Quote: gerr'emonside "Its got more to do with the decline of West Yorkshire RL rather than a decline or death of RL as the OP suggests.
Hopefully we can have a wigan wire final next year when it would be a guarenteed sell out.
As I said a couple of years ago, unfortunately there is only a handful of teams in RL who can be relied upon to fill Wembley given the increased size and the West Yorkshire teams are no longer them.
As long as we have a final between two of Wigan / Saints / Wire / Hull / Hull KR youll have pretty much guarenteed Sell Outs.
Previously Leeds and Bradford were also on that list but with their decline in form, and loss of fair weather fans, they no longer can pull a significant crowd at a final!'"
I think, as easy as it is to be all sanctimonious now, there were some clear differences in the experience of Leeds and Wigan fans this year. At the end of the day, both clubs have a fairly similar number of what you might call "proper" supporters, who attend most games through thick or thin. Wigan perhaps slightly more, but if we say 11k - 15k or so, that would be near enough. Wigan are currently nearer the top end of the range. Let's call them tier 1.
You then get the next tier up, those who don't go regularly, but will tend to turn up for the big games at home. There are usually more of these when things are going well, but in general they explain part of the variation in gates between matches against big rivals and "normal" matches (other variation being readily explained by fluctuations in visiting supporter numbers). You can probably add 6k-7k for these. Tier 2.
Then there are the hangers-on. The type who don't really bother much most of the time, but like to come out of the woodwork for big occasions. There are probably another 10k of these at both clubs. Tier 3.
Tier 1 were probably, for the most part, present and correct on Saturday, and always would be.
Marketing to tiers 2 and 3 is the hard part. You need these to fill big stadiums for big matches. Like them or not, if only the hard core support turned up, Wembley would be a bit rubbish with 25k people rattling around in it.
Leeds have dragged the hangers-on and fringe supporters in huge numbers to Grand Finals in 2004, 2005, 2007, 2008 and 2009 recently, to go with CC finals in 1999, 2000, 2003, 2005 and 2010, all of which yielded large, although ever-decreasing followings. Numbers of tiers 2 and 3 drops as novelty wears off, but they are readily kept at good levels while you are largely winning the big matches.
2011's form, together with the 2010 Wembley debacle challenge the commitent of supporters. Tier 1 will largely withstand that challenge, as they have commitment. Tiers 2 and 3 have little (2) or no (3) commitment, by their nature. So a big expensive day out in London was always going to be a tough sell to them. Wigan's 2nd final in the last 5 years, and the first CC final at Wembley since 1998, with ateam enjoying huge success is a much easier sell to the floating voters.
4 years ago the Leeds boards were full of people looking down their noses at the attendances of other teams.
Or you could believe that Wigan's 30k who were there are all just super hardcore and Leeds' casual fans aren't. Up to you. My explanation makes more sense to me though.
