So what would be the difference? you think people wouldnt buy tickets because they might be playing at 7 instead of 3?

People go to the magic weekend for the atmosphere and the p1ss up. Its an 'RL weekend' that its selling point, that isnt effected at all.

Now you're just being naive - or deliberately obtuse

These smokey threads.....

Maybe we should rename the forum to Smokey's Virtual Terrace. It can have a motto of 'Everyone is entitled to their opinion, as long as it is the same as mine'

i gave up on page 8. Smokey is still banging on then?

2012 - SL Average 9564
2015 - SL Average 9997

Regular season crowds up, and what is to say next season only 2/4 points will separate 1st from 8th. The RFL can't predict how clubs perform, they can't predict whether a club only has an ambition to stay out of the bottom four and couldn't care less about getting to the GF. They can't predict anything, the only thing they can do is try and come up with a system to give more teams something to play for. They certainly couldn't predict one of the SL teams might publicly give up after less than a third of the season.

Can't be bothered replying to all things as you're just ranting and sulking repeatively but I'll point to theses two....



The first week of the Super 8's took place the same weekend the Premiership kicked off. Even if you brought the Super 8's forward a week no Premiership team who has just spent the summer either re-laying or just generally getting their pitch into top condition for the start of the season will agree to having 8 RL matches on it just before the Premiership kicks off.



That you have to go back to 2012 is pretty telling about the effect the old system had.....you do realise the years of 2013 and 2014 took place since then and the 2015 season. The reason you don't mention them is because the attendance started to drop in those years which is exactly the point about the old system starting to turn the fans away.

thats what happens when change the data sets. 400k fewer people can watch and the average goes up.


Really? many people did predict that exact thing happening. And it is as much of a possibility next year as this year. A club could get off to a bad start next year and throw in the towel on the initial part of the year.

So how do we make our attendances less dependent on the hope that things are close?

fair enough

and yet we have and do use football pitches in November, in October, we have held the magic weekend at the beginning of May, the end of May, February, we have seen the WCC held at football stadiums in February,

of the 28 Super 8s games last year, 11 were held at football grounds.

you still dont seem to realise you are still arguing against your own point view and are still simply highlighting the negatives and complications that arise through this system, and putting forward no solutions whatsoever to them.

You do realise the old system was dumped during the 2013 season yes? You do realise that 2014 was played under an entirely different system yes?

its funny to see you make all the excuses about the struggles of the new system, introduce all these variables that could also have had an effect, anything and everything but definitely not the structure. Yet in 2013, 2014 definitely the structure, nothing else but the structure, even though there were some pretty obvious 'variables' during that time.

everyone is entitled to their own opinion. They are not entitled to have it unchallenged.

Smokey dear, your figures in that case are as flawed as mine in that case. Firstly you would have to remove ALL Bradford and London games from your calculations. London won't affect it that much however Bradfords average was 11k. I reckon that removing all those games wouldn't be far from 400k. You could of course come back at me and say 'oh I did all that'. You didn't though did you. Its almost you have taken lessons from the RFL in data set manipulation.

16 pages of pointless 'discussion' perpetuated by you know who.

Yeah because playing ONE game at Old Trafford (or any other football venue) on a weekend is comparable to playing EIGHT games over a weekend on the same pitch.



The Magic Weekend not working at the start of the Super 8's isn't highlighting a flaw or complication in this structure because the Super 8's don't actually take place at the start of the Super 8's. It's an idea that only exists in your head to move the Magic Weekend to that week, yet you blame the structure for your poorly thought idea not being do-able in reality.



It wasn't entirely different though was it. It was still a top 8 playoff, still allowed teams to coast through seasons and grow apathy in fans.

Why would we? Surely, regardless of any and all context we wanted that number to go up? Surely we would just include Bradfords and Londons attendances this year in the average? the cut to 12 was still supposed to cause crowds to rise wasnt it?

But yes, as i said earlier in the thread, there are comparisons which are flawed and our total could go down simply by having fewer teams, our average can go up for the same reason.

Which is why i have used other indicators as well. Such as the fact we havent met the RFLs own expectations for this year.For example, the Super 8s attendances went down instead of up. The RFL aimed for 10 sell outs and got 4.

But once again, my point was never that the change has caused crowds to fall. My point was that it hasnt caused more people to attend. Because league structures do not attract fans.

If you look at this thread there is a succession of very defensive people making that exact point, that there a multitude of reasons that effect whether a game is well or poorly attended, but what they wont admit for some reason is that we should so something to address those reasons.

You have just shown yourself up to be the clown we all know you to be. Include Bradford a and London so figures from 2015, that is laughable even from you. Back you into a corner and you become irrational. I must apologise to the users of RLFANS for taking this onto page 17. Oh and by the way I couldn't be bothered to read beyond your Bradford and London aberration. My time here is done

Yet you included Bradford and London from 2012 in your averages? You do seem laughable and irrational and you should probably apologise.

Either we include Bradford and London in both years or neither. Either way, its not going work out well for you.

Even more cracking grommit

The cut number was never going to increase aggregate attendances but, it should be enough to massage an increase in average attendances.
However, the expected mass hysteria surrounding the Super 8's never quite happened.

Having said that, the change in format allows us to claim record attendance figures due to not having anything to give us a like for like comparison.

Let's see what happens in the coming season, only 28 days to go

its a bit of a myth that we should have expected an aggregate fall, whilst we had fewer teams, those sides played more games.

Regardless, we didnt see a rise as was expected, thankfully Blake Solly and Roger Draper arent quite as sensitive as the self-appointed 'Guardians of Acceptable Opinions and Cheerleaders for the Game in General' who frequent these boards.

They understand that "We've got to be smarter in the way we attract and market the game to newcomers" and "We know there's a market in London and the south east for big rugby league events but we've got to serve them up."

It would be nice if we had some concrete evidence and examples that this wasnt just lip-service. Just dont let the cheerleaders know the system wont solve everything

How can you be ****ed with these endless pointless p /ssing contests?! Open your curtains, go out get some fresh air!

I'd say im sorry this thread doesnt meet your exacting standards, but id be lying.

We could rightly expect a lower aggregate since we played fewer games due to fewer clubs and fewer playoff games.

But the system shows how little it takes for people to decide to do something other than watch RL.
The uncertainty over the new system, over whether 8's games were included on season tickets and when, where and who against those games would be, most certainly led to the decreases we saw in some cases.
I think Cas are a bit of red herring in terms of trying to draw a picture of the whole just from them. 1/3rd of their S8 games on a Thursday and a worse season compared to 2014 will no doubt have had an effect.
But those other issues I mentioned will have impacted clubs. I know Leeds were struggling with the short turnaround to sell hospitality for instance and I know the ticket office were inundated with requests for info re the S8's all the way up until they started.

So it shows how clubs shouldn't take their support for granted as a decent proportion appear quite transitory.

I'd previously thought moving the Magic Weekend to the first week of the 8's would solve some problems, but Printer rightly points out issues with that. What might help is something like saying all the top 4 are at home in week 1 of the 8's. That might at least provide some certainty for some clubs who would be safe in the top or bottom 4.

Other than that I think we've just got to stick with it and ensure fans know the system. Hopefully another year in fans will be more informed.

but those clubs played more games. Discounting magic/play offs its 180-182, and lets not forget that the play-offs were cash games and not season ticket games, and 13 of the games we have were London home games which were getting about 30k total.

Though we should ask, what is the point of cutting the number of games, if there isnt a congruent rise in averages? Shouldnt the expectation be that we have fewer but better attended games, otherwise what is the benefit?

In the licensing period of 2009-2014 SL clubs played 189 games per season not including playoffs.
In 2015 it was 180 not including playoffs. You've replaced some of London's poorly attended games but you've also had to replace Bradford's better attended games.

With 9 fewer season ticket games (13 fewer games total if you include playoffs) it's reasonable to expect a lower aggregate total.

Don't worry, it's not just this one. Seek help.

yeah the difference is magic,

there are 13 games fewer all in, Which is London's season. It might explain a slightly lower aggregate but nowhere near what we are actually seeing.