Whether or not the stated attendances at Lamport last season were accurate it was always going to be a risk to play none of their games during the entire first half of the season in Canada. With this being only their second season in existence there is always a chance that some of last season's spectators will have lost motivation/interest in going after such a long gap between home games. I would hope that they have been setting up fan parks for supporters to gather and watch the away games on big screens or something similar to keep the habit of going to watch the team going during the season so far. I want them to succeed long term but there could well be a drop off in numbers attending when they get back to Lamport.

Why do you want them to succeed ? What do they bring to the English game ?

They bring visibility and media interest, they have already done so when playing in League 1. Despite how much the likes of us on this board and other RL supporters think of our sport, with a smattering of northern towns and cities playing the sport the national media and the wider public have shown over the history of the sport that they couldn't give a hoot about watching or hearing about it. Mention of Toronto among the list of teams in a cup draw or league fixture list has made and will make news editors etc. take notice and we get news stories, newspaper articles. Whether atm this is down to novelty value or not we are still getting coverage about the Toronto club.

They provide an opportunity for attraction of more sponsors for the sport and its competitions by creating awareness in a market where we as a sport have had no outlet previously. Initially these are going to go to the Toronto club itself rather than the wider game but the continued existence of the club means that businesses in NA become aware of the sport where they previously weren't. This then provides the opportunity for the game to access sponsorship money for the wider sport, or to sell tv coverage packages in the NA market.

In time (10 years plus, but a shorter timescale is unrealistic anywhere with a brand new sport) if the club survives they would provide another breeding ground for players. Not the fanciful claim of failed NFL players switching to play in SL in 2019 but with an established professional team in the city through the establishing of community clubs from which RL players will develop. It also gives a focal point club for those men already playing RL in USA to aspire to, with the will to play RL already present a club into which they can step up acts as a higher level of the NA pyramid than previously existed. Toronto do buy in the squad right now but what else could they be expected to do right now. The important things are that 1) the club continues to exist and 2) that it is successful so as to give local kids something to aspire to play for. The likes of Cramlington Rockets in the north east didn't exist
prior to Thunder's existence but the north east junior system is now producing players for that club, the same applies in London which took around 30 years but is supplying SL players despite the struggles of the pro club at the top of that particular pyramid.

I understand that some people are concerned that Toronto and other proposed clubs in NA are currently looking to take not only players from our clubs but also places at the top table, with for the time being not an awful lot appearing to come back in our direction from them. Also that people worry for the possible effects on long established clubs like Leigh (your club I believe), Featherstone and Halifax should more clubs follow but IMO the possible benefits for the profile and commercial power of our sport lead me to hope that they survive and succeed in our sport.

They have delivered nothing other than smoke and mirrors to date and Like London 30 years on, will deliver nothing. Sponsorship is a contra deal that will cost that sponsor 50% less this year....their TV deal is FREE......premiere pay little if anything for anything......and fewer people watch it than the fishing channel.....they are mid way through season 2 and "the media attention" has delivered us no new sponsors, no new interested broadcasters...Perez has vanished of the face of the earth (strange for someone who was so good at self promotion), NYC has gone as quite as a mouse and given they've been wining and dining big Nigel, you'd think they'd be all over social media.......but nada........
....and finally. The Player pool is 28 Teams at the top table globally.......23 in a squad...644 all told and we're going to dilute it further for the likes of Tony Clubb, LMS and a couple of others in 30 years time and little else..

No they didn't. The threshold was originally a minimum to allow DR players to continue playing for the DR club after the transfer deadline (but, if they did, they then couldn't play for their parent club and vice versa) but has since changed to a minimum to allow DR players to play for both the parent and the DR club after the transfer deadline, providing that both clubs are in different 8s.

Hardly a surprise given the stadium is 25 miles out of town. Would Halifax have sold 3,200 tickets in the week leading up to a home game at an alternative venue?

How would Fax know?, they are not rebuilding their stadium or relaying a pitch.

It’s a good job, I remember Halifax taking several years to finish building their main stand.

I am well aware that deals acquired to date concerning Toronto are of low value etc. etc. They are a new start up and the first such club in their country, they are hardly going to get a queue of companies waiting to fund them through sponsorship, tv deals etc. right now. They have had the foresight to set up from the beginning avenues for them to build recognition within their own and the UK markets that will (it is hoped) lead to more lucrative deals in the future. I did mention that their presence provides the opportunity (and that's all it is atm an opportunity) to tap new markets, sponsors and so on, not that it already is. I have selected the most relevant part of your post in the quote, this is only year 2. Nobody would or should expect any club to be contributing as much as established clubs straight away in terms of player development. I am being realistic on the likely timescales for producing players, it will take 10 years or more but if the club continues to exist then it will happen.

I don't dispute that the Toronto club may not succeed ultimately nor do I assume that they will fail. I just hope that they do succeed, some are worried about a detrimental effect on some established clubs, some people seem to want them to fail. Opinions differ, c'est la vie.

That wasn't the point. They averaged (according to published figures) home crowds of around 7,000 last year, with around half of those being complimentary tickets (of which many may not have actually turned up for the game), and had around 650 season ticket holders. I guess that if the freebies have stopped now, then we might get a more realistic view of local interest in RL. Having been starved of live RL for so long, it's either going to be a case of folk desperate to see a live game (when a 25 mile trip means nothing) or they'll just have lost interest.

Tbh, I thought they had more season ticket holders last year (they were very cheap at around $199.99/£115).

Sourcehttp://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-42702631rl

What do Leigh bring?

Regards

King James

Contradiction here. Do you really know what you're talking about?



After reading your quote above,what does anybody bring?

1) at least 500 away fans to each game (even in the championship) 2) don't ask for special treatment (i.e. 12 games away, then 12 at home) or ask not to appear in the challenge cup 3) when Barrow had to play Toronto away in the league one play offs, multi millionaire owner Argyle did not pay for their flights, they had to set up a justgiving fund to help finance the trip. (no such problem at Leigh) 4) we have an under 17's academy set up 5) we sign players and use them, not 'ship them out on loan/get rid after a couple of months) 6) set up the Leigh Centurions community trust over 10 years ago. https://leighrl.co.uk/wp/leigh-community-trust/ 7) we have superb modern stadia facilities at the Leigh Sports Village, in which the club have a 12.5% stake a local 'born & bred' owner who cares passionately about his club. That enough for you, fake expansion lover !

1) at least 500 away fans to each game (even in the championship) 2) don't ask for special treatment (i.e. 12 games away, then 12 at home) or ask not to appear in the challenge cup 3) when Barrow had to play Toronto away in the league one play offs, multi millionaire owner Argyle did not pay for their flights, they had to set up a justgiving fund to help finance the trip. (no such problem at Leigh) 4) we have an under 17's academy set up 5) we sign players and use them, not 'ship them out on loan/get rid after a couple of months) 6) set up the Leigh Centurions community trust over 10 years ago. https://leighrl.co.uk/wp/leigh-community-trust/ 7) we have superb modern stadia facilities at the Leigh Sports Village, in which the club have a 12.5% stake a local 'born & bred' owner who cares passionately about his club. That enough for you, fake expansion lover !

What does your team bring? Who is your team anyway?

All taken on board, but my concern is that the main driver has gone, the sponsor is saving 50% this year on last years flight deal, they seem intent on ignoring the salary cap, they have been allowed to play their games in blocks which is 100% advantageous to them as they will face 10 sides at home who will all be fresh off the plane whilst they will be acclimatised, they lied about attendances at games last year and for all their good intentions, it'll take 3 decades to deliver "home grown players".

Their constant bombardment of good news on social media and other channels is well done, but the reality is they are preaching to the choir.....of the 700 or so ST holders there last year, most would have been ex-pats from the North of England. A mate of mine lives just outside Toronto and he was a hardcore Bradford fan when we used to work together....he said you wouldn't know about the wolfpack unless you went looking for them......he didn't now they existed until I asked if he'd been to a game. They owe their kit suppliers money from 2017.......this is a substantiated fact as the same brokers supply London......their are rumours of players being "uncontrollable" when back in Toronto and whilst it is nice to have a side outside of the heartlands, they will I suspect go the way of PSG and Crusaders once the emperor is seen to be wearing nothing at all......because the TV execs and Sponsors could find neither Wigan, St Helens on a map as they can't currently find Dewsbury and Swinton.

Toronto's Canadian Football team have the lowest crowd average (14,000) in that comp, despite making the finals last year. Trying to get tickets to the Maple Leafs on the other hand is much harder, but they still only average 19k...the Blue Jays average 40k, Toronto FC 27,000.....the FC, the CFL and the Jays are head to head against the Wolfpack.....without free tickets, of which there were thousands last year, the real attendances would have been 2 or 3k.......whilst the wage bill was SL standard.....without Perez pressing the flesh and doing the PR, the wheels will soon come off the bandwagon and not even 1.8 million of SKY SL money in 2019 will be enough......David Hughes personally sunk 2 million a year into the Broncos in SL with comparable attendances to Toronto but without the other overheads the club has........how long before Argyle splits? Then what......if we've lost a Halifax or a Leigh, we've lost 2 clubs that provide a pathway for young English talent all because we were told there was a mega-bucks TV deal in the offing and we believed them with no proof?

I don't hope they fail, but I will be stunned if they succeed in doing anything other than giving us something else to whinge about whilst attendances and TV audiences continue to plummet back home.