1 out of 3 ain't bad.

Yes

Wow
Thats ten sides clubs.

It was a relegation because you finished in a relegation spot, one which you knew about at the start of the year, you didnt make way, you were relegated. Wigan finished 3 positions ahead of you in the league table, you werent relegated because wigan broke the salary cap.

If it were, more people would attend.

Head says of course.

Financially you make an asset work.

But you can understand that fans see that as a first step towards merger.

If anything I actually think it would make that less.likely in the short term as a joint stadium a both should be better off.

But in the face of expansion and/or contraction unless both teams started operating at the top of Sl the question would always rear up unless they started to perform at the top of Sl.

No one asks Saints and Wigan to merge but then Wire and widnes were told to merge and refused and glad they didnt.

Yet there is one succesful merger in the top flight Catalan.

Whichever way it goes it has to be fan led.

Not sure about your point Smokey.
If you read my other post, I mention that Cas will never be able to fill a 15000 capacity ground.
Bearing in mind the size of the town, they do well to average 7-8000 fans most seasons.
Even if they had prolonged success, there wouldnt be a major change due to the proximity of their local rivals, so unless Wakefield and Fev ceased playing RL, Cas will not significantly improve their attendance figures.
Their attendance has more to do with the size of the town and the proximity of its local rivals than the current state of WR.
Ok, there may be a small increase in supporters in a new state of the art ground, but IMO nothing substantial, and yes, I prver a visit to WR over Hudds every day of the week.

Do only people from Cas watch Castleford? This gets trotted out all the time.

The borough of Aston has 28,000 people living in it, yet they have a 42,000 seater stadium and a football team averaging 35,000 a game.

No. Cas Tigers have support from surrounding areas like Selby, Garforth, Normanton, Pontefract, Knottingley and Kippax.

If that is true (and im not saying it is) then they have no need for a new stadium, and wont be an SL side for much longer.

If it isnt the stadium, and it is just intrinsic to Cas that they attendance's will always be limited then they wont survive as a fully pro side and will need to drop down to lower leagues

At the begginning of the SL era - Cas Tigers only averaged about 3 to 4 thousand. We now get 7,000 plus. Facilities at Wheldon Road do let us down but even if we moved to a new stadium and had a bit more success I still think we would only average about 8 or 9 thousand. I would be happy with that figure though and so would a lot of supporters from other clubs.

8 or 9 thousand isnt enough.

Thats not me saying that, thats SL chairmen who will tell you, you cannot operate at a full cap with less than 10k averages.

So if Cas' potential is 8 or 9k with a brand new facility, then they arent a sustainable SL club even now, never mind in the future.

I agree, they probably wouldn't be able to operate on full cap but, there are many others who will struggle and some with attendances much lower than that of Cas.
Cas will suceed by producing larger numbers of their own players (as thy do now) and by "maximising their revenue streams" (i hate this phrase, but it is appropriate).

Looks like we will be having a 7 team SL them.

Many? there arent that many.

Totally agree. If we went to a 10 team SL it would be curtains for Cas, Salford, Widnes and London. Wakey, Hudds and Hull KR would be sweating too.