One decade on, has it in fact worked out best for all four parties concerned, the least bad of several options available in 1999?

Mildly mischievous title I know, but it's a serious question and without considering myself overly well-informed I'd give a guarded 'yes'. Feel free to put me right below.

all 4 clubs would have gone under without the help and mergers from the rfl

some clubs directors did their best to see the death of one club from hull

Thank You. Now **** *** and can this pointless thread be locked

Happy Birthday Huddersfield and Hull.

Well, two of the four clubs haven't done too badly.

I still don't see how a 'merger' can work. Teams represent towns and we know how 'territorial' we all are, so mergers of sports teams - in Britain at least - end up being a case of one death and one survival.

I mean, how many of the original Sheffield Eagles and Gateshead Thunder supporters now support Huddersfield and Hull respectively?

And how can these be considered "mergers" when, almost straight away, new teams with the same names and colours as the teams that disappeared emerge a few divisions lower down?

Huddersfield at least spent half a season trying to play SL in Sheffield.

For arguments sake then had Sheffield and Gateshead only been relegated and handed a parachute payment with help from a central fund to manage the debts incurred trying to stay in the top flight could those two clubs have survived better than how they were reformed?

I am not exactly sure how this merger worked (was pretty young back then!) but I guess the two "new" clubs were given financial aid by the RFL??

If this was the case then the monies may have been easier to distribute between two NL1 clubs and two SL clubs with a potential interest free loan if possible from the RFL to the two remaining SL clubs??

I guess options and avenues were explored and this was the best of a bad bunch chosen however in hindsight was there better options available??

Thing is, it's not even like those teams are close to each other!

They tried to do a Warrington-Widnes merger, which whilst a stupid, stupid idea that wouldn't work, at least they were towns actually next to each other. I mean Gateshead and Hull? FFS!

It wasn't meger, it was rape!

It was just another way of helping a then struggling Huddersfield side keep hold of their Super League status.
Looking at last nights MOS Awards I suppose it was more than succesful, eventually.

Why, were they not very good?

Looking at it another way Huddersfield's crowds don't suggest they'd survive at all without their Chairman. There should be 10,000 people watching them every week given how well run the club is.

There are a plethora of reasons as to why we aren't yet getting the 10k average. The amount of time we were down in the doldrums with the generations of support going elsewhere and the merger are just two of them. Even today we still get jip from the merger, you think we liked it any more than some of the more bitter ones on here? Well I marched through the Town centre back in '99 against the merger, along with hundreds of others.

In the last ten years our crowds have tripled. You don't just arrive at your destination in one step you know. And it's not really anyones place to judge our crowds. Especially those who don't look at all the factors that have affected it and who don't take into account the fact that progress is undoubtedly being made.

A fair point.

I agree with that. In the nicest possible way, Huddersfield have never been a glamour club and have until very recently won nothing, and not even been anywhere near. Weren't you at the bottom of SL for four consecutive seasons?

Its no wonder crowds are low. Keep up your improvement, though, and your crowds will follow.

At the rock bottom and wanting to go down to regroup and get some confidence back for 3 years.

Look what happened when they finally let us go down? We stormed the division and then managed to stave of relegation legitimately.

Awww

Two of my favorite clubs!

Firstly, Huddersfield...

Geez, if ever a team was founded on the idea that the entire world took a sh*t on them. This truely is the idea of a club born with a wooden spoon up its ar$e.

You have to remember that for many years the Giants were fighting the evil doers at the RFL who's sole purpose was to keep the Giants down.

You have to visit Huddersfield to realize that, its the culture. I mean here is a place, half way between cities that people actually give a damn about, many think of it just as a train stop, and the Huddersfield people know all to well how people look down on them.

God love em.....no one else does!



Then, my club....


I'm a proud Gateshull Thunder Shark. I was put onto the club a few years ago now and I've stuck solid.

Its not just the violence, its not the fact that even our B team over in the East does well. Our feeder side. Its about more than that.

Its about having a beer with your mates before the game. Its about sharing your common enjoyment about Rugby League.

Its about throwing bottles at the opposition supporters, tearing down goal posts, ripping up stadium chairs so you can hurl them, jaggered edge first mind you, and know that hitting a small child is only worth half as much as hitting an adult is.

Its about knowing you're better than Salford and KR fans, but only because you don't do meth.

Its about knowing that no matter who you buy next season, the clubs screwed because the coach is hopeless.

Its about years of off field problems with players, only for the club to buy a bloke that bet against his own team.

Its about the people that remember Phil Sigsworths involvement all those years ago.

Its about people who warn you about how dangerous Hull can be, and yet finding the people friendly and the beer cold (Mostly).

Most of all though, I just think its about going to the footy with your mates, and bludgeoning someone who supports the opposition.


Here is to ten more years!

Well, when you think about it, it was undoubtedly a catalyst for Hull FC re-emerging as a big club and it's doubtful if they had ever had the Challenge Cup of 2005 and the Grand Final of 2006 in their history books if it had not been kick started by the merger.

I'm not sure it made any difference to Huddersfield as they finished bottom after the merger and it really didn't seem to do a lot for them.

Sheffield and Gateshead, on the face of it were killed off. They might have lost a few years top flight history but, when all is said and done, would such poorly supported clubs still be in Super League? Chances are both would have been relegated and be in the division they are now with the crowds they have got now anyway.

That said, the mergers were very sad days for Rugby League and was the heartbreak it caused the supporters of Sheffield and Gateshead really worth it?

I don't think there is a definitve answer to whether they worked. There are so many different angles to look at it from.

That said – when I signed petitions against the mergers 10 years ago, it was at the request of Hull and Huddersfield fans, worried at the potential death of their clubs and history …

Huddersfield wanted to reform in the lower division.

The lower division clubs wouldnt let them.

Hull too

Though they did, quite rightly, let Sheffield do it.

Do you stand by signing them with hindsight?