One point to be considered is the potential financial value of a second french team in television terms. As it stands, the Dragons have brought French TV to the table, but French TV are paying close to zilch for the rights. If having a second (or third) French team in SL means that the French broadcasters are willing to pay, then it may (I stress may) be worth bringing more French teams on board. In the NRL, the most valuable team for the competition are the NZ Warriors because Sky NZ pay for the NRL comp and wouldn't do if the Warriors weren't playing. The Dragons have made the comp more glamourous to Sky, but a second french team (with poss exception of Paris) would make little difference to Sky. In summary, Sky pay approx £1.2 million per club per season for Super League. Quite simply if a French broadcaster can be persuaded to spend £3 million for French rights for 2 French teams, then a second French team would be a good idea. If they'll put up £5million for 3 clubs, even better. But without that kind of cash, SL will have to stick with just one French side.
On a separate, but related question. Do the Quins add anything to the amount of money Sky are willing to spend?
The simple answer is... [uprobably[/u.
I say that because Sky Sports have (privately) always insisted that there is a London side in the competition. Sky aint a charity, so they must have done sufficient research to find out that they can sell more subscriptions to the south of England on the basis of a London club.
Personally, I'm an expansionista by inclination. I tire of supporters of traditional clubs with poor crowds and facilities who want to claim a place at the top table because of history rather than potential. (By the way, we rarely hear from Widnes/Cas/Wakey/Fev fans, that clubs such as Swinton or Oldham deserve a SL place despite their equally glorious history).
But expansionistas must be realistic. If the numbers don't add up, there should be no further expansion. TO and PSG would be fantastic additions, but as the old phrase goes, "Show us the money".

Totally agree, main reason for attending games live instead of watching on tv.

I'd love to see SL form a sponsorship deal with a national coach provider that gave clubs free coach travel for fans to away games. Clubs could sell tickets for 1pound each to determine number needed each week and the coach company provides as many buses as needed in return for a major sponsorship deal.

Would really encourage away fans to attend imo if they didn't have to worry about parking, fuel costs, traffic jams, could have a beer etc.

Come on RFL make it so!

"The building of a good atmosphere at sporting events cannot be underestimated".

It must be pretty small if it cannot be [uunder[/uestimated. Do you mean that it [ushould[/u not be underestimated?

Well you might consider the number of tickets the away club sells for starters. That might be a reasonable way to measure number of away supporters.

Have you ever bought an away ticket from your club? Me and the 6 guys i'm going st helens with haven't.
Warrington's a big place, it's too much of an effort for me to mess around going to the club shop

Can you pay on the turnstile at Warrington ?

Can you pay on the turnstile at Saints ?

If it meant you got free transport to Saints if you bought a ticket from the HJ a week earlier , would you buy a ticket ?

Possibly but I dont think I could be bothered with the hassle of travelling into warrington and plenty others wouldnt.
Alright idea in principle, in reality it'd never work

Can you pay on the turnstile at Warrington ?

Can you pay on the turnstile at saints ?

I'm missing your point fella.
If we're giving license points on the amount of away fans in the away end, Saints don't have one as such, you walk all the way round the stadium and the Warrington away end is usually full of Warrington supporters. For the Wigan game it was a third full of wire fans, sooo how many do wigan count towards their application.

Can you pay at the turnstile at Warrington ?

Can you pay at the turnstile at Saints ?

How hard a question are you finding this ?

Yes you can and both home and away fans do.

I havent suggested we should

What I have suggested is that all fans are important , and every effort should be made to encourage away fans to travel , as they add to the atmosphere at games , which in turn encourages home fans to turn up in larger numbers

Others on this thread may have suggested that away fan numbers should in some way count towards a clubs SL potential , I have not

That's where the discussion had headed, I assumed you were referring to that too. Considering you responded to my point on that very issue, I think it is you who were struggling to grasp the concept

Dont ' assume '


As benny hill used to say

" Rissen wiww you "

, Got me unders and overs mixed up

So you think if a franchise point were available the clubs would make no effort to simplify the process of buying your ticket reliably and in good time from the club? That's not really a difficult problem to solve is it?

Would it be impossible, if this were not a hypothetical discussion, for each club to dedicate certain turnstiles to away suporters so that each club could submit independent away support figures?

I'm struggling to think why you thought this might be difficult.

Because that will never happen.
Take the St Helens example, I go in at one end of the ground (the Saints end) and walk round once in the ground and hundreds do the same depending on where you park. All this dedicated turnstyle lark is silly, at the wire ground there might be 300 wire fans and 3200 Saints fans, are they going to only allow saints to walk through half the turnstyles? but what happen if, like at wire/wigan, loads of wire fans end up in the away end when it wasnt expected, are they going to make certain fans queue up for ages because they're only allowed through certain turnstyles. What about those away fans that prefer a side on view, and there's usually a few at places like wrexham for the same price, how do we count them?

I'd never buy from the club shop because, like a hell of a lot of people, I can't be bothered, offer me a fiver off (aint gonna happen) and I might consider it

What a silly idea, really.

If you don't want it to work, it won't work. If there is no incentive to make it work it won't work. None of what you said is insurmountable at all.

What we need to do is start from some common ground. Can we agree that:

Any given crowd is made up of home and away supporters?
To increase the crowd size either home support needs to increase or away support needs to increase or both need to increase.?
Higher crowds equates to higher revenues and a more enjoyable experience for all supporters and both are desirable outcomes?

I agree completely.
But there's certain stadiums where this just won't work.

I'd much rather see, like Wire did for Crusaders last week and im sure others have done, cheap tickets offered for certain games to encourage supporters to travel. You could get match ticket and coach travel from the Crusaders exclusively for £18 last week and look at the crowd figure as Crusaders brought more than many SL teams. A similar thing was in operation for the Quins game and will be for the Salford game, some would argue a club loses money, I would argue for Warrington to have an 11,500 average after 3 games, 2 of which were quins and Cru, this system is the way forward.

Again, rather than making it the responsibility of the away team with a franchise point, I'd rather put the ball back in the Home teams court. If they want a full away end, there's the way to go, the supporters WILL travel, some of these wrexham blokes had seen maybe 3 league games in their life, but I wouldnt punish a club on it's away fans when it depends on so so many factors

We have managed to put a man on the moon, we have mobile phones bouncing signals off satelites, we can invent such technological marvels as the internet and World Wide Web. Surely it is not beyond the wit of man to figure out which are the away fans and which are the home fans.

I don't actually believe that there is much the home side can do to encourage away fans. I support Hull KR and our ground is often put forward as a major reason why away fans won't travel. But away fans don't travel in significantly more numbers to the KC a modern, covered, all seating stadium with excellent views everywhere.

The reason I say the onus should be on the away team to increase travelling numbers is that the away team has a big advantage. They know who their fans are and can consequently communicate more easily and directly with them, and they are the ones who will be rewarded with a franchise point, not the home team. As a fan of the away team I could feel that I am doing my bit to help with the franchise bid by travelling to watch my team. As it is, travelling rewards competitors in the franchise process, that's contrary to maximising crowds surely?

This way, each club would be rewarded for maximising their own support home and away, and every club would benefit from increased revenue. That's a win win.

You travel to support your team Bill, not because of 'franchise points'.

Agreed for some supporters, but mostly they don't travel at all. For some this may encourage going away a few times or a few more times (than they already do) a year although the main reason to travel (for those that don't) would likely be down to intiatives run by the club to encourage greater travelling numbers, not, admittedly, the franchise point. Again, as it stands travelling supporters are enhancing rival franchise bids (in some small way), that doesn't make sense. How should me supporting my team actually be potentially detrimental to my club's SL status?

Furthermore, if away support was accurately identified, then by default home support is accurately identified. There could then be a clear measure of a clubs success in increasing and retaing its own support, not benefiting by occasional influxes of away supporters.

As a further note, it would still be in the interests of the home club to ensure that away supporters are well catered for, that would not change. There is little point in getting increased supporters one year only for them to have such a miserable experience that no amount of cajoling will get them there the next.

I think if people cared enough to travel soleley because of 'franchise points', they would probably have travelled anyway. I hope all clubs can increase travelling support, but a greater home support will have a knock-on effect on this anyway and that should be every club's priority, not relying on away fans.

No, you've not read my post properly, even before I edited it. The main reason more supporters would travel is because their club incentivises them to. The franchise point would I agree be an unlikely reason, in isolation, to travel.

Good, we agree then