the Grand Final and international matches all the time.

There is nothing much wrong with RL as a sport, in fact it is one of the greatest team sports ever and remains so, what the problem is is the way its leaders treat it with their inability to run the sport from week to week and year to year. The main aspect is officiating and application of the rules (or lack thereof) during matches, its vaugue, inconsistent and often illogical and most definitely unprofessional from top to toe. There's also the inequity/consistancy regarding the disciplinary.

It's down to the RFL to make the game appealing by cleaning things up and having defined rules that officials keep to. Players/coaches soon come into line when penalised to death.
It's down to the RFL to come up with initiatives to selk the game, clubs can only do so much within their locality and as far as I can tell the vast majority do have lots of community stuff going on. Again the problem lies at the door of the RFL Who have being impotent for decades and basically sat on their laurels with next to no clue how media and attracting new fans (& sponsors) works.
As a sport we've missed the boat and missed it big time, in an ever shrinking market we are surviving on crumbs. It's almost laughable that each SL club only receives the equivalent of £19,230 per week from TV sponsorship.
At the end of the current sky deal as a sport I really worry for us and the future despite how entertaining rugby league is.

At the end of the day a lot of this boils down to £££s. The RFL just doesn't have the kind of cash reserves required to push the sport. They made a pre-tax profit last year of £201,000 ffs. Half the clubs want rid of Wood, while the other half are quite happy to tread water. The RFU made £15million from their World Cup alone. There needs to be a drastic overhaul of the game in this country if we're ever going to compete with them. Or the NRL could just lend us a few million from its deal...