And it's that kind of attitude that is killing attendances in this country - basically NO games matter apart from the semis/finals! It's 1st v 2nd and,admittedly in the great scheme of things it might not matter but it still should be built up as a big game regardless. I don't think the stunt from us was anything to come back and bite us - it was harmless and not mocking anyone - unlike the Hull stuff which was daft.

Why the condescending nonsense about this not being a big game for Saints??? If so, then why turn up in great numbers like you do - it's this dismissive arrogance that gets up everyone's noses.

Saints are favs giving us a 4 start..for those who wanna win a few quid take saints giving us 4...

For us the big game(s) will be in the play offs or the Challenge Cup if we get there or if we have to win our last super league game for the LLS. We always turn up at HJ in great numbers because the style of play of the 2 clubs is the attraction and most likely to be an entertaining one. Its a much bigger game for Wire because they are playing catch up and they are not giving up on that challenge.

I'm not sure this game would sell out from a Warrington perspective without the additional push - I'm not confident it will sell out with it. How much would the promotion have cost? I couldn't honestly say, so it's difficult to determine cost effectiveness. The club don't seem to be doing the open press conference this time around which is a shame (they did vs Wigan) - possibly they are looking at how well these things work in isolation before introducing them to all big games.

It's too simplistic to think of it as the impact just in terms of the attendance, there were probably 100k+ people watching that Saints game on Sky, more bums on armchairs is important too - this sort of thing can attract fans of other clubs to tune in, important given how close the TV contract renewal is. Warrington are all about building the event this season for each game, and increasing awareness around the town. I've had mates send me Twitter posts with videos on, some of them aren't even RL fans, so it shows it is working to a degree. Maybe with enough repeated exposure, some will be influenced to take in a game - it's all about building the perception of the event and how important it is, make people not want to miss out.

Getting more people talking about the sport in the town, and in St Helens (especially those who aren't as bought in to the sport / club as we are), has to be a good thing? It's intangible to a degree, but we need to raise awareness.

At least they are doing something.

I don't bet against my team.

ok, scratch what you've just said there, and think about when the SL chiefs go and sit down with the Sky folks for the next TV deal and they ask what attendances are like, and what viewing figures are like, would you rather mcmanus to say "we got 10k for this game, 13k for this game" or would you rather he say " we got 5-8 sellouts, and were turning ppl away which probably was reflected in your viewing figures BECAUSE THEY WERE MARKETED AS BIG GAMES. That's what we're trying to do

You lot need to get off your bloody high horses and stop talking down to us, cos if we don't all pull in together, there will be no sky deal and no central funding and no super league. Though granted based on saints fans current attitudes you'll be taking the cos we didn't win the league before the competition went bust.

Think about the bigger picture guy.

Boom

Did I like that post!

I think you might be right about it not being a sell out, is there some sort of Walking Day in Warrington on Friday that might mean quite a few staying in the pubs later and watching the game from there.

Talking of high horses do you really think a plane with a banner 3000 feet high is going to attract a significant number of extra fans to the game, for us it was just throwing money at it with a gimmick. Maybe your club think to get a better super league deal you have to look up towards the SKY when they are actually grounded. Wire are putting more effort into promoting more than other clubs but others like McManus look at other ways in branding for example.

Tell us about your branding then

Vaping sets a great example to the kids too.

Because it’s embarrassing. ‘The wolves are waiting’. For what exactly? Another tonking? I don’t see much else happening on Friday. The phrase implies we’re sat back in style and in control, patiently waiting to batter them. No, we’re not, we’re sat in second with a massive gulf between us and them. Perhaps it’ll be different if we meet in knockout games, but I don’t see anything remarkable happening on Friday. I hope I’m wrong. Call me a bad fan for all I care.

Chill out. It's not embarrassing. A bit corny yes.... funny yes. Promotional yes. Responsible for defeat no.

Ok, so, scenario 1, warrington send a plane over the totally wicked stadium, promoting the game, we get a slightly higher attendance than usual, more money in the coffers, and possibly like the leeds game opening night, the momentum grows and the match might sell out. Our social media standing improves somewhat, warrington then get beat, saints fans take the , and lord it over us.

scenario 2, we don't do anything, get about 12k ppl, warrington then bet beat, saints fans take the and lord it over us.

scenario 3, warrington win,saints fans take the that they're still 4 points ahead and we've not won the league in forever.

The problem here is, you're still bothered by what saints fans are gonna say, and no matter what, as we've seen with as108 and the rest, they're a classless bunch who will move the goalposts and are poor winners and even worse losers.

As i've said to the judderman, ppl need to start thinking about WHY we're doing this, it's changing the perception of Super League games to being events. Popular events.

I could be wrong here, but considering the attractive and effective rl your side is currently playing, your attendances seemed to have remained fairly stagnant. So aside from a few more vape smokers and a few more extra saints folk owing money to Cash converters, I fail to see promotional success in any other areas as a result of Mcmanus' alternative branding.

Lmfao!
That's funny.

Which fans exactly are Wire appealing to by flying a plane over another town?

Do you think more Saints fans will attend as a result? Is it meant for floating Wire fans (who had an actual home game to watch at the HJ as the plane was flying overhead but would rather watch Saints on telly instead?)

I'm a bit confused as to how it's going to boost your attendance for the fixture but happy to admit I may be completely wrong.

It might lead to a few more watching the telly to see what the bluster was about I will admit.

I suppose had Saints lost it would have been a bit more interesting but we were racing into a early lead before it arrived overhead, to maintain a six point lead plus 100-odd points difference.

Felt oddly small time to me but that's just my view and I admit it has got people talking!

McManus is in 3rd year of branding within the community to make the club very much part of the town. Its been very successful and the RFL have given us awards 2 years in succession on its promotional foundation to RL.

The club goes into schools, hospitals, care homes, war veterans, autistic and mental health care as very much as an image brand by the first team players. We've got a great young mental + physically impaired rugby team now. Same for ladies rugby McManus has invested money into this venture and beat Leeds in the next round we will be in the Challenge Cup Final and is promoted in the mens semi finals venue at Bolton.

We've also worked hard in the service areas to get a good quality young player into the scholarship programmes, some parents from Warrington and Widnes have allowed there kids to come to Saints and Wigan because the development program is more structured and has a quicker tier. The Saints brand for youth development in rugby league has got great recognition.

The club is well known in Australia for its Academy product brand with seasonal tours with the NRL counterparts, I think the academy team have always come home with a lot more wins than losses. This is one of the reasons you see the first team with a very heavy weighted home product and we could probably compete well with just an academy produced players in the first team.

All this branding is done at grass roots level first with progressions to the super league levels, promotions of the games are through social media avenues with regular networking across the existing and future fan base.

We have copied the Wigan and Warrington Big Game Image Profile but its not really had much impact on drawing in a lot more fans, its the quality and entertaining playing standard which is doing that at the moment.

100k+ people saw that plane on Sky, plus those inside the stadium, plus those outside the stadium, plus the WolvesRL twitter feed, plus the Saints twitter feed, plus the local paper(s) plus those that got sent it via text msg, plus Facebook etc etc.

This isn’t about a one off ‘let’s see if we can get a few more bodies though the gate at the HJ’ for this specific fixture, it’s part of a season long campaign, which I’m sure will go into next season building interest, building the event and reaching out to as many RL and non RL as possible.

'it's got people talking' ergo it's done the job it meant to do. I don't think we thought it would have an effect on the attendance more promote a game to the TV public which should be a good advert for the game, full house, good players etc... We'll 17 of em will be undeniably world class. Like it or not our marketing is getting on sky sports news regularly and even sky news at times and I think its actually making our game NOT look small time. Cash Converters and Totally Wicked do that.

Our average in 2018 was up 7% on 2017 (and 3% on 2016).

Not huge strides I'll admit but better than being down 8% over the same period like Warrington I suppose.

Not sure where Saints or Wire sit this season with attendances - I'd guess we're down given we played Wigan at home on a Thursday night as the opening fixture. Trick for us is to try to get the extra 2,500 or so that regularly watched in our first season in the new stadium in 2012 when we averaged 14k or so.

Edit - Saints are up about 5% on last season's equivalent fixtures, pretty good given we lost out on a GF home game to a Thursday night season opener in January and had London at home instead of Widnes.

All very laudable, but they don’t need to be exclusive!

All the above you mention Warrington are doing too ( with the exception of the overseas tours for the youth team I expect ). We just had a community day for the Catalan game whereby every youth team player from a community club got a ticket for a quid. This was preceded by four or five coaches and players going into the community clubs and delivering training sessions. They did a similar event with schools earlier in the year. Blake Austin organised weekly sessions for kids on his local park to help promote health living etc etc.

Warrington’s ‘gimmicks’ are getting the club regional recognition, and mentions on Sky when they aren’t even playing. That has to be positive surely?

It is but its short lived. If you are doing something similar to us at ground zero community level but maybe at a lesser promotional expanse then thats good for the game, its certainly not exclusive but its need to be far reaching to the max.

If this was a one off, I’d agree, but it’s part of a much bigger campaign from planes, vans in Pieland, open press conferences, spy gate etc etc. They all have a compounding impact, so the impact i’d argue would increase with each individual ‘gimmick’

The biggest difference in our game attendances have been the away fans thats well down this season. We only get Warrington and Wigan occupying the 6 sections of the away end, Hull sometimes fill 4 sections but the majority struggle to fill 2 sections.

Leeds use to fill 4 sections but on Friday I estimated they brought only 280 fans, Castleford and Wakefield have gone the same. Some games the away stand is closed off because of that situation.

We also did a promotional game in the social media think it was against the catalans and we half filled the away stand with home fans.

Our attendances are up with the Impairment, Academy and Ladies teams. Its not always about the 1st team playing its the club involvement overall.