Lot of 'ifs' there though isn't there?

And your point is anyway?

I think the issue is, most people in East Manchester probably don't even know that Salford Red Devils exist. With the idea being that once they do, they'll realise Barton isn't a million miles away.

I don't think it's a kick in the teeth at all, we'd all travel as far as Barrow, Whitehaven, Hemel and London if we were drawn there in the CC so what's the difference in going 10 miles across Manchester?

It's a typical Salford fan attitude of "it wont work" and "I doubt we'll attract any new spectators doing this", doing nothing and staying at Barton hardly did anything for our 2,630 attendance vs Widnes (with a good following from the Vikings) this season did it?

i don't see what the problem is at the end of the day were not exactly filling the Aj Bell stadium. So to promote Salford were trying something different and being proactive. Afterall last season we managed around 2500 v Widnes and most of them were probably Widnes fans!

We might as well play Wigan at Wigan, we'd have just as much of winning the game there then in Manchester at least at home there's always some hope. Home advantage shouldn't be underestimated. Anyway no matter what we say, he'll do what he piggin well wants.

You're missing the point.

It's an idea to try and catch a few new fans to drag them back to Barton. You could drive ten miles in each direction from Barton and there will be people that have never heard of us. That's pretty criminal, even if most of them never come. To want it to fail says a lot about the mentality of some Salford fans.

Just to play Devil’s advocate: there is already precedent for this. Salford took a match to Old Trafford in the 1950s with the hope of drawing a big crowd, but it ended up being a disappointment with terrible wet weather thought to have affected the attendance.

However, I can’t say that this doesn’t make me feel a little uneasy.

Another way of looking at it would be to say that it stands a team in good stead in the CC if they can play at neutral grounds.

You see? There's plenty of ways you could look at it negatively or positively.

I would agree with those sentiments if we were still at the Willows, however I don’t think we have any home advantage at Barton at all. We haven’t made it a fortress in the slightest since we moved in, in fact how many times have we turned over any of the “top” sides at home since we’ve played there?

And if we take games on the road then it never will get chance to become a fortress.

At the ned of day everyone has their own opinions, I just don't agree with it. With the lack of anything Salford anywhere on the playing shirt, merchandise, the website always refers to us a Red Devils and now talk of taking a game to Manchester! I’m slightly concerned about the docs intentions that’s, maybe I’m being cynical, but with him you just never know.

You see, I know its aimed at geting fans which they have to be praised for. The reality is though the best way to get fans until we have a winning team is to promote in Salford itself. At the minute, we're failing to advertise well and properly near our own stadium.

Also, the idea that we have to go to the East Manchester to play as no one there knows we even exist is extremely laughable and short-sighted. It was only 6 MONTHS ago that the whole competition played there for Magic Weekend. The Magic weekend also had more publicity around the city from the RFL than we could ever achieve as a club. And, with this in mind, our attendances hardly picked up after Magic and that should be a precursor for why this will be a failure sadly.

With last years top 8 entering the cup a round later this year, our most attractive tie would be against a bottom 4 SL side, with us more likely to be drawn against a championship opponent.

The Red Devils vs Dewsbury at the Ethiad Campus. Can't see this one packing them in.

As i've said, if playing in East Manchester was suddenly going to miraculously boost our attendances it would have done so after Magic weekend when the city had (although not loads) more publicity than our club could manage.

It wont work, its a nice gimmick and a nice way of the administration saying "at least we tried" but the writing is on the wall, sadly.

Catalans at home, at the Nou Camp. Can we count this towards our attendance figures?

A big danger is, if it goes ahead and the Manchester stadium is a FULL house
Will he then seriously relocate ?

Where would it be though, overkill using either of the big football grounds, I suspect the smaller venue at the Eastlands complex or the new lower tier football ground I've heard something about.

We can hardly blame the Doc for wanting to try something different, if we were filling Barton week in week out he'd not need to go looking for new fans, but we aren't so he does.

simply really.

I agree there is more that could be done with regards to advertisement within Salford, but this is being addressed at the moment and some very positive plans are being put in place.

Ok, so the whole competition played there for the Magic Weekend but how did that help increase the popularity of Salford Red Devils? Just because we played a game there, it doesn't necessarily mean East Manchester now know we exist. I am genuinely shocked you think the RFL did a better job at advertising the weekend than Salford could do as a club. What advertising was done in and around East Manchester? How many schools etc were visited?

You simply cannot compare, the Magic Weekend was only marketed in and around RL circles as a yardstick for any future Salford game taken on the road. Plus it isn't an ideal format to attract new supporters to is it? If you've never watched a sport before, you don't want to be paying for a ticket for 3/4 games of said sport!

In and amongst all this, lets not forget the fantastic work the club are currently doing IN Salford. I know players have spent the last week attending local amateur clubs presentation evenings, as well as selling poppies and opening the ice rink at MediaCity;UK. When you have a city next door with a population almost double that of Salford, it would be daft not to explore and market.

In favour
but only if marketed correctly and that will be difficult as the lead in time for cup games is minimal.

Fair enough then, lets just all pack up our bags and move to Manchester tomorrow where we're guaranteed 20,000 attendances at every match



In all seriousness though, if we did play a one-off game at the Etihad training ground, what would be judged to be a success? If some of the fans who are advocating this really want to see if it will work it would be better if the regulars stayed away and we could judge how many 'new' fans turned up.

At the end of the day, I understand that a large proportion of our supporters try to prove "top redness" by agreeing with everything the regime does since Koukash got on twitter, but agreeing with this when none of you had previously advocated it or anything similar makes some of you look like sheep.

I don't think it's about who we play it's more of inviting people to watch the game to start with, people from Gorton Droylsden won't have a clue if dewsbury are good or not? We MUST try this its better than sitting still hoping, if crowds don't rise were finished.

You’re just talking sh*t now.

Who said we’re guaranteed 20,000 attendances at every game and what logic is there in regulars staying away? If it was a normal away game you would go, so why not travel 10 miles across Manchester in a bid to market the club to a new audience. It will be easy to enough to judge how many new fans turn up, as we have a reasonable yardstick from the attendance last season v Widnes at home in the Challenge Cup which was 2,600 (with around 800 Widnes fans – I am sure club will know exact figure).

If we were to play a one-off game at the Etihad, a success (opposition dependent) would be any increase in attendance from above game as well as attracting any people into the ground that haven’t previously watched a RL game.

I’ll keep supporting the clubs positive marketing ideas, you keep concerning yourself with obtaining “top red” status.

If I'm right then, in fairly recent times, the biggest crowd we've had as a club was the last day at the Willows where we got 10,000 in. With this in mind why do Koukash and Vickers feel the need to take the club as far away from our ancestral home as possible? He's said himself it's a community game unlike football. Most of us could walk to the ground when we were at the Willows. Why is the club emphasis now on getting us as far away from Weaste as possible?

Yep too many fans letting their Salford faithful status get in the way of logic.

If crowds don't rise we're finished? I agree, but lets not pretend moving a cup game to another stadium will have them flocking in. Widnes (who are widely regarded as the model super league 'franchise') made the play offs last year as well as a cup semi final, yet only averaged 800 fans per game more than Salford. If Salford made 8th plus a cup semi next season we would more than likely make up this difference. Sadly any quest for attendances to instantly double is unlikely to happen. Just look at Huddersfield's crowds. Perhaps they should move a game to Leeds?

The magic weekend comparison is interesting. Perhaps the club have already missed their best chance of attracting a M/CR audience by failing to advertise to M/CR locals the chance to watch their 'local' side in a premiership football stadium. I'm sure this would have been a more attractive proposition than what is currently being proposed.

You keep stalking him in the VIP section every week, then report back to the forum to let everyone know you were 'chatting to Koukash' at the weekend.





Are you being serious with this comment? No offence but you are the biggest Koukash lauder on twitter.

If there were to be a cup game at another venue somewhere in Manchester, then that would be the time to attempt to generate a big crowd with heavily discounted tickets.
Doing that away from our normal home base has the possibility of attracting new fans and given a good performance hopefully getting those new fans to want to see more.
It's certainly a tad depressing to read that Salford fans want such a venture to fail - isn't it blindingly obvious that if the crowds don't increase to sustainable levels over the next season (or hopefully 2 seasons) then we won't have a club to watch at all?