really sad that fact for the oldy types like me but we have sky to thank for that..there is a sunday match here this weekend but its for the mancs v thugs semi..sky dictate mate its a sad fact..

Guess we'll see the clubs stance on preferred fixture day come tomorrow morning. Think Middle 8's matches live on Sky are on Saturday's so no excuses about short turnarounds due to Sky making us play on Thursday and Friday nights. Think we'll see a mix of Saturday and Sunday fixtures for our remaining four at home this season. Moving forward onto next season, who knows, but the club certainly need to come up with a definite structure and plan to give fans chance to plan for themselves.

Sunday/Thursday/Friday re-schedule didn't effect Cas as league leaders, Hudds as league leaders and Wire as League Leaders.

It's all bollox if you ask me.

Is anyone actually suggesting it has had an effect? All as I can see is a few comments referring to possibly wanting some transparency or consistency with regards to our home match schedules?

I think I know the answer to that, the club want to to reduce the amount of Sunday to Thursday / Friday turnarounds. I think their initial choice was to switch to Fridays, the compromise was to see how Saturdays worked.

If the switch from Sundays is to aide player welfare/fitness/recovery then it is an acceptable change, we may not like it but having the players in top condition has to come first.

Saturday's work well for me, in all honesty.

I might have a look to see what castlefords fixtures have been like for this season.


I've said on here a few weeks ago, the change in fixture to aid player recovery and turnaround times ain't done this year.

Wasn't Geordie a monkey hanger anyway?

It won't have a fundamental impact on the teams fortunes obviously, but could do on player welfare. Surely an extra day off from the Thursday fixtures are a good thing, as long as it doesn't impact on crowd numbers? There will obviously be individual preferences based on what days people can / can't make.

What will be difficult to quantify at this stage is how much of the drop in attendances for Sunday to Saturday games (I presume there has been a drop) is down to the switch, and how much is down to team performances.

There's no Thursday matches and only one Friday match for the Middle 8's so no reason why the club couldn't have played on Sunday. Short turnarounds or maximum recovery isn't really a reason in this instance, the club obviously just want to play on a Saturday for whatever reason.

I would suggest it's more a corporate marketing decision. Sell more packages on Friday and Saturday?

Suppose we'll find out when people are coming back from the event..

I asked the question someone asked regardimg the early bird season ticke sales in conjuction with RFL fixture announcement, they are looking into that. But going forward into next season we will be mostly friday night games.

The meeting was constructive and some good questions were asked, next meeting is pencilled in for september.

Give him is due Karl Fitzpatrick came across very well, i know a lot of people have had negative views about him(me included) but the guy is passionate that's for sure, let's give him a chance.

BTW it was not a slagging off meetimg.

Did they say anything about a roundup online of all of tonight's answers? I couldn't be there due to work commitments.

These things should've recorded and put on YouTube / club website. A weekly podcast would be good too...

Sorry i did not hear if that would happen, there were a lot of questions asked and to be fair they were all good questions which they answered and those that couldnt will be looked into, gave us a tour to start with to soften us up lol.

They were asked why it took till now to have this meeting and why no statement had been given, listening to their reasons why did make sense.

It was not all about on field performance although that was talked about obviously and what they trying to do going forward about it and recruiment. They said they always looking out for the good players over here not just NRL and that most clubs here fear us because we can basically buy anyone availble if its what we need.

Other things that came up were marketing and commercial, one that came up was the touchdown club thing that is on just now, someone said yes they like it but dont want to sit in east stand that they want to go were they normally are, they agreed with that and will look into trying to make it work.

Recruitment is done between TS and SM, they explained everyone else's jobs on the board.

Toonwire help me out here, i cant remember everything lol.

Hi All,

i will post some of the questions asked as i wrote a lot of the answers down. It went from commercials deals for the club to the touchdown club to ACTIVELY LOOKING FOR A MARQUEE PLAYER. Also Expect to see a new main sponsor for next season as i got the impression that the deal fro Emirates which expires at the end of the season will not be renewed or we may not have that choice. What i read into it i wouldn't be surprised to see Amazon on the front due to a new deal being struck with them. All in all the club know the season has been poor and have things in place now behind the scenes to not let this kind of thing happen again. Lets just say Mr Draper spent an awful lot of money for little return and got found out but by then it was too late.

Toonwire

Hi

I also went tonight. Agree with karetaker and toonwire, I was pleasantly surprised by how well Karl presented himself. I was wondering how this guy ended up in the job but think he deserves a chance.

They said they were still open to extending the deal with Emirates as it expires this season, and had been in Dubai recently to discuss extending it although as mentioned the impression was given that we could have a new name on the shirt next year. Amazon was name dropped so could be on the cards.

Dom Crosby got a mention, he's mentally in a better place now and in contention for a return to the team for the Widnes game.

They still haven't given up on Currie for the year either.

With regard to the marquee player, they made a point about players with a chequered past being given a chance if it fits the club so don't be surprised if we see another Sandow/Barba type over here.

karetaker Toonwire and WazzaWire cheers for the updates

It went aa far as talking about the type of turf/grass used to try to prevent injury using Ben Currie's injury as an example, as said by wazzawire it was a good and interesting meeting, not sugar coated in the slightest.