Ageing fan base... I go the the HJ to watch Wire and there are loads of young people in attendance, LOADS! And we won’t be the only club where that’s the case.

Decrepit stadia... Headingly, KCom, Langtree, HJ, DW, John Smiths, AJ Bell, Gilbert Brutus are all fine stadiums and with a bit of work so would Craven Park be... Cas have an old stadium but it’s always full so it looks good anyway

Half empty stadia... this is where we fall down. But we look better than every NRL game in that giant 90000 stadium in Sydney with 12000 fans in there every week. But compared to RU we do look empty. (It would help at Warrington if the cameras looked AT the standing stand as that is always full)

Spot on........... What Carter doesn't like is the chance of finishing 9th but being relegated....... The way Wakefield celebrate 8th spot is an embarrassment to the sport..... Survival should not be seen as succrss

Tell that to every Premier League, Championship, Lg1, Lg2, ANY football competition in the world when a team secures safety from relegation...

We are not a wealthy sport. Giving 1.8 million to teams to survive is not a luxury we can afford...... And it's not just wakey..... Salford and Widnes are in there along with Huddersfield......

There are only so many places in a league system and somebody has to be in every place, and with the player pool we have it doesn’t matter which club that is because it’s the same players playing for whoever makes up the league.

London are doing OK in the 2nd tier and are developing talent..... Their kids have been really impressive over the last couple of years.... Fax have 2 sides...... Clubs can produce players if they aren't threatened with relegation...... But the likes of wakey will spend the 1.8 on survival...... Widnes look like they've thrown in the towel this year..... Watch them prosper in the 2nd tier and develop more local Players

Occasional cheap tickets are fine, but in isolation they are not the answer. Whether it’s Camel racing, tug of war or Britain’s got talent contestants, to attract people who do not normally go to rugby games to attend, it needs to be an event with additional entertainment and the event needs to be marketed to get the word out.

This is taken from an old news article. Yes camel racing is a bit daft, but it’s sure to be talked about and it made the newspaper sports headlines (free marketing)

Saracens' hopes of making Wembley stadium a "home away from home" this season have suffered an untimely blip after stadium authorities banned the club from staging a camel race as part of the entertainment at Saturday's Premiership Big Day Out against Northampton.
Saracens' eventual goal is to replicate the huge attendances Stade Français have attracted in Paris with similar reduced-price ventures. The majority of tickets for the game are on sale at £10 for adults and £5 for children and the club's long-time backer Nigel Wray predicts the club will attract a crowd in excess of 90,000 within three years. "Over 10 years our average crowds have generally flatlined at Watford at around 8,500-9,000," said Griffiths. "If we can bounce an extra 3,000-4,000 out of Wembley to our game against Gloucester on 27 September, we start to get some momentum. Viewed in isolation it could be a loss-making exercise but you can only assess crowds over a whole season." In the camels' absence, entertainment will include a performance by Diversity, the winners of Britain's Got Talent, and a tug of war competition.

Can you imagine football doing something as stupid as having a major event at a stadium that this incredibly difficult to get to and giving fans almost no time to organise their tickets and travel. They may as well have played the Champions league final in a war zone. Oh wait.

If you mean Koukash then I’d rather he not have bothered. All he brought to RL was inflated player wages for a few seasons. Nothing else.

We don’t need or want that kind of wealthy owner. We need ones who are more forward thinking and less short term and build for the future.

Exactly as the Union fella in that article said - we need to spend money on club infrastructure and the matchday experience, that’s made harder for everyone when a billy big bo||ocks comes in flashing his cash at players for a few years and then sods off when things don’t go his way.

What a load of tosh. Remind me what Davy, Carter, Hetherington and Lenegan have done for the game other than reduce their average gates

Regards

King James

A big part of the reason that we are so far behind RU is the a***holes on here constantly griping about clubs other than their own not being good enough or fit to play the game. If there are teams that can replace those teams, and in that I include my team then it will happen. until that day comes along stop moaning and support the game.

But the only thing that allows the likes Salford to beat any of the Championship top 4 is the fact they receive £1.8 million in central funding, while the Championship top 4 only receive a tiny fraction of that figure. Because of this it’s not a given the 4 stronger clubs in the Championship will replace them.

We really attract the idiot, inept and incompetent admin don't we to the code.

RU is rub by successful and admirable competent administrators and people with vision, no wonder they are moving forward at a rapid rate!
Unless this game grows a pair, it will become even more of a irrelevant niche sport for a few working class council estate suburbs and villages along the M62....
Open your f*ckng eyes people.

It's a big world out there and the game has great potential if this ship is captained and steered well!!

Sunday Times - 26 August.