I am astonished at just how successful the WC has been, and apparently they have now sold 70,000 tickets for the final - so it's looking like a sell out. www.sportinglife.com/rugby-leagu ... -world-cup

I am astonished at just how successful the WC has been, and apparently they have now sold 70,000 tickets for the final - so it's looking like a sell out. www.sportinglife.com/rugby-leagu ... -world-cup

Just managed to get through to ticket telephone hotline and it has apparently SOLD OUT that'll learn me

I think its been fantastic and has totally challenged a lot of my negativity about the international game. I always felt that rugby league fans and especially the wider public just didn't care about international RL and thought this would be an embarrassing end of season mickey mouse competition in front of half empty stadiums.

But we have had great games with healthy attendances and the stories about sales for later rounds just look fantastic.

A few months ago I sent an email round a few people at work mentioning that its the rugby league world cup and was anyone interested in coming to the final at Old Trafford, and from that, we ended up getting a group of 14 for the final (of whom only two, me and a Wigan fan, have ever been to an RL game before). The idea of being able to get tickets for a world cup final was a real draw and people who weren't on my original invite were getting it forwarding on saying add me when you buy tickets.

Since then I've bumped in to a couple of the others who've told me that they then went on the rugby league world cup website and booked tickets for other games for their family/friends etc and they commented on how easy and cheap it was to get tickets - they are used to big struggles to get tickets for football or other large events and thought rugby league was great for the accessibility to a new or casual audience.

Then one day I was down in our London office and a couple of the guys there were complaining about how hard it is to get tickets for England RU at Twickenham, I asked them if they were interested in the rugby league world cup semi finals and immediately they thought it was a great idea to do a double header and couldn't believe you could get two semis for £30. Immediately one of them got on to his mates from his rugby club and so now I'm going down to watch the semis with about 10 or so RU fans all of whom are seeing their first live RL game.

What has been encouraging is that now the tournament has started I've been seeing the email chat amongst these guys talking about the games so far which otherwise they probably wouldn't have seen.

It just shows how RL does have the potential to reach out to new audiences...there is no attitude of "oh they are all flat cap northerners in that sport", these are guys who are used to watching and playing RU so find the game easy to pick up and are finding it interesting and enjoyable to watch. I am hoping that I can get some of these guys to be more regular fans and if they are decent lads I will suggest we do the Challenge Cup next year and try and get rugby league on their agenda of sports to follow.

Its getting harder and harder to get tickets for a lot of big sporting events so RLs relative accessibility is a huge draw card for the general sports fan.

Great post , Can only imagine how much more the games profile would have been raised by being on a free to air channel , there are casual sports fans where I work who are unaware there is a world cup being played .

Credit the RFL for the pricing policy and promotion of the comp , but they missed a trick in broadcasting terms IMO .

It's interesting that you raise the 'flat cap' issue. Personally, I think it is a complete myth, propagated by some RL fans and perhaps believed by many. I have never experienced it when talking to RU fans and I have been living down here for 40 years now. They will certainly defend RU, but like all rugby fans, they enjoy fast flowing rugby with good tries and plenty of physicality. If we could get more people to a couple of matches and ramp up publicity and TV, I think RL would do very well indeed across the whole of the UK.

I don't think they missed a trick at all. looks like the BBC only weanted England games, and maybe the crowds have been enhanced partly because of that. there surely can't be too much criticism of the organisers anyway. I reckon that the whole tournament is a real shot in the arm for RL in this country.

Correct. The rights to broadcast RLWC2013 were put on offer. I don't know all the details but I know SKY made an offer but wanted exclusivity. Premier also made an offer and were willing to share with BBC who only wanted to screen the big games. The BBC also promised coverage on radio and Internet and also to promote the event with trailers. They have delivered with all of that and getting 2m+ viewers for the England games is brilliant (compared to a few 100k for SKY games).

You can't force broadcasters to show games they don't want to, so you can't blame RLWC2013 for not getting more games on BBC. I think they've done a great job.

Yes I think RU fans are pretty open minded about RL. The one upmanship comes almost exclusively from RL fans who often want to take every opportunity to put down RU and claim how superior their game is. It's not the best way to sell the sport as it make us look like bitter folk with chips on our shoulders.

When I was at uni (in Leeds) it was the same, there were a lot of posh southern ruggerbugger types and a few of them around my halls, I got a few of them down to watch Leeds as they had good student discounts at the time, or to watch the Tri Nations games in the Skyrack pub, the lads got in to it and they started buying NRL training gear from the Rhinos shop in town to go to training at the uni RU club....that can't help but be good advert for the game as it gets their mates asking questions and talking.

The other day Stuart Lancaster (England RU coach) was on the BBC talking about how he's been to Australia to learn from NRL clubs, he was saying that he wanted to take on board the lines and channels that players in the NRL run because they're ahead of RU with only the All Blacks getting there, he also said he was impressed with the culture at these clubs and how humble they were.

Test football really has been reborn and I am absolutely loving it! You only have to look through the sticky thread at the top to see that the World Cup has surpassed all expectations. There have been so many magic moments which will live on in memories of the young and old for many years to come. If you are still debating whether to go to any games bite the bullet and splash some cash before you regret it. I have heard a few complains about only England games being on the BBC but I think we have got quite a good deal really. Had every game been FTA we would not have seen such good crowds, especially in places like Bristol and Workington. In Cardiff I was surrounded by people new to the sport, naturally some were more interested than others but all had a brilliant day from what I could gather, which is what matters. I am glad that I booked my tickets for the final months ago, if anyone is still after tickets you are best getting them via Manchester United here- https://www.eticketing.co.uk/muticketsa ... emref=5082

Test football really has been reborn and I am absolutely loving it! You only have to look through the sticky thread at the top to see that the World Cup has surpassed all expectations. There have been so many magic moments which will live on in memories of the young and old for many years to come. If you are still debating whether to go to any games bite the bullet and splash some cash before you regret it. I have heard a few complains about only England games being on the BBC but I think we have got quite a good deal really. Had every game been FTA we would not have seen such good crowds, especially in places like Bristol and Workington. In Cardiff I was surrounded by people new to the sport, naturally some were more interested than others but all had a brilliant day from what I could gather, which is what matters. I am glad that I booked my tickets for the final months ago, if anyone is still after tickets you are best getting them via Manchester United here- https://www.eticketing.co.uk/muticketsa ... emref=5082

Correction, just had a look and they appear to have sold out of their allocation!

They have just released 1000 more tickets