Not quite "at the same club" but only just over the road, I'll have you know I've actually paid to go and watch a union match at Twickers. Won't do it again because the game is of no interest to me and I don't expect union supporters to come and watch us if they've no interest either.

[size=50Above referenced Union match involved Steele-Bodger's XV and was in 1960 (+/- 1 year).[/size

I tried looking at the news archive and the articles relating to this couldn't be found

- other stuff could

Was it something to do with the availability of the then-new west stand? I know that I got a seat in there and was able to look across at my existing ST seat in the east stand. So maybe the west stand became available right at the end of the union season and so wasn't used by union supporters and hence was all available to us?

Or maybe I'm mis-remembering as usual.

Can't be bothered replying to messages right now but I have recieved a reply from the club, our esteemed GM will be releasing a statement with regards to this. Look forward to seeing it.

In fact the e-mail I have recieved in "reply" to my message is pathetic and has addressed nothing that I queried. Perhaps they have their hands tied and are unable to express any thoughts on the matter, which is even worse because I suppose the Union lot have effectively told them to shut up. If any other club did this there would be uproar, alas some people on here are STILL thinking it is acceptable. I'm starting to shift more towards the views of rupe1 right now, as Harlequins Rugby United or whatever it is called is the most one sided, embarrassing, and disrespectful thing I have experienced supporting RL in the South. If anyone wants to go to the RU game and whistle at their goal kicks, inform their players at their lack of skill and relay our feelings towards their fanbase, then PM me.

=#FF0000<edited by Homer>

Listy...I appreciate that this has really got to you...it did me as well when it was announced, but for different reasons. I sympathise with the Saints fans as well as those Quins fans who go to occoasional games and now have to fork out an extra £10...BUT.......naming names of staff who are in no way responsible for this decision is not on. Believe me, I have incurred the wrath of the club, the rfl and the mods on this board over the years, but naming names is a "no no", especially when it is an innocent that incurs your wrath.
The fact is that everything you take for granted on match day, the bars, the bands, the lunches in the jesters, the players being available to chat to...none of this would happen without the efforts of one person. This person works very hard to make things happen and in no way deserves to take flack for this. I have seen this person close to tears with the stress of getting things done. The Xmas event in 2008 was a fiasco, with the bars not cleaned, hundreds of empty kegs just left on the walkway in front of the East Stand and this person mustered troops and got things done.......and at the end of the day the look of stress but relief was quite disturbing. The support from the rest of the "club" was minimal in my opinion and may explain why this event didn't happen this year.
Paul Blanchard on the other hand is the General Manager of the club and it is him that should catch any flack if you feel strongly about this, but be warned, we exist only because of David Hughes, the RFL expansionist plans, possibly SKY TV and the patience of Harlequins Rugby Union.
I hope that you see sense and remove the name from this post..........they really doesn't deserve it.

See my PM for reasoning.

And I'm sorry but I'm not buying into that sob story. I am sure that as one of the more senior members of the club, she is very well paid, and the job title, like I said, comes with a certain level of accountability. If this is completely PB's doing and this is completley out of PW's hands, then fair shout, but the e-mail I recieved was pretty shoddy for a so called OM. I'm not going to share it, you'll have to take my word for it. But the phrase "cop out" springs to mind.

In fact, I see your point GF, but I'm just tee'd off with the reply I got. In fact, I am now pretty sure who is responsbile for this decision, but I didn't think PB would ever bother replying.

What am I even talking about? I bet even PB had no input into this "decision".

Last message. The day I edit out a club employee's name on the basis that their feelings are hurt is the day I stop posting on these forums.

I recall attending an Open Day at The Stoop in September 2005 and the West Stand wasn't quite complete, so presumably no union STs were sold for that stand that season. (The double header would have been Spring 2006 I think.) furthermore the union team were outisde the top division that season so presumably their crowds weren't quite at the same level as now.

I was under the impression the union team comes close to a sell out for most games so I would have thought it a tight squeeze to accommodate our crowd too (especially for a fixture with a larger than average travelling support) without selling some of the same seats separately for the two games.

As for the £25 ticket price for Saints fans including a game of no interest to them - as a matter of principle I think this is wrong. The closest equivalent I can think of would be if our game at Leeds was preceded by a Leeds Tykes match kicking off three and a half hours before our game, with a gap of almost two hours between matches, and we were charged an extra tenner on top of the regular price. It wouldn't stop me from attending if I was going to travel in the first place, but the union game would be of no interest to me whatsoever and I wouldn't be impressed. The earlier suggestion on this thread that different coloured "league only" tickets could have been sold to only admit the bearer after the union game is over sounds logical, but there could be a stewarding/safety issue in directing them to vacant seats as no one would know which union fans intended returning to watch the "free" second game, having paid their usual £25 for their own game.

Other than putting a spin on our average attendance for the purposes of our next licence application I'm beginning to think this whole double header has fewer plusses than minuses and that the union team should ahve arranged their match for the Friday evening or Sunday afternoon instead.