36,503....that's how many people watched the London Broncos over 13 SL "home" games this year......sarries getting 41k is indicative of how BADLY the London RL club is run.......

I do agree.. for a club with a small fan base Saracens have some great people marketing them.. Unlike Broncos. The potential is there.

The Potential has always been there...........it's just the long line of unqualified people that have been tasked with running a RL club since 2006 that's the problem.

Paul Brown: RL man but had to retire early due to illness.
Keith Hogg: Sponsorship guy from Scottish and Newcastle no experience of running a sports club
Paul Blanchard: Cricketing background....left cricket to join RL, left HKA after 6 months.....left us to return to cricket.
Gus MacKay: Cricketing background.......over 2 seasons has nearly destroyed the club IMO.....even our shirts are made by a cricket manufacturer....

We arrived at the stoop with a healthy 3,918 average that had just risen 13%.......the following year we got close to 5k.....THEREAFTER......it's dropped to 2,807...44%

Sale are in deep doo doo it seems

Indeed, only one point (a bonus point as well) and already shipped 163 points in 5 games.

Good. get them relegated. Get them out of competiton with Salford for the new stadium. They are like cuckoos in a nest.

If they go RU will not be able to claim national prominence. They will have no top tier prescence north of Worcester.

Keighley. Enough said.

Really don't need to say any more than that. Ignore the trolls. Geography obviously isn't his strong point. Leicester being further north than Worcester. Also competition is a strong word. At the moment we're hardly stealing fans from them and most of our lot either don't like League or follow Wigan or Warrington.

Still, you might be a bit thick but you've reeled me in. Can't beat a spot of Sunday Fishing. Beats sitting at home I suppose. Fair play to you.

We are indeed in deep trouble.

We're in a relegation battle, there are no 2 ways about it. It's about time somebody from the club came out and made a statement. They're all too good at marketing themselves in the summer, talking about a shiny new stadium and getting the corporates in.

There is no leadership on the field, they all look lost. Already 21 points behind first and a lot of pundits had us to finish between 4th and 6th. Leicester at home next so looking at 6 loses from 6. Then we have the Heineken Cup so it could be a long Winter.

Still, Leeds, Doncaster and Rotherham will mean I don't have to set off at 7am for an away game.

He may not be entirely accurate on his geography but the sentiment makes sense. Years of being derided as a Northern-only game are infuriating (and there tends to be little opportunity to make the case otherwise) grate an awful lot (I get it down here in Southampton, a place where nobody appears to be interested in either form off egg-chasing).

By all means don't rise to the bait, but Keighley's point comes loaded with generations of context.

Oh, I know. But he appeared to be saying it because he wanted the Northern teams to disappear. I'm fully aware that there are those who want a Southern only league. I'm not one of those.

People who give it "League is a rubbish Northern sport" are just as idiotic as the other way around. I have no time for either. I think Catalans have proved there's room for teams outside of the M62 corridor. The less said about the Broncos at this moment in time the better.....

However - people can be quite narrow minded when it comes to the context. If you look outside of the Premiership you have Doncaster, Leeds, Rotherham and Newcastle all in The Championship. I've said all this about 6 months ago I think but the game isn't dying in the way people think it is up here. At amateur level it's still massive in Cheshire, Lancashire and Cumbria especially.

Of course we need Northern teams to flourish in the top flight.

I'm not really rising to any bait. I'm a Union and League man, albeit much more Union. I don't necessarily believe all the conspiracy theories about the RFU wanting a Southern elite though.

Oh I agree, played a bit of amateur Union in Cheshire myself. Rotherham is an odd case- the RFU shot their fox for years to come by blocking them when they could have come up. I was making one of my frequent visits to Rotherham the other weekend and now the team seems unknown to the locals.

Shark J how long do you think Redpath will last at Sale then,weeks, months?

Urmston - Rotherham have been in the Premiership for 2 or 3 seasons I think but I know what you mean. A lot had London Welsh to beat their points record this season but they've already surpassed it. Realistically there's only Newcastle out of the Northern teams who have any chance of going up.....for a long, long time.

Leeds recently sold their Premiership shares to Exeter. It'll be a while before we see them back, their fans have already come to realise their situation and that they're a developing team now who are gonna be mid table.

Interestingly the 3 Yorkshire clubs have all started a new tournament this week. I'm not sure if it's based on league positions or matches against each other, but the highest ranked Yorkshire club gets a trophy at the end of the season. On the Leeds board they don't see the point but I suppose it's no different to International matches that act as 2 separate competitions. One in whatever tournament it is and one as it's a traditional fixture with another trophy up for grabs.

cj - I hope months. We're fast becoming a Football team with our in and out policy. He needs time to gel but then we have the players and they shouldn't have lost 5 games. We had a tough start but London Welsh at home is unacceptable and we should have been able to get something away at Bath. Our performances haven't been as bad as results may suggest. Exeter destroyed us but that's the only real hammering. Saracens at home was us trying to be too smart. We tried playing Saracens at their own game of kicking down the full backs throat every time we got the ball and it didn't work. Saracens are one of the worst teams to watch but they're efficient and know what they have to do to win games. We didn't even attempt to run with the ball that game and Saracens did what they do best - pounce on your errors and just try and get as many penalties in front of the posts as they can. Harlequins away was a fairly decent performance but 2 late errors meant they ran out with a bonus point win and at Bath last week we were dominating the game at only 19-10 down. Again, stupid errors late on and a sin binning cost us.

It's not good enough to make excuses though. We have 15 individuals on the pitch at the moment and it doesn't feel like a team and that's the worst thing. Last year we played the most attractive Rugby in the league, even though we conceded the most points. It felt like we won the thing when we finished 6th but the reality was we still lost far more than we won but took advantage of other teams having a poor season. It didn't matter to the fans though as every player seemed to take pride in the shirt and that's what fans want the most.

Steve Diamond has taken a more hands on approach now and that can only be a good thing. Steve is known at the minute for having a big gob and doing nothing but talking about getting fans into the new stadium. He probably got the position he's in because he bleeds Sale and we all respect him for that. If he can get that same energy and commitment in the players then hopefully we'll stay up.

What ground are Rotherham playing at these days?

Will be interesting to see what the attendances are for the Premiership this weekend – all the home teams are struggling with attracting the numbers. Only Gloucester have attracted a 5 figure crowd at home this year and their two games so far this year are an average 3k down on the same fixtures last season

Teams at home this weekend with their average this year

Sale 7,465
Exeter 5,855
Gloucester 11,300
London Irish 6,576
London Welsh 5,322
Wasps 5,612