What really annoys me about scrums is teams never have the right amount of players in one from the off. We always wait until someone runs in and fills in. Not hard to get 6 blokes in the scrum with a half at the side.

Bad sales people are great at "BLAME" rather than selling a product. If we'd had a steady decline in attendances then I'd appreciate that maybe it's the product that is off, but the average over 22 seasons is 8,591 and last season we averaged 8,568, so we haven't shed fans as a competition although I would be concerned with the average age of our supporters going up.......
The issue (and this thread to get it back on line) is how do we attract more fans and then keep them coming back? Is it down to the RFL, the Clubs or a combination of both?

Isn't that to do with different scrum make-ups depending on who's putting it in or where the scrum is played, as they put different players in the attacking/defensive lines at different points? It's more to do with players not realising it was their turn.

At times this can contribute to it. But usually when it happens the nearest player just fills in. So it just looks like they have no idea how to form a scrum rather than for tactical purposes.

I know defenses like to have their FB in the LF role. And for attack a hooker will go to LF to ensure good distribution if the half doesn't pass. But when the play is stopped due to lack of numbers it's usually down to the players not using their heads and just getting in there. I know I'm being picky but we all have those little things that grind their gears and this happens to be mine. Ironic since I am a hooker and in the scrum too

In my simple view of the world the answer to those problems are easy. Putting matches on at a time when the younger generation can attend, like weekend afternoons. Not have matches played until 10pm on a school night with a long drive home afterwards.

I agree about following what works. With only 3 trophies to play for teams are always going to do what gives them the best chance. I just found watching SL recently boring. Although it annoys me the amount of forward passes creeping into the game. Hopefully clubs will get back towards playing a more expansive game.
I just which that like Cas clubs find an identity of play that suits them, and stick to it. But like you say it's not going to happen.

The thing with scrums is it was there great feeling if your side won one against the head.
I think that in scrums we should have the pack that's on field should be in the scrums. Giving backs a chance to do something for at least 1 play. And that the b'all should go down the middle to the hookers, and not the farce we have at the moment of putting it in to whoever's at LF feet making the whole thing pointless.

We'll just have to disagree on the part of wether scrums are important or not, and wether to scrap them or not.

Just a point on previous players skill level.
Part of the problem with modern players is that in those old years.players were to develop and learn about 1 position. Players learnt everything to do with there position, because that was were they were expected to play. And how to be the best in those positions.if they could play more than 1 position was a bonus.
Were as the modern game/coaches prefer players who can play a number of different positions. Sort of a jack of all trades master of none attitude.

starting to warm to the idea of eddie hearn and matchroom , seems talks have taken place

could do with an over haul as its not going anywhere fast super league

I've heard this pretty often, not sure how effective it actually is. If it was that straightforward the teams with a history of playing sundays should be in healthier positions than they generally are, crowd-wise. Then I look at my club, Leeds, who opted to go for a Friday. These nights became a highlight for good numbers (some would say too good) of teenagers, not all of whom were interested in sobriety. However, a fair percentage of these are now paying adults - soon to be paying more in our re-furbed South Stand - who will in a few years doubtless be moaning about the antics of the new generation. Of course it has helped massively that the team has been successful in recent years but the point stands that - coincidentally or deliberately - the club probably managed to recruit new paying fans more successfully than an equivalent targeting under 10s is or was likely to.

I fail to see why people think the Hearns are any sort of answer to our problems.

The Hearns are event promoters, and their entire business model relies on having control - control of the audience, control of the talent, control of the event, control of the sponsors - control over everything. They would never get that with 12 Super League clubs and 14 Championship clubs all pulling in different directions.

How do the Hearns / Matchroom solve problems that are predominantly rooted at club level?

well thats why there would to be discussions held between all parties

they seem to know how to get things working! plenty of upsides from them..... lets face it , cant do any worse than what we have now

they already have a great working relationship with sky, our main backer!!

The club chairmen would never give the Hearns the control they would want.

Hearn is an event promoter, not a 'sports' promoter per-se (sport is just the tool). With his events, he controls everything - the venue, the sponsors, the players, the experience - he could never get that with rugby league.

I personally don't believe that Hearn is that interested in the sport, but there's no question that he's enjoying the attention. It's actually quite embarassing that we're people are looking to him as some sort of messiag and allowing him to feign interest in our sport purely to massage his own personal ego.

The clubs that have collectively allowed this situation to happen really are pathetic.

The SL chairmen now have control over their competition and I for one would hope that they are looking outside the sport for "expressions of interest" from companies keen to work in partnership to grow their comp. Hearn fits into this bracket perfectly......if he thinks he can fill St James's Park for Magic, then by all means let him have the same terms as the marketing team for the 2013 BIG BASH had, with a small retainer, tight reins on spending and a reward on results. If he thinks he can sell the TV rights separately around the world then let him and SKY argue that out......but to dismiss a bloke who between him and his old fella have had far more success in 22 years than we have is just stupid.
If he does fill St James's then let him "pitch" for other business, but the real difference here is having people ask us for the business and not us begging to be noticed.

LOL

No s*** Sherlock. That’s what marketing is about. Control

Regards

King James

[urlhttp://www.independent.co.uk/sport/rugby/rugby-league/eddie-hearn-darts-boxing-glitz-gimmicks-matchroom-jonathan-liew-a8190231.html[/url

This sums up my view on why any talk of Hearn getting involved is a non-starter.

A pal of mine wrote this about RL sponsorship on our whatsapp group but it applies to posters on here too I'm sure - he certainly has a point and a similar attitude is at play with how we deal with broadcasters:

[i“If people want to keep insisting that the sport can only be strong in towns where the high streets are full of bookies, pawnbrokers and fast food shops, you have to accept that the only sponsors we'll get are online bookmakers, payday loans and tinned mushy peas.”

This is the issue and it’s an image issue. People within and without the game have accepted this as a reality and it’s class bull. Firstly, look at this whatsapp group, we have professionals, teachers, self employed small business owners. People that marketeers should be telling sponsors and advertisers about.

Those Northern towns have no greater proliferation of bookies, fast food outlets than the likes of Leicester, Northampton etc. The midlands and the south has its fair share of holes.

We just don’t have the ambition to pitch to Zurich, BMW, Barclays etc and we gladly accept our cloth cap image.

Oh and we must make international rugby the pinnacle of the sport and not an afterthought"[/i

Are we in the same Whatsapp group?!

It's all about image and most of it is based on class stereotyping. If you tell Barbour and Land Rover that the crowd wear wax jackets and aspire to a country lifestyle, they'll be interested. If you tell Foxy Bingo and Batchelors that Northerners love their bingo and eat mushy peas on everything, they'll be interested.

Far too simplistic - don't kid yourself that the likes of BMW, Land Rover, Bachelors and even the much-maligned Foxy Bingo don't already know *exactly* who their demographic is, where they live, what they do in their spare time and how much disposable income they've got. There's a whole science devoted to this stuff, and big companies are very much at the forefront of it.

I don't deny that there is a class issue at the heart of RL's perception problem - but it's pie in the sky to think that the only reason we don't have sponsorship from blue chip companies is that nobody in RL has told them that some of us aspire to own their premium products, and might even have the means to do so. It could also be argued that our sniffy attitude to the sponsors we do have, is also a form of inverse snobbery - why are we so ready to deride mushy peas, online bingo and haulage companies - is their money somehow less desirable than that generated by producers of 'high-end' goods and services? And even if it suddenly became the BMW Superleague - who thinks that the commercial team at BMW would be stupid enough to pay more than Betfred do for that sponsorship?

There's nothing wrong at all with their money, but it's just reinforcing the stereotype for those on the outside looking in. If you asked someone living in the home counties who rugby league was likely to be sponsored by, they'd probably jokingly reply "bitter, pies and graaaiiirrrvy". I've asked that question on more than one occasion. I've had similar answers. It's 2018, 'that joke isn't funny anymore'.

The last 15 years has seen huge sociological changes which have been building up for 20 years previous to that. In the digital age, aspiration and image, and showing off that image, is EVERYTHING. It's sad, I don't like it, but it's true. Just have a browse on Instagram and look at some of the most popular brand hashtags, brand ambassadors and influencers (take some anti-nausea pills mind! My particular favourite is an Audi steering wheel with a hand holding a Starbucks cup, the wrist adorned with a Rolex, and a Michael Kors handbag in the footwell, all accompanied with the description #goals). It's absolutely mind boggling and the people and monetary figures involved when you read into it are beyond the realms of comprehension. Everything I was taught about image, advertising and brands has pretty much gone out of the window since the onset of social media.

The world of advertising/promotion/sponsorship is changing almost monthly but rugby league is still running with things that didn't work the first time round. There's a dilemma of course - chase the Yankee Dollar and risk peeing off the die hards, or carry on as is and still be talking about what we can do to grow the sport in 5, 10, 15 years time?

I used to think that it was because it would be so difficult to market the towns of Wigan, St Helens, Warrington, Widnes, Wakefield, Castleford or Hull to a wider audience.

If it was Liverpool Manchester London Birmingham as well as Leeds it would be an entirely different animal.

But Northampton Bath Coventry Exeter Gloucester Worcester and Reading aren’t exactly the big thriving hubs of the country are they?

At the core of all modern day marketing now is Data. Data, cross polenisation (sic) of data and recycling, renewing and culling data. The "offering" will still be the same, be it a product or service, but the message and who delivers that message is dictated to by data.
Endorsement from a friend is one of the most important ways to get new customers on board and marketing departments and social media are adept at getting you to endorse a product or service to your social network sometimes without you even knowing it.
Endorsement by a celebrity has been around since adam and is still another good weapon, but it would seem that some of the SL clubs still believe that sticking posts in the ground and announcing a KO time is enough......

A few years ago I had some dealings with the sponsorship team at the RFL. At the same time, I got regally ed off that HSBC, whom I've banked with forever, was sponsoring the Union Lions tour to Australia. I managed to get the email details of HSBC's head of sponsorship. I asked him to explain why HSBC money was being blown on what is a minority sport in Aus. His reply was that they were seeking to 'build their brand' in Australia. What this shows is that there is undoubtedly a bias from the big UK finance companies towards Union, as they would have had a much better brand building opportunity down under by sponsoring League in some format or other. It's also worth pointing out that this HSBC guy was in Australia at the time no doubt 'monitoring' (between sips of champagne) the bank's sponsorship 'return'. I passed on this exchange to the RL sponsorship team. Clearly they couldn't get HSBC to change their minds.

Dacia (turnover €4.3 billion) and Betfred (turnover £3.5 billion) are both big companies and decent sponsors to have.

Unless anyone can give the figures, of how much these companies are paying to be Super League sponsors, compared to BMW and RU, I don’t see what the problem is.

Betfred is paying around £1m a year to sponsor SL, Champ and L1. By comparison, Aviva pays £7m for the RU Premiership.

The agency I work for has worked with a number of bookies whilst I have been there and I've got a decent idea of what it costs to earn a customer, and what the return on that investment is.

On average, it costs about £40 to earn a customer from digital marketing, and the average lifetime value is around £260 (using rough numbers). That gives you an idea of what any potential sponsor in RL would be looking for as they will invariably compare their return from sports sponsorship against other marketing channels.

By comparison, whilst I don't know what BMW would be paying RU, I think it's fair to say that it costs a lot more than £40 to attract a customer but by the same token, the lifetime value of that customer is going to be a lot more than £260. Its the same with Aviva - their wealth management, investment and life insurance attract customers who are worth a lot to them, so they can and do pay more to reach them.

Yes, there are other reasons why a company may get involved in sport sponsorship (brand building, CSR, etc) but at the end of the deal, the same questions get asked - what was the ROI?

Cool Story Bro.



The B&I Lions tour of Australia saw 418,000+ fans attend games....that's 40,000 fewer than attended the 2013 RLWC in England and 125,000 more than attended the 2008 RLWC in 'stralia.....not bad for a Minority sport. The SKY TV audience for the 1st test was 1,150,000 UK viewers........on a Saturday Morning...the 2nd and third both hit over 900k........30,000 fans apparently made the trip at some stage over the tour..........I went to the first test in Brisbane and stayed for Origin the following week.......which game do you reckon got the bigger attendance?

Union is a sick puppy in 'stralia, with the exception of Internationals.......I'd hazzard a guess that there are far more Wallaby jerseys in Aussie Wardrobes than Kangaroos and HSBC is an INTERNATIONAL brand....so the fit is perfect. Your bitterness would have been ignored and regardless of your opinion, there will be an entire team of people checking and monitoring this sponsorship and its return.

League doesn't attract HSBC because our audience isn't their target audience.......we get foxy bingo, but Union doesn't.....you join the dots Einstein!

Credit where it’s due, Toronto are good at getting media coverage, just take a look at the number of news articles they’ve shared on their Facebook page.