By your reckoning Man Utd and Man City are the best teams and should replace Wigan and Hull at Wembley: instead of playing RL, we count those going through the turnstiles. Would save on paying players' wages.

Sorry but I do not follow your argument at all. Certainly where I was stood, it was packed.

Double headers would achieve nothing.

26k total attendance for the two semis. I reckon you could easy get 30-35k for a double header at the Etihad.

A double header would only serve to paper over the cracks.

The semi-final attendances are just another symptom of a serious and worrying apathy towards the game from many of it's traditional hardcore fans.
We've talked about it plenty, but that apathy is a culmination of lots of things, the main being;
- Various league formats that have over saturated what were once deemed as 'big games' (in years gone by all fans of the game would look forward to a Wigan/Saints, Leeds/Bradford, Wigan/Leeds, Saints/Wire, Saints/Leeds etc), now even fans of those teams aren't that fired up for those games
- Various rule changes have sanitised the game, so it's not so much of a gladatorial battle - having a proper battle on the pitch, followed by a beer afterwards is part of the fabric of our game - the softening up period, forwards having a good old school battle and being enforcers, the odd bit of biff to sort out players who step out of line, or go too far with cheap tactics (you wouldn't get half as much of the cheap stuff like cannon ball tackles, niggle, wrestle if players were allowed to sort it out themselves. (I believe the loss of this element of the game to try and make it more family friendly has actually driven many of the traditional fans away and is a big reason the old rivalry games don't float peoples boat as much nowadays)
- The lack of genuine confrontation and fireworks in a game, plus new soul-less stadiums has had a significant impact on the atmosphere and feeling within the ground at live games - you rarely get that spine tingling feeling at a game anymore, so watching it on TV doesn't feel like you're missing as much as it used to do (I'll never forget the atmosphere at Central Park when Cassidy elbowed Morley in the face - the hatred, the anger and the anticipation of how the Leeds players were going to right that wrong made for the best atmosphere I've ever known at a game - you simply don't get that anymore. If there's a bad tackle, the player goes on report and the other players have no real way of settling it.
- A decline in standards of teams

So whilst plenty of people will still buy season tickets as part of family tradition, with home games being part of their routine, when it comes to one off games where they then have to dip their hands in their pockets, people are finding something better to do with their money, or are happy to just watch it on the TV. The product isn't as good anymore, and the benefit ofattending live over watching on TV has significantly reduced.

As we all know, there are serious issues within the game - but lets keep papering over the cracks, put a positive spin on things and burry our heads in the sand.

Cant argue with any of that and part of the problem with RL is that any "growth" in the sport is coming from taking more and more money from existing supporters, rather than working harder to attract new supporters.
There is no doubt that when less fashionable clubs make it to a semi final, its a much bigger deal than when Leeds or Wigan get there.
However, the numbers of Wigan fans at Doncaster last year were absolutely pitiful and although more of you made it to Warrington, the place should have been sold out.

As for the Wembley final, I'm still dreaming of seeing Trinity get there, it's been a long time.