If thats what you think, thats what you think. I think they are doing a good job of being a semi-pro RL club.

They are a good semi-pro club. I just don't see that they could progress to a fully pro one and compete financially in SL

Fev would bring as much to SLE as the bulls, wakey ,cas, hkr,huddersfield,Widnes ,salford & london as they currently are, so no big deal if you was to replace one of those.

Everything's in place for Fev...apart from the crowds. And I don't believe you can just expect the attendances to quadruple because they're in SL. That plan didn't work for Leigh and won't work for Fev.

Until they have a really big push on attendances / memberships to match everything else they're doing they're still falling a bit short for me.

4k would've been a decent attendance for that game imo.

the only way fev will get in superleague will be at the expense of either cas or wakefield, imo of course

The problem fev have is there is only 18000 people in there town and there to close to Wakefield and Castleford

And that is the sum of their problem. From a perspective of what percentage of the town turn out , they're probably one of the best supported clubs in the country. The downside is, even in SL they are unlikely to increase their crowds much as there physically arn't the people in the town to do it

I wasn't aware someone had to be born, brought up and reside in Featherstone in order to attend games there. When were such restrictions imposed?

oh arn't you the intelligent one? and where do you suppose the extra thousands of fans will come from to support Fev? the nearby towns of Castleford or Wakefield perhaps? not a chance!

Try Ponte.

Town of Wakefield? You haven't got a clue about the area have you?

Its hardly far away is it?

My point is getting fans from the area, but not from Fev to suddenly decide to support them is not very easy, its very hard and you're certainly not going to get thousands to do it.

To be clear, I like Fev, what they have done with such limited resources is brilliant, an example to ALL RL clubs, but they are constricted by their geography, this is a fact

Does everyone in Wakefield and Castleford have to support those teams?

Are there no other local towns/cities with potential fans?

That football team from Aston do alright for crowds, especially considering their stadium holds more than the population of the area itself!

For the Uneducated, Wakefield is the 11th largest "City" in the UK, the Wakefield District is made up of the "City" of Wakefield and 5 "Towns" (of Normanton, Pontefract, Featherstone, Castleford and Knottingley) other "Towns" in the district of Wakefield include, Ossett, Hemsworth, Horbury, South Kirkby & Moorthorpe, Hemsworth and South Elmsall HTH

That's amazing!
So again, are Fev going to get in the region of 5k extra regular fans from the area, when the bigger city of Wakefield and town of Castleford have pro teams already? Any glory supporting fans in the area will have got Leeds shirts for Christmas already

Yep, to replace their Bradford shirts.

Exactly, only the most successful, trophy winning sides will attract fans from outside their immediate area

What exacly defines 'do a Leigh' ?

is it :

1 - Actually gaining promotion in 2005 to SL rather than being placed there ?

2 - Average crowds of nearly 5000 once in SL even though we had no time to recruit a competative side (what is Londons average with a competative SL side, never mind one that will get spanked !)

or 3

Thrive and grow in a wooden closet with an environment and facilities London can dream of ?

Oh, I get it, getting only 5 points out of a possible 60 (2 of them being against London !) Halifax a few seasons before won only 1 game. (was that against London too ?)

No promotion should have been an end to the likes of Featherstone, Halifax, Sheffield and Leigh. They deserve to knock on the door because of perseverence, hard work and having fantastic loyal supporters. Well, here they are queuing up waiting to be given the chance they deserve.

The championship is a fantastic division. The dream of getting promoted should never have been taken away in the first place !!

Londons honeymoon period is now coming to a close I'm afraid. I hope this year that London dont do a 'Leigh' !!

The championships are a fantastic division, and they should concentrate on being a fantastic division rather than being a division where the sole reason it exists is for clubs to try and get out of it.

I don't think all clubs see it as being the "sole reason it exists". Promotion provides possibilities, however remote, that they can aspire to improve toward. That some may never get promotion is irrelevant if it can be used as a driver for management, sponsors and fans to improve the club.

Yet P+R removes the necessity for that ‘possibility’ to be based upon management, sponsors and fans improving the club. It is based solely on the first team put out.

There is nothing wrong the clubs in the championships using the improvement of the championships and themselves as their drive for management, sponsors and fans to improve the club. There is no reason for the only driver for management, sponsors and fans to improve the club management, sponsors and fans to improve the club to be getting out of the championships.

Dreamer is right of course.

Wouldn't evny Smokey telling the Championship soccer clubs that they'd never get out of that league because he'd decided it was best to make the Premier League a closed shop with its current constituent clubs and scrap promotion
and relegation arrangements.

Yeah, cos they are comparable. I mean its not like the parachute payment for one Championship club is more than the entire turnover of RL is it.......................Oh.

Moan and moan about not being allowed in SL for years, go on about how good the attendances will be when you get your chance, get promoted, get rubbish crowds, get relegated straight away.

Hull KR averaged less than 2K when they were in National League One....do you recall ?