English RL needs more high profile matches (e.g. a Yorkshire v Lancashire series) and the England RL team needs to play high profile matches at home, every year. Simple as that.

As a supporter of the England RU team, I know I will have a minimum of 7 or 8 matches to watch every year that will be played at Twickenham or in the same time zone (Wales, Scotland). Unfortunately it's virtually impossible to get tickets for Twickenham so my support is restricted to watching on TV and perhaps buying a replica shirt or other merchandise once in a while. The point is that I feel part of something and I put a bit of money into the game.

How many home games have England RL played this year? One, against France. That is not enough. Of course we also need to tour Australia and NZ as often as they come here, but in my view it is essential that at least one of them comes here every year for a three match series. I also firmly believe that a three match Roses series is essential to give those people who don't have a club team in their area (which I imagine is a fairly high % of the country) another high profile RL event to watch. I don't buy all that crap about it being too parochial.

There has never been so much sports coverage on TV as there is today. Whilst this is a good thing in many respects, it also means that individual sports have to work harder to get their product noticed. Back in the 1980's and 90's when GB matches were shown on BBC Grandstand, it was often a choice of watching that or some American show on ITV. Nowadays people have the option of changing to any number of other channels, so if your product isn't delivering, the audience will be gone. And when I say delivering, I'm talking about things such as playing in big, packed stadiums (which means RL fans supporting the game). I don't care what sport it is, I am far more likely to watch it if it's being played in front of a packed crowd in a famous venue. Or if the teams involved are notable ones. No disrespect to either team but Halifax v Widnes isn't a game I'd add to my sporting diary. Lancashire v Yorkshire, however, is!

Until RL grasps this basic fact, it will carry on as it is. Which, incidentally, is absolutely fine, providing you're happy with how it is and you're not one of those who whinges continuously about what RU is doing. RL is a perfectly good sport played by teams predominantly in Lancashire and Yorkshire, with the occasional international match thrown in. It's survived like that for 100 years and it will do for another 100. There's only a problem if it has ambitions beyond that.

I've said it before and I'll say it again.

Rugby League NEEDS a national stadium. Not a 80,000 seater, yet, just a simple 20,000 seater, advertise correctly, fill the stadia on a regular basis where international games are played. Once we get that consistent full capacity, extend the stadia - so on and so on.

The problem is still , who would we play in it ? , a stadium needs to be used to be viable , it would need 15/20 full houses a year to pay for itself , we just dont have that many games to put in it

Just put the Cricket on , the stadium is empty apart from the Barmy army on holiday , hardly an aussie in sight , nobody is interested in a no competition match , even in Australia for their national sport

Its because test cricket is about as exciting to watch as paint dry.

Seriously... who on earth would pay to go and watch a game that can last for 5 days... yet there is not guaranteed to be a winner?


The Twenty20 form of the game is a bit more interesting...at least they try and belt the bejesus out of it.

Test cricket is sooooo boring

not another stadium ?we have stadia coming out of our ears and can you imagine the RFL paying out a couple of hundred million on such a hair-brained scheme ? What's wrong with the DW for example ? or LSV or The Keepmoat ? These are wonderful venues,make one of these or,Hillsborough,Elland Road,Estlands etc the National RL stadium !
I refer you to the brilliant idea to build a wonderful new staduim in Milton Keynes - great idea eh ? they called it the National Hockey Stadium wowee !!! used for Hockey Internatinals (another minority sport like RL) and the MK Dons home matches with a few thousand soectators ! yet another white elephant...

no,not by the peole anyway but the Mayors are elected every five years - to be anyone in france it's helpful to 'know' the right people...

We have one. it's called Wembley - a national stadium in the national capital.
Building a smaller, largely unused, stadium in the north would simply be agreeing with our detractors in the national media that RL is just a small regional sport of no interest.

I'm with you tb, Wembley is a Rugby League Stadium, we should use it more, First test of any series I think. Sell tickets from the bottom up, so if needs be, the top tier doesn't get used.

yes,great idea

If your in London now you can't miss the advertsing for the next Saracens match at Wembley.

Its all RL need to do to fill Wembley for a test, cheap tickets plenty of marketing and maybe drop the word league from it and con a few people into thinking its Union and show them something decent.

Total absolute non runner.











Shame cos it's not a bad idea.

Actually, it's very easy to miss it.