Only a short hop for me so good luck to them, I'll look to attend if it happens whoever is playing.

Thanks for the support! Tomorrow's announcement of support at the Bristol City game should drum up a good amount of public interest and a chance to push the bid in local and national media. I'm confident we can at least match the attendance of the same game held in the heartlands and to take it to a new place and achieve that would be great; you can imagine a successful bid will get us a "smaller" game but the "102 years factor" and growing interest in RL promoted by those backing the bid should be able to get folk through the turnstiles.

I'm not convinced that 'Brizzol' really deserves an RL fixture.

Why?

Because no one apart from half a dozen Brizzololians and a few Welshies from over the bridge would bother turning up to watch it.

The nearest professional RL club to Bristol is about 3 hours down the M4.

It's a bad idea.


A VERY bad idea.

It's not about deserving, it's about providing the best facilities and atmosphere.

How do you know?

Ashton Gate.

In Bristol.



That is all.

Remember the 2000 world cup and what happened when we took games on the road to places that dont care about rugby league? We got crowds of 2000! 2000 for a world cup game, it was embarassing.

There is no point having games in Bristol, Gloucester, Cornwall, Wrexham, London or any other place where no one cares about the game. They need to be in the heartlands.

Why did you need to log out and log back in as someone else to say that?

Agreed. What a muppet, at least Barry was a funny persona

Is Bristol are willing to market this then I don't see why it's not worth a try.

We also got crowds of 2,000-3,000 in the "heartlands" of Hull and Cumbria whilst games in the "heartlands" of St Helens, Castleford and Widnes struggled to get more than 5,000. There are probably many reasons for that but RL fans in general are notoriously apathetic to international and representative rugby. If we can't be bothered watching games is it really a great loss to let another part of the country enjoy the sport?

The Bristol bid (and the bidding process in general) is addressing one of the key failings behind the 2000 WC and that is promotion. Bristol City, Bristol Rovers, Bristol Council and the local tourist authority is not going to throw money and effort at a venture if it doesn't think it can get a return - it is in everybody's interest to promote the game - unlike the previous WC where the only interest for many hosts was the size of the rent cheque.

Heaven forbid that we might attract a new audience....

It's not about the RFL just dumping a game somewhere to try and attract a new audience; Bristol is actively bidding for this and will actively promote, not just the game, but Rugby League in the area too. Read the press release again - lots of avenues of support and schemes in place.