Trust me, there was bugger all to get excited about, that's got to the worst England performance (in attack) I've seen in decades. Were we trying to not lose rather than win, fookin disgusting performance. Waste of money, good job it's not far to get home for me!

It was dead quiet. Literally the odd murmur.

But we won't build atmospheres for England until we have frequent games at the same places so that we all know what the score is year after year and so we feel like we have a team to support at a home or a select few homes often. Not a few times every two years.

Worst attacking display I've seen in a long time . What a waste of a great opportunity. We stood far too flat and no running on or off the ball. I think budgie got one pass all game. Atmosphere totally flat .

Yeah I was thinking this, half of the tickets sold were to people from London who haven't been to league before so wouldn't really know what it was all about and wouldn't be able to get fully involved and with hardly any games to go to people in general wont really know how to act at internationals.

Today has probably done untold damage to the game.

Woeful spectacle.

In hull, huddersfield or wigan you shrug your shoulders. But in the capital at the olympic stadium?

Appalling.

As a long time follower of our sport I enjoyed a very good English & NZ defense & a tight game, but you are right that the casual viewer today would be underwhelmed to say the least. this would not be such a big problem if this was one of six or seven international games this year but it is 3 games in two years it tests the faithfull let alone new fans. We need to rebuild a tradition of international games but unless the Aussies loose thier love afair with their club & origin games we are stuffed.

Maybe there's not as much atmosphere because people are genuinely nervous about the outcome of the game, and more interested in seeing how it unfolds?

Games against the Aussies in recent years, even at home, we've gone into as massive underdogs so any bit of good play on the field has been cheered to the rafters. Now, in particular against the Kiwis, it's almost like Man City or Chelsea fans. There's an expectation that England will do well, and a nervousness about things when they don't start well as they haven't in both games so far.

Sorry but that is way wide of the mark, the vast majority of people attending from the Southern regions will have being before AND a decent % actually played the game to one level or another.
The simple fact is that the game was devoid of attacking rugby and was a turgid affair, the fans had nothing much to shout about no matter which part of the country you were from.

The lack of an atmosphere was completely down the dire game that was on the pitch. When England did something good and everyone started clapping and shouting, then it sounded good. But that might of been around 5 minutes out of the 80, appalling game to watch live. Something has to change next week or they will get beaten again.

I think it really was a missed opportunity. Plenty of non RL support there today. Cotton Traders, Tweed jackets, Eng RU shirts, Club RU shirts and we could only show them that. But they were there! Good job otherwise it would have looked a very poor attendance.

We need to stoke up the rivalry in the press, like boxing does. Build up some player rivalries on social media and the newspapers. Get the fans really wanting us to rip the Kiwis apart, then at the end shake hands and say well done to the winner.

Lets be honest if the OZZIE'S we hear has well we would then have also have been cheering the Kiwis when they played the Ozzie's has some one says we like the Kiwis to much its all

and

when we meet

Something I did notice yesterday was a lot of Kiwi fans, maybe it might have been an idea to sell a section of the stadium to Kiwi fans to generate more of an atmosphere?

On the ticket site there was indication of a block seats for NZ fans but you can't make them sit there.

Totally agree with you.
Makes you wonder if the series was being kept alive for next week



Couldn't' believe that we took the 2 points early on, instead of testing the Kiwis.
Macnamara must have been watching too much Union.

Apathy, lots of international rugby league apathy.

fy what you mean by thathe fans, the players, the coach, the tv pundits...something else?

Fans.

How so, did not enough fans attend the first game or yesterday, have you attended any games, if not, why not or are you in fact apathetic?
You want people to get excited watching dross like what was on show yesterday?

Very poor match from England in attack. Seems a bit pointless having centres and wingers if you aren't going to use them.

If you went to the Olympics in 2012 the place was rocking.
Desperately poor advert for RL. This of us who live in south and act as evangelists for the game have been badly let down by this

Nope, not attended either game, due to work / been in Dublin. Wouldn't of minded going to 1 but at the same time wasn't overly fussed. Wanted us to win yesterday, wasn't overly bothered we didn't. Wanted us to win last week, wasn't overly bothered we did. Additionally you can still attend games and be apathetic.

I absolutely do not blame anyone for not showing enthusiasm. I rewatched yesterdays game and struggled to concentrate on the dross served up.

It has been very quiet when watching the England team for some time now. I remember going to a few of the Exiles game and it was silent in the stands for long periods. Even in the WC games in 2013 it was very quiet in the crowds.

It hasn't helped for this series because between England's last home game (WC semi in 2013) and this series (with the warm-up game v France) the following national teams in various sports have played at home:
Football 8 times
Rugby Union 13 times
Cricket 14 times
England Rugby League have played no home games in that time.

You could argue that we've had too long between home fixtures to be pumped up about this series because our interest has waned too much. In fact, since 2010 there have been the following home games for the various sports:
Football 31 games
Rugby Union 37 games
Cricket 39 games
Rugby League will have had 22 home games by the end of this series.

And then number of games home and away altogether since 2010:
Football 67 games
Rugby Union 70 games
Cricket 72 games
Rugby League 30 games.

I don't think we have enough games, we aren't interested and involved with the national team often enough to build the intensity of supporting them. But that is also a circumstance at the state of the international game as we don't have enough different teams to play. I don't think hammering the current level of Wales or France mid season would get the fire burning with the atmosphere neither. What we need is for Wales and France to have decent sides to put up decent fights against us to build mid season excitement for the England side and then build towards an Autumn series/Four Nations/World Cup.

A supporters group would help (i'd rather stay away from a drummer/band). but even then we'd only have the Four Nations next Autumn to get together and we wouldn't play at home again until 2018 after that. But again, what can we do about that? who do we play in between?

It's only going to be when the international game improves that we will see better atmospheres, for me. I think we have the numbers to make a decent racket, just not the continued interest in the team through lack of fixtures with no big mid season games.

That's a poor comparison. Of course it was. It was the Olympics FFS. You're really comparing the pinnacle of sport with one game in a three match series?

It's a shame it has to be this way round, but if England go ahead a couple of tries in the 2nd half, it will be a rocking stadium this Saturday.