Quote: sally cinnamon "Is the game really marketed poorly? This is one of those issues where again RL fans are missing the point. International rugby league is crap, thats the starting problem. If you market a crap product you might get people to try it once, then they will think no thanks. No matter how much marketing you do if your product is rubbish then you can't fool people.
Wales v Ireland rugby league is going to be teams of English semi professional players mixed with a few Australians and a few amateurs. Do you REALLY think people in Wales and Ireland are going to be interested in that.
If for instance, Gaelic Football decided to have an "international game", and they aggressively marketed England v Australia in Gaelic football being played at Edgeley Park or somewhere, with teams of lower division Gaelic footballers made up of players with English or Irish grandparents, would you be interested in it? Would you be going down with your England replica to the game chanting for England and your new England stars Donal O'Rafferty and Ruairi Quinn? No you would think it was rubbish however much it was put in your face by marketing that there was an international on.
I don't remember anybody complaining about the ARLs lack of marketing for the Rugby League World Cup.....but when the World Cup semi final came around in Sydney at the Sydney Football Stadium there was only a crowd of 15000 which is well below what a regular Super League derby would attract between Wigan/Saints or Leeds/Bradford. Was the problem that in Sydney there was a lack of awareness of rugby league or people didn't know that the World Cup was going on.....?'"
Good views, but don't be daft on that last bit. They know that RL is and they knew it was on.
The problem I see is that both the RFL and NRL have focused their attention on bringing their domestic game up to scratch since the introduction to Super League on both sides of the globe. As a result, the spectator's main interest is Super League or NRL and with football, RU (cricket in Aus) also beginning their domestic seasons at the same time as our internationals then interest is spread across other more profile sports.
