That's the point. The path is clear but it takes a long time.

A chance of promotion used to be every year, now its every 6 or so. Is that too long?

But despite the disparity in wages etc that are currently alienating football fans, they are at least seen as representative of the country as a whole rather than the somewhat 'split' world of RL.

That said, I will only miss the Wales game of all the England ones this year, so I'm not one of this affected by RFL-related apathy, but I can understand those that are.

They can get stuff as far as I'm concerned. But that's a personal note. I still don't know how they got my mobile number!

Think the RFL have a very hard job.

After Englands pittiful efforts in last years world cup I'm not suprised the general public arent fussed to shell out more money in the middle of a massive reccession.

Also all the other major internationals in other sports are mostly promoted for them via the national media who completley ignore our sport.

Dont get me wrong I will be making the journey from Leeds to be there, wearing my GB shirt with pride. Plus I have got 4 mates to come with me.

For me its essential that there is a full house + we compete / beat Australia infront of a live BBC audience.

We need a massive crowd to get behind the lads and hopefully Burgess, Peacock, Morley, Ellis and Graham will go out and smash the Aussies out the tournament like the Kiwis did last week!

Come on England!!!!!!!!!

I understand you can pay on the gate for the Scotland v Lebanon game on Sunday...

the fact this game won't sell out is solely down to the shocking performance in last years world cup. I wasted enough money watching england last year so have decided not to bother this time round.

If England showed p well last year this game would sell out no problem at all

No it isn't, it is down to lazy fans in the heartlands who can't get their backsides off the sofa, wrap up warm and go and support their country.

It isn't that long ago we were seeing decent crowds at Wembley, Old Trafford and Elland Road, we had no better chance of winning then as we do now.

I think the the game would be sold out this weekend if it was not on BBC, there are 26 of us going to the Galpharm the week later but with it been on BBC this week it is just to much money to travel and buy a ticket when we can all watch it at home for free.

We quite clearly did though indicated by that fact that in 1990 we very nearly beat them same in 1992. In 1994 we had nearly beaten them in Australia the series before. We had no chance in 1997 and crowds dropped.

Fans of RL are no more lazy than fans of other sports. They just need to be enthused and think their team has a chance of competing never mind winning. The World Cup set us back massively, we were supposed to have a strong squad but got battered.

Doesn't matter how bad the team was last year. It should of been £10 tickets behind the goals with £20 on the sideline and it would of sold out easily. It's going to be embarrasing. The gate will be less than Wigan got on against saints this year.

There a couple of hundred thousand RL supporters who attend games, people should not be able to get a ticket at this stage if they could all be bothered.

But they can't and it's unreasonable to expect that they would all be bothered.

Of course it matters how bad the team was last year. They are by and large the same team this year if not weaker. It's a good indicator of what the likely result will be this time.

The prices are ridiculously cheap. It's costing me £80 to take 8 people. You people don't know you're born.

Maybe unreasonable to expect they should all be bothered, but there is enough fans in Wigan to fill the stadium along with Saints and warrington fans.

They should of had a game in Hull IMO.

I have just booked tkts for the final at elland rd.

I enquired about the east stand upper, and was told it might not be open
due to refurbishments. I suspect this is the stock answer if its a aus-nz final (ie not a sellout)

If England got to the final im sure the demand for tkts would mean they opened it

It would help if the RFL allowed you to buy a ticket via the dog and bone after 5pm. How hard is it to have someone there?