I see that one of the London "exiles" Rugger teams has been taken over by 4 Irish investors.

There is so much that can be read into that story.

What like there is actually 3 or 5 of them rather than 4?

I find this London XXX a total embarrassment towards Superleague, they have been in decline for 19 years now. How many false dawns do we need to absorb, when in reality the borough of London doesn't want a professional rugby league team.
We all know it would need the London Rugby Union teams to go out of existence to give London XXX a chance, better odds of winning the lottery.

In all seriousness I hope not. If they move again in five to ten years . All that would do is ruin any base they have consolidated. I London is not a sporting area. People dont support London,they support an area of London. For a London side to progress fan wise they need buy in from the place where they play. Whilst you will pull people in from other areas. You have to keep you base in one place. Name me any 2 topflight teams in any sport with as many combined moves as London in the last 20 year's. Certainly in SL. Leeds never moved. Wigan once and about 1mile. Saints 2moves. Warrington 1 move. Hull 1 move. Etc you get the point.

Moving does not breed fans.

In fairness, I don't think that London are moving to breed fans, they have always moved for other reasons.
You are absolutely right about the London thing though, they would be better off becoming the Barnet Broncos and try and create a stronger identity.
In the pats, whilst speaking to London fans, we found that many of them are displaced Northerners, who already enjoy the game, plus a good number of Aussie, the locals were actually in the minority and this is the issue that they need to overcome.
I'm not sure about the work that The Broncos do in the community but, surely they need to draw fans form the junior and amateur game down there ?

This is partly down to the RFL wanting the London signature so that they can say we have expanded the game down to the Capital.
I still say we should have invested and developed the game into the Midlands area not too far away from the North of England stronghold, instead of this persistent lost cause of creating a professional team in such an isolated area rugby league wise. Trying to compete fan wise against Arsenal, Chelsea, Tottenham etc under a London banner will never work.
In saying that the Union clubs London Harlequins and London Irish have that banner but they are not nomadic in nature.

Has Reading always been there home? What about London wasps and Saracens



Does it not? Have a look at a number of clubs that have moved grounds, Wire, Hull.....



What's the difference between the Midlands and London other than London has more people, is the media capital of England as it is the financial capital. If Football clubs are the threat have you forgotten about, Wolves, Aston Villa, WBA, Walsall, B'ham.....

The bottom line is London has been poorly managed. No investment in Marketing etc

I thought that what with you being from London and us being thick northern monkeys you had a mind immeasurably superior to ours?

I agree the best thing to happen is for them to stay were they are.

If that is the long term plan then i think they need guarantees that the stadium can and will be developed if or when needed

Like I say Barnet have long term goals of improving the stadium into a 10k stadium, obviously that will be hard especially as the locals are constantly fighting against them currently, but the ambition is there.

I think that's right.

Commonsense suggests that resident rugby league fans are going to be spread all over the capital so it shouldn't make much difference where they re-locate, though I guess near the tube would be handy. They really do need to stay in an area long term and use the area's name as part of the club's name. Building a local following is essential if the club is to grow its fan support, and encourage local companies to support the club financially imo.

I wish them well, whatever.

Ok I suspect fishing, but I'll give it a bite.

Firstly I did say moves where bad in themselves. My point was about the suggestion that London should be looking to move again, before they have even stepped in their dressing room at their new home.

Secondly i made a whole point about the number of moves in 20 years, compared to others who have moved once or twice in that time, but actually we are talking once or twice in closer to half a century, compared to 6 or 7 moves in 20 years (depending on if you count the stoop as 2 moves as they moved inbetween). So suggesting and 8th is clearly not going to grow a base.

Also there is the difference in locality and distance. Yes Wire moved 1.3 miles.
Hull moved 0.8 miles
etc etc.

I can't be sure that all the addresses are 100% accurate, but if discount craven cottage and the first spell at Crystal palace and all the on the road games and times that grounds where being used temporarily just to return back. So starting from Chiswick Polytechnic Sports Ground, the shortest distance the London club have had to move is 4 miles between twickenham and brentford.

Other moves are more significant in terms of an impact on being a home team. Certainly as a Saints fan, we only moved a short distance to Widnes for a temporary 1 year move and the impact on the crowds was massive , far in excess of what the club had predicted. If Saints had moved as far and as often as London, we would have been playing games not just out of the town, but out of the county. That would not ender us to the historical fan base or any new base, with the expectation being we would always move on. Our crowds too would have dwindled into the low 1000's.

As I say, I suspect fishing given the tatic of quoting out of context. But there is your bite.

What is it that you fear? If there is someone willing to pump money into a professional club in London then we should embrace it.

Talk of London being a RU base is so far wide of the mark it’s untrue. The population of London is very much a magic mix of every nationality in the world. Many of whom really don't care for sport of any kind, let alone Rugby League.
If you take a look at Rugby Union in London since professionalism you may well appreciate where I am coming from. With the exception of Quinns I believe ALL have had money problems and in most cases they have moved out of London. Wasps, Irish and Welsh are classic examples, let alone the nomadic Saracens club. Rosslyn Park and London Scottish have had mighty falls from grace.

The HQ is in Twickenham which yes is within the M25 but that believe it or not attracts people from all over the country not just London.
What this does raise though is the question of why someone would feel that RL will work in London. A question which many of us would probably feel hard pressed to answer with a positive slant.

I guess it all comes down to cutting your cloth accordingly and looking towards a community and not a pan London club. That means you don’t look at London and say its got a population of 8m people so we must be able to attract bigger crowds than Wigan. It simply does not work like that.
Providing they get settled into the Hive with its capacity of 5000 they can build solid foundations from there as a community club. It’s relatively close to the tube which will assist. It’s also close to the M1 / M25 / A1 for travelling support to dip into London and straight out again. As I know some of you have an aversion to all things southern this should address your problems.
In time the capacity may well grow which gives reason to be ambitious. A smaller ground may well also generate a better atmosphere which will help the faithful.

Some of the problems over the past 3 years for the Broncos have been that it has tried to appeal to the whole of London. Their biggest crowds came when the Evening Standard were giving tickets away. It got people through the gates, but ultimately despite the product there was no follow up and people failed to return. If they had given 2000 tickets to residents of Twickenham and Richmond (the immediate locality) it may well have assisted in building crowds, especially if it was to 1000 local kids and their parents. But I am not a marketing expert so may well be wrong there. What I do know though is that people from east London should not have been enticed to The Stoop in the hope of returning regularly. It was never going to happen. Give them a freebie though and they would be there every week or at least until the club went bust.

I wish the Broncos well. They are what the SE needs at a time when participation is up. (This is a fact. It’s the only team sport to show increase in participation over the past 12 months) Without a London club / SE club the youngsters in the SE have no team to aim for “locally”. That team has to be top flight in my opinion. I just hope they manage to attract some good players who will fight for the cause and avoid relegation next year and then develop from there.

Are season tickets on sale yet?