Im proud of the Wigan walk anyway. How many teams do you know that are famous for walking and playing rugby? No mean feat

Warrington really put Saints to shame last night, hats off to them. We need more teams with regular big followings in the league. Warrington vs Wigan when it comes around will be an absolute cracker and a sell out at both ends imo.

Not being there, I can't comment on how big the home crowd actually was, or what the atmosphere was like, but the Sky cameras only seemed able to find Wire fans.

At first I just assumed the cameras weren't roving very widely, but even by the end of the match I don't recall seeing large blocks of Saints fans anywhere.

It could be the new ground syndrome, of course. When Wigan first went to the DW, people didn't think of it as home for quite a few months. But like Brian Noble said last night, when asked if the Saints fans were staying away because it wasn't Knowsley Road: "They'd better get used to the fact that this is home. Knowsley Road ain't there any more."

The same match last season was a sell out capacity crowd at KR with 17500. Last night's should have been a sell out but only 10k on.
Lets just forget any talk about taking the Saints home game v us at Goodison or Anfield. Saint's will be lucky to sell out Widnes.
This will be a difficult year for them crowd wise.
Lets just hope for them and the game's sake the Saints fans all return when the club get into their new place.

Especially if Saints have a disappointing year on the field. It's been a story of decline for Saints in recent years and let's face it, even when they were top dogs back in the mid-noughties their crowds were poor. It would be bad for the game if their 18,000 seat stadium was less than half full for most matches.

Saints NEED to give Wigan the South Stand for our match with them at Widnes.

Indeed - new grounds can be good and bad for a club. In the long term Saints new ground will secure the future of the club. A new ground brings with it the prospects of more corporate revenue and hopefully affordable tickets at a top class rugby league ground. It also allows the club to do something that they were unable to do at Knowsley Rd - attract new fans and familys. Better players will also be attracted to the club as a result of playing at a better stadium with better facilities.

After the honey moon period is over at the new ground I don't see crowds reaching over 10,000 for most matches sucess or not. Luckily though the new ground will be the main achievement in what will be a very lean spell on the field for the club.

In the short term however things will be bad. Only the real die hards will trek to Widnes. Personally i'm too dissolusioned with rugby league as a sport to even contemplate going to Widnes. I have been for the past 5 years and have very rarely watched any games either live or on TV (partly due to living abroad for the past two years). A poor excuse however I'd much rather watch some of the vintage Youtube rugby league clips that are available than Super League right now.

bad for the game yes, but would prove all we have ever said about a lot of saints fans. Not worthy to be mentioned in the same breath as us. I think they are in for a hard time this year, and if so i will enjoy every second of it.

Pathetic little boy

how poor of you to use the photo that was taken post match and make it seem like they left early!

agreed!

agreed mate, it would have been close to a sell-out last night if we were given that stand and left them with the west! its pretty poor from them really as everyone on this thread has alluded too!

It's pretty obvious that Wigan are not the only side to walk early from a game but I'm not sure if any other clubs have fans leaving early when we are WINNING (sometimes only by two points or so) - I can never fathom out why somebody would ever do that? Taking a tonking I can understand but winning? Nah.