Ha ha! I see what you did then. Clever

There were a group dressed as penguins but they were massively outnumbered by the thousands dressed as empty red seats.

Can you do the same thing with matches? You could be like rainman but without the social skills.

Not at all, and it isn't a question of whether you "believe" it, but whether there is a sane reason to doubt it. There isn't. It's not a matter of faith or religion. It's just the fookin official, actual attendance figure that's all.

What amuses me though is the fact that you must be the weirdest guy on the block, since you make an entire character by building your endless whining posts in this and other attendance-related threads on the foundations of many years of published attendance figures! It's what you do!! So if official attendance figures are as you seem to believe no more than some form of conspiratorial propaganda invention, why the fsck do you spend your entire waking life adding them up and comparing them?

It would be my preferred method back to back coverage each week. Whether SKY would allow such a pause is a different matter.

That's a bit harsh FA. Its actually therapy for the feeble minded. (Billy is their star patient).

Official attendance does not equate to actual attendance.

Official attendance (which includes all Club Wembley seats whether occupied or not) = 78,137

Number of Club Wembley seats = 17,500

Number of Club Wembley seats occupied at the CC Final = not very many, but I'll be extremely optimistic and suggest 2,500 of them were occupied.

78,137 less 15,000 empty Club Wembley seats = Actual Attendance of around 63,000.

I think to be honest FA, the difference is between the number of seats which were paid for, and the number of seats which had bums on them during the game.

As I understand it, the club Wembley seats are all pre-paid annually, and the annual ticket is for every event at the stadium - so technically, the club Wembley seats were all sold for the cup final. On that basis, just like season ticket holders at club games, they are deemed to be in attendance even if not there. So I guess Wembley Stadium got money from over 78k people on Saturday, and that was the 'attendance'.

Anyone who doesn't believe the ACTUAL ATTENDANCE was 78,137 must be among the weirdest people on the block.

Sky wouldn’t necessarily be the problem. It would be the fact that it would leave some clubs without games for large periods of time which would cause cash flow issues, as well as player preparedness issues (from both sides, some would complain that the players would be out of shape and lacking in match sharpness, others would complain that a club used it as a mini-preseason and came up to the business end of the year fresher and fitter)

Im just not sure why we insist that all matches in the same round are played on the same weekend. We could sell to the BBC 1 challenge cup game a week throughout the summer. Play it on a Saturday when we don’t have the Sky game anymore. 4 games from round 4, 4 from round 5, 2 from the quarter finals, the 2 semi’s and the final would be all played on a different week would give us 13 weeks coverage. A weeks break for the magic weekend (which is on the biggest sporting weekend of the year anyway)a two week break for Wimbledon, and a weeks break after round 5, the QF, and the semi would pretty much mean that round 4 could start at the same time and the final can be at the same time, but we would have coverage for 13 out of 20 weeks instead of 5, giving a much better flow to the competition and keeping interest.

As for the impact on Sky, well I think it would be an advertisement for the game which is good in the long run for them, but from the other side, it also means that they don’t have the 5/6 weeks loss of content the currently have because of the Challenge Cup. As well as giving clubs more flexibility if they did need to rearrange fixtures.

You doing a rainman impression and pretending you have counted 2500 out of 17500 does not equate to the Actual Attendance.

In fact, a little tip for you. If you need to use the word ‘around’ because you are approximating (or in your case, plain ol’ guessing) you cant also use the ‘actual’.

Not only that Smokey but, its fair to assume that the attendance this year was compiled in the same way as the previous attendances at the new Wembley.

Sales of 60k then smokes leaving 12.5k unsold

Is it 60k we have decided on now?

Why not 50k? why not 85k? why not 61250? Or 63451?

Correct, they were compiled in exactly the same way as previous attendances. The previous CC Final attendances had more Club Wembley seats that were actually occupied, particularly those Club Wembley seats situated on the lower tiers around halfway line which were conspicuous by their wholly empty appearance on Saturday. Cue responses of "[iThey were empty only because it was raining... same reason players couldn't catch the ball, or complete a set and why it was a really crap game, it was all the fault of the RAIN and anyone who doesn't take the RAIN into consideration must have an anti-RL agenda and MUST REALLY HATE RL, blah blah blah"[/i.

I ought to know because I was sat in those 'OCCUPIED' Club Wembley seats last year.



Oh, and guess what? Those Club Wembley tickets I had last year were not paid for... they were freebies

Hey MAN,

Might be easier to blame the RAIN for the crap attendance, eh?

I don’t think anyone is making excuses. Most are quite happy with the attendance of the CC final. Except those who had decided to make up their own attendance and get angry about it.

I for instance have decided there were 7 people there, and I am furious about it. There should be at least 12 people there, and if it wasn’t for Super duper league ruining everything by getting more people to attend more often, then we could have been back in those halcyon days when we saw a team of postmen defeat a team of shepherds in front of 15 and a half people. And if you don’t believe that you must REALLY HATE RL

We can blame whatever we want for whatever we want.

We could blame Deirdre Barlows poor taste in men for the being 8.234 people in attendance. We could blame the Greeks for their being 3.124 people in attendance, the Spartans for their being 300 people in attendance, Martin Luther King for there being 1 million men in attendance. We could blame Heisenberg and his damned uncertainty principle and just give up trying to measure anything.

Not many Leeds fans hung around to see Warrington presented with the CC last year.

Still no response William - not shocked!! keep rattling on about something you cannot prove.

Wasn't worthy of a response Sal.

You lost me with your complete dismissal of international RL.

There's no point debating with parochial one-club supporting fools.

Enjoy your off-season immediately after the SL Grand Final.

Don't forget to wrap up too or else you'll catch a chill.

You take a beating so well - shame I was hoping to engage you in some manful debate. Seems you want to hark back to the 1960s, the world has moved on shame you haven't. The world cup will be an interesting barometer of demand for international RL. The idea of playing both semis back to back at Wembley should draw a crowd if not then the RFL really are flogging a dead horse.

Sal... you've never got it and you never will. I accept there are lots of parochial one-club supporters just like you who are not interested in international RL and the bigger picture. The sport has never crawled out of it's northern backwater because it's infested predominantly by those with opinions just like yours.

May you continue to lavish praise on your hero Danny McGuire as he's twinkle-toeing in for his next hatful of inconsequential tries in meaningless fixtures against teams like London, Widnes and Cas during those precious two months of June & July which must be protected as part of the SL season no matter what the cost. Wouldn't want you or precious little softcock Danny Mags dying from frostbite in Dec or Jan now would we?

Now please excuse me while I rest up, elevate, compress and apply the requisite amount of ice and compression after that severe beating you've just manfully handed out to me.

It will be interesting given the RFL's talent for marketing and promotion.