We had a mini tour of oz back in the mid 80's. It was a complete disaster I think

Hope the players are gonna come out on the p!ss with us if were gonna make the effort.

Be good if the Illawarra tourist board allocate areas of the city to each club, so they really push Hull FC to the people in the West of Wollongong for example to get a bit of rivalry in the stadium

Brilliant exposure for the club, yeh we might get a bit jet-lagged and suffer slightly, but the rewards in growing the clubs brand are much bigger

I dont think it will affect the players too much, unless we are in the World Club Challenge as that will give us a week off

This is great news for the club, very prestigious. It should give the club plenty of publicity.

Very unlikely that I'll be going with the cost and with work commitments but I'm sure there'll be lots travelling over not to mention the expat community out there.

Incredible times. Sounds like the 2018 shirt will be a winner as well..

not only are you obsessed but I'm not as narrow minded as you clearly.

it's a great idea, if NSW state gov+TV are funding some/all of it then the incentive is there to play. Wigan will see it as part of expanding their global brand and as the 'home' team are likely to be compensated for that more than we are. Still, it's an opportunity for one of the best supported teams in SL to make the most of it from a marketing POV.

Taking the academy as mentioned above would be okay if they can fund themselves to go, otherwise I'd expect that there's limited finances to send/accommodate people from each team, so i wouldn't expect to see anyone except the necessaries plus a few AN other's.

This is massively different to taking your team for a jolly in tenerife and calling it a winter training camp which I do/did object to and gave reasons why.

Sounds like? Where have you heard that sound?

i see the virtual terrace regulars are raising the bar to new levels of jealousy and negativity over this - impressive stuff

Amazing and superb. I almost certainly won't be able to go though but I think it is immense. Will be so jealous of those that can make it

Rabbitohs announced they'll be playing Wigan as well.

I am as excited about this as the semi final. It's a 9 hour drive from Melbourne but I'll defo be going. It will be my only Hull game apart from Wembley in 3 years, at least the trip isn't as far this time.

For those wondering why Wollongong.

I'm not 100% on this, a Melbourne storm fan just told me but st george illawara play 12 home games, of which 4 are in Wollongong, 4 in west Sydney and then when the Sydney teams play them they do it at Anz stadium which is much bigger. Home games in Wollongong get 12-20k and so lifelong die hard fans see 4 games a year (virtually nobody travels away) so if you're wondering why it's there that's my guess.

Then you add the weird Aussies, Sports fans have a very different mentality out here. Games are very well attended by the neutral basically and sports often go on the road, in Aussie rules big clubs play annual home games several hours away. It wouldn't surprise me if it sold out but more realistically I think around 10-12k.

It's a great idea as Super League is getting worse slots on the Fox every year so I'm guessing interest is low and it doesn't take much to re energise it.

I live about a 90 min drive away from Wollongong where my family have have had a connection since 1919 when a Hull aunt married a WW1 Aussie soldier and settled there. Her married sister also from Hull joined her a couple of years later and they had 8 kids between them so giving me plenty of family when I arrived in Aus in 1968. About a dozen relations remain living in the Wollongong area.

Apart from the Wembley game the last Hull game I attended was also about 3 years ago(Leeds away).