Jeremy Guscott : You won't see many better games than Origin

Quote: Mr Churchill "RL in Britain is striving to be successful here. For now, we are not bothered about comparing RL to RU anywhere else or even here thanks. We know RL is a better game than RU and that's all we need to know.

Britain is still a class stratified society. We know that, for whatever reason, the upper middle classes will in general support RU, and because their people predominate at the top end of society, RU will continue to receive an undue weighting of media attention.

The people's games here are soccer and RL. In RL in Britain, it is more of an issue for us to compare ourselves with soccer. Soccer is of course a much bigger game here on any measure. But we still want to compare RL with soccer. Our potential 'markets' include the same people. Neither game is actually a threat to the other and there can be and is mutual respect and co-operation.

In measuring RL v soccer, RL is not of course looking in any of our lifetimes to overtake soccer. The key measures of the [irelative[/i success of RL in expanding over time are in ratios.

eg

1. I think You'll find I didn't start the comparison with Union and specifically their RWC.
2. RL and RU invite comparison given the origins of the games and their similarities.
3. Union is not the preserve of the upper-middle classes. 750,000 at their 2003 parade.rlhttp://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/rugby_union/rugby_world_cup/3300061.stmrl
4. TV audiences for England at the RLWC were equalled or beaten by Union friendlies not featuring England.....are there really 2.8 million welsh upper class s or is your class debate slightly outdated?
5. Soccer attendances in the 1970's? Really? Compare Union attendances in 1970 and compare them to now.....Jesus, take Union attendances in 1990 and compare them to the Aviva premiership now
6. On the subject of Media attention......the RLWC getting matched or beaten by friendly Union games on the BBC has all to do with upper-middle class media bias. The 2013 Autumn Internationals played in the 4 Nations and France attracting close to 1,000,000 fans in 17 games at a 59k average has SFA to do with Media Bias.....the fact that most of these internationals had series naming sponsors has little to do with media bias and the fact that RLWC 2013 will post only 10% more profit than 2008, with 55% more games and 57% more fans has little to do with media bias either. Over 92% of the players representing countries in these 17 games were actually BORN IN THOSE COUNTRIES.....little influence of this media bias there either.

You aren't interested in comparing RL with Union but you should be. I know which game I prefer to watch and I know which game in my opinion is better......it is the game that could learn a lot from the other slower and more ponderous game when it comes to administration....England v NZ at Twickenham with about 82,000 people in attendance will have generated close to 5 million on the gate.......they had 2 more of those and then the Fiji/Barbarians game.......they will have generated more profit in 4 games than the entire RLWC of 28 games.

Your comparison with soccer is totally invalid BTW.......tickets to Premiership matches are as expensive (if not more so) than any other sporting tickets in the UK.....your "UPPER-MIDDLE CLASS" are actually middle and lower middle classes with a Capital Once Credit Card