I don't know the stats for sure but this is a guess from recollection slightly but we do seem to have more and more games played on the Friday night. For example when Cas played Saints at home early on in the season, it was a great game that Saints won at the death.....we also had 4 other matches taking place that Friday night. Some big guns as well, Wigan, Leeds, Wire and Bradford all at home so straight away you're lobbing off the roughly 40k who attended those matches instead of being able to watch the TV game.

Sometimes they get it right. Leeds vs Wigan the only game on a Friday night back in May (245k), Wigan vs Saints in June likewise (202k)......you start adding 2/3/4 fixtures to the same night then you start lobbing off a few thousand each extra match hosted.

I know clubs have preferred game days but as we know Sky get their way. I find it strange they don't ask for the Friday schedule to be pretty much a single game night to maximise the potential RL fan audience actually watching.

Double-edged sword. For me, it should be one Thurs, one Fri and rest of the non-TV games played Sunday.

However, clubs will argue that their commercial income will be reduced by moving games (although it could be argued they'd get more families and fans on Sunday games) and so the RFL wouldn't want to implement anything which may damage the income coming to clubs and the financial strength of the game, understandably.

That said, I do think it is disappointing as I do believe more fans would travel to Sunday games compared to Fri night trips down the 62. And TV games would generate more viewers too, which can only be good from a branding perspective to clubs and Super League itself.

All the big clubs... Leeds, Wigan, Saints, Warrington and Hull... are all committed to Friday night home schedules when they are not on TV.

Most of the other teams prefer Sunday afternoon home games.

I assume they've all done their market research into the optimum timeslot for maximising their home attendances?

It's not an issue I'd considered but one would assume that both attendances and Sky viewing figures would benefit without the distraction of other SL fixtures taking place at the same time.

Don't know where you have got your information from William but Warringtons home games are usually Sunday afternoons when not on TV.

Saints play on Fridays to maximise hospitality income.

I am not too concerned with figures for two reasons.

1. There was about 6 weeks where i think there was only one top 4 v top 4 match, which would have dented the figures (top 4 in tv terms: wigan, wire, saints, leeds)

2. Football world cup would have taken some viewers/ if people watching a lot of football, less time for rugby.

However you spin it there is still a downward trend from 2012

Not sure why I said Warrington played Friday nights when not on TV. I think probably because my perception is shaped by seeing them on TV quite often playing in that particular timeslot, hence the error.

To all you stattos with more knowledge than me on the subject:

Has the change to Thursday nights affected figures in any way? How do viewing figures compare to the Saturday 6pm games over the years?

Erm... could it also be that some households can no longer afford Sky Sports packages etc....

My household is one of these, and I know many others who no longer subscribe - there are many reasons why attendance/viewing figures are down, we all have different lives/lifestyles

According to more recent reports, Sky's subscriber base has reached it's upper limit of 10.5 million (5 million HD customers) and any future increased profitability needs to be based upon a strategy of flogging extra services to existing customers like HD packages, phone line and broadband.

Sky do not divulge information with regard to how many of those 10.5 million current customers subscribe to Sky Sports packages but it's a reasonable guess that if their subscriber base has reached it's upper limit, it's unlikely that Sky Sports subscription packages have nosedived in the opposite direction. My guess is that it's movies which tend to get dropped first when people are feeling the pinch (after all, sport is the new opium of the people these days), which may explain the bombardment of offers available for Movie packages.

Has Premier Sports had any effect on these figures - showing 8 NRL games per week?

I would imagine subscriber numbers are relatively low but I cancelled Sky Sports in favour of Premier a couple of years ago and know quite a few other that did the same.

I guess people get fed up of paying their subscription fees to essentially fund football and an extra euro football channel

I also cancelled Sky in favour of Premier Sports. Is William Eve a RL fan? I only ask, because he seems to enjoy ragging the game.

To be fair there is plenty of choice