The tournament is in ENGLAND (nowhere else). The majority of games will be played in the north (80%) due to securing £25m in Northern Powerhouse government funding. The stadiums on the bid video include Wembley, Old Trafford, Etihad, St James Park, Anfield, Olympic Park, Hull FC, Leeds and Saints https://goo.gl/bm0Hxl

The tournament is in ENGLAND (nowhere else). The majority of games will be played in the north (80%) due to securing £25m in Northern Powerhouse government funding. The stadiums on the bid video include Wembley, Old Trafford, Etihad, St James Park, Anfield, Olympic Park, Hull FC, Leeds and Saints https://goo.gl/bm0Hxl

Try a game in Nottingham. At decent game might pull a good crowd at the City Ground. Not too far away from the Heartlands but far enough to be pushing some boundaries.

It should be possible to make a very decent profit from this tournament.
25 million in the bank is a great start, and that should just about cover the running costs.
Keeping it all in the heartlands should maximise profits and minimise costs.
With the 2025 tournament promised to North America, we'll probably need to bank a profit in 2021 to cover costs in 2025.

Olympic Stadium for the opener and Wembley for the final. Let's show some ambition please and ensure the London based national media can't ignore this.

Anywhere apart from the Olympic stadium, awful ground.

First of all I think it's important that all the games are played in England.
England have won the World Cup bid, not Wales Scotland or France etc.
Secondly they need to look at 2013 World Cup, what stadiums worked, what didn't.
Thirdly they said they want to get 1 million fans attending games at the 2021 World Cup, this is a huge ask but think it is achievable, to do this though they need to be looking at getting 40-50 thousand at all England games and 20-30 thousand at all Australia/ New Zealand games.
Based on all that I would look at using the following stadiums

England group games
Olympic stadium (opening ceremony/England's opening game)
Anfield
St James Park

Australia/ New Zealand group games
Kcom stadium
John smith stadium
DW stadium
Ricoh arena?? If it's successful 4 nations venue

Other group games
Langtree park
Headingley
Haliwell jones stadium
Leigh sports village
The shay stadium

Quarter finals
Kcom stadium
Etihad stadium
St James park
DW stadium

Semi final
Wembley double header

Final
Old Trafford

In terms of this forum, it usually means cheap tickets.

Have you watched rugby (league or union) there, or you basing this on the opinion of West Ham supporters? My experience of watching rugby there is that it's a great venue, as the broader park can be utilised for fans to have a great day out. Also, for the all the reasons the ground is bad for football (easy for fans to mix, etc), it's great for events like rugby internationals. And it's another element to helping us get headlines.

I don't think having England group games at both St James Park and Anfield would work as England are probably gonna be playing two pretty rubbish teams in the group stage so you're gonna struggle to get a big crowd in Anfield for something like England v Fiji. I think one of them would work as a double header with a New Zealand game though and my preference would be St James Park.

I get your point but the RFL now have 5 years to get their house in order and really to push the event even more than 2013. This is a WC and we should absolutely be pushing this as a must see event to the locals and beyond. We have to be more ambitious than staging any of the big 3 at little heart land stadia, we should be trying to fill 40, 50 even 60k stadiums for England and Australia. Over to the promotions team, no excuses really.

I'm all for having a bit of ambition in regards to the venues but I think you've gotta be realistic too. If the big three are playing anyone but each other then it's going to be a bit of a drubbing 9 times out of 10. I just don't think you're ever gonna get a crowd of more than 30k for a game like England v Scotland or Australia v Ireland unless it's as something like a double header which can be turned into an all day event with lots of other stuff going on. I think Elland Road or Goodison Park would probably be about as big as I would be willing to go for just an England group game on it's own not against Australia or New Zealand and even then I don't think they would sell out no matter how well they were promoted. I suppose it's just personal preference between whether someone prefers a sold out 25k stadium or 30k in a 60k stadium.

I agree. Stadium was great for the NZ game last year. Loads of space, good fun area for the kids, easy to get to ( slightly odd last bit of route walking through Westfield Shopping Centre, but, no sweat ) real ale on tap, loved every minute apart from the match itself which was a let down.

1. All games should be played in England as its England thats won the WC. The 2013 bid was a joint E&W bids (yes some games were played outside of those borders). But what has changed that Wales was dropped from the bid and will that impact on its "right" to host a game ?

2. Start with the stadia which held games in 2013. Did any of them "fail"? If so, drop them. So then have a look at the stadia dropped and the extra games from the expanded matches.

3. Out of the stadia which were successful in 2013, are there any new stadi better then these to replace them ?

4. Which stadia are willing to pay the RFL the most money to host the games ?

Double headers are a tough call. They are only likley to work with 2+ x "big name ties" BUT those are the ties which should be capable of being successful as a standalone fixture.

Do we need to use the RLWC as a means of expanding the game or should it be aimed at a successful consolidation of its strengths ?

Westfield is owned by Frank Lowy, an Australian billionaire who used to be Chairman of Football (Soccer) Australia.

Yes watched both codes there, massively underwhelmed by the place. Felt it had a total lack of atmosphere . Its an athletics ground not a rugby ground.