I have decided to bite the bullet and have booked to go to Workington for our game.
I hope a few others will turn up too. I include the team in that.

I admire your bulldog spirit Victor and whilst the 800 mile round trip is a step too far for me I am now seriously considering the Sheffield game in Ebbsfleet that the club has kindly lumbered ST holders with. The way things are going it may be one of the last games of the season I go to and the only one pre August. This season has, on reflection, not been very good.

I'd argue that the entire period 2008-2022 or as it's otherwise known, "THE HUGHES YEARS" hasn't been very good. The level of ineptitude and incompetence shown by the owner and his appointed staff has at sometimes been breathtakingly top notch.

If there were an annual RFL/SL award for utter incompetence, the Broncos would have had sole custody of said statue for 15 years on the trot and I'll repeat, Hughes didn't just waste his own money in that period, he also wasted the fans income stream (which he diminished every year) as well as a guestimated 15 million in central funding. In 2008, 50,821 fans paid to watch the QRL......there's a million quid that inside 5 years he'd halved......

Evening Orangeman, hope you are well?

Bongser quite liked the litotes of Big Time's last sentence but is getting the feeling that you don't like Hughes very much.

Reassuring to know we can win something.

I'm going, leaving Mid Sussex at 05.40.
Only because as retired ex traincrew starting just before BR's demise I keep Free/ reduced rate travel

To be fair, I felt the first few years at trailfinders we had turned a corner up to the SL season in 2019, and was on the right track. But since the relegation from Super League every decision has been the wrong one

Well done Vic, don't think anything would drag me to Workington although I guess we may well be playing in black.

I thought long and hard, but decided it being such an important game, I ought to make the effort.
Taking the train up on Wednesday and staying overnight, going back on Thursday evening.

Litotes- not heard that word used in a long time. All the best for SAturday. Not sure I’ll take in the 1895. Ms son is so disillusioned by what Broncos have served up this year it’s hard enough to get him to the main event, although I understand it’s disputed which match that is.

Whilst I was shocked at how poor the facilities were when we first pitched up at Trailfinders, I think we played some of our best rugby for years there.
As you say it looked like we turned a corner there - but as per DH has managed to stuff it up.

Danny Ward built a team that was way more than the sums of its parts at Trailfinders. We've had better players before but I'm not sure we ever had such a determined team. Hughes has let that all slip away.

Bongser buddy.....I defended Hughes when the RFL/SL Clubs/Lenegan left him holding the baby, but any support I had for him started to erode after the appointment of McKay, as well as his refusal to deal with McDermott's continued years of below average results, appointment of powell, returning to broncos but with a children's logo and the need to put RL on the url when RL was given as the reason for the change, the move away from the stoop with 225k rent cited as the reason (we pay the same if not more now in Wimbledon)......and buckets of poor decisions and recruitment since. Make no mistake....promotion to SL was a fluke and his reaction to relegation and then rejection in 2021 has been to throw his toys out of the pram and defund the club. So yeah.....I'm not a fan

2 more of us will be joining you and the merry band up at Workington Victor. London ! London !

I am pleased to hear that. The last time I was at a game at Workington, there were eight of us.

General admission currently £12 on the Workington website

and...U15's FREE*, U12's must be supervised. *FREE as long as wearing your community sports or club colours!
Gates, Fanzone, Club Shop and Gus Risman bar open from 11am! Live Music in the Gus Risman FANZONE from LAKES ENTERTAINMENT from 2:30pm!

This brings up the debate about how do you add value to something after it has been free, but for me, London Broncos 2023 (if they exist) need a total rethink on pricing and the overall offering on matchday..........
If it were me.......
£15 General Admission pre-pay
£20 General Admission on the door
£35 Posh Lounge pre-pay
£50 Posh Lounge on the door
U18's FOC pre-ordered/join supporters club
Over 65's FOC pre-ordered/join supporters club
Student's/Concessions £5 pre-ordered/join supporters club
SERVICES £5 (Armed forces, Police, Fire, Ambulance, Nurses, Doctors etc) pre-ordered/join supporters club
ST Standard £150 - comes with a Broncos Hat & Lanyard to hold Membership Card
ST Posh £400 - comes with a Broncos Hat & Training Shirt as well as a Lanyard to hold Membership Card & 4 "mates tickets" to be redeemed online by registering the mate to receive a post match questionnaire. Posh ST also gets to go to a launch event, with food, interviews with coach, owner, skipper etc as well as a ticket to the end of year awards and the option to buy one more. Pre match they get to hear the thoughts of the coach and they're joined at their table by a non-playing squad member or senior back office member during the service of the meal.

In terms of post match, I see no benefit in ringfencing this to the posh tickets and would like to see this done in the public area. The club needs to get back to being a club and connecting with its few remaining fans as well as attracting new ones and having a post match party for EVERYONE is a good start.

Buck & Dusty need to be on duty for 90 minutes before and after the game, an inflatable or some such other for the kids in the fanzone and incentivise people to come early. If there's to be no programme, [url=https://www.stevenagefc.com/news/2022/may/digital-matchday-programme-salford-city-stevenage-fc-football-club-sky-bet-league-two-efl-english-football-league-saturday-7-may-2022/then at least create one that can be downloaded on match day, with the team sheets etc.....[/url


anyway...back to Town.
They were in the game v Barow and Barley lately, with only Leigh spanking them, so this is too tight to call. Whomever wins, I suspect it'll be by 1 score.....good luck and safe travels to those going!

Do you ever write short posts?? I can’t remember the last time I read one
Youre like a yank/Aussie (maybe it’s drifted to NZ) whereby they contextualise everything and rabbit on resulting in there message getting lost.
Have you ever heard of the term executive summary?

Fair is fair it’s a long post but a decent one. On the issue of match day experience I’m happy to hear anyone’s thoughts as the club don’t appear to be putting much thought in, or if they are, they aren’t articulating it.

I have to agree that the matchday experience is poor.
To get first time attendees to return, you have to make some effort.
The club offers nothing for kids and they are the future. If there is a future ?

Sorry, Orangeman, eyes obviously elsewhere on Saturday so didn't see your reply. A lot of what you say (whilst almost definitely true) is beyond Bongser's ken or remembrance. But he will say that, with the present play-off system, promotion to Super League is often a fluke. In the regular 2014 season, Leigh won the Champ at a canter but there was no promotion/relegation. 2015 saw us only lose one game (at Doncaster - wtf) and draw one late doors at Bradford. Comfy Champs (or rather this somewhat ugly League Leaders name) but just missed out on the wooden spoon in the Middle 8s. 2016 saw us lose one and draw one in the first four games after the last minute betrayal of Rowley before (ignoring the CCup) winning 29 games on the bounce to finally gain promotion (seem to remember a scary late resurgence from Broncos in the second (?) of the play-off matches).

Relegated (winning five) and shortly into the new season Mike Lathom (the Leigh chairman - nice to see him leading the team out at Spurs with a big grin on his face) had to talk Derek Beaumont out of walking away. Similarities there.

Think that we beat you three times in 2018 but you went up. In fact with 10 wins you made a damned fine fist of it but still came back down on points difference from Hull KR (the only club to have gone up and stayed up in recent years).

The artificial Toronto Wolfpack lost their only 6 games of a Covid19 hit season, withdrew from the remainder and were then wound up.

Leigh were arbitrarily promoted for 2021 (not even Google could've read all those dossiers before the decision was announced) and as sacrificial number fodder were duly relegated on a mere four points. 2022 sees Toulouse as the latest likely yoyo.

So yes going up can be a fluke, coming back down is (almost) a formality. Aspiring owners should know that already.

We were lucky to get promotion to SL but unlucky to come down. Since then we have ceased to be competitive even in the Championship thanks to Hughes.

As I recollect the club gave 2 reasons for the expensive upheaval of a move to Wimbledon. 1) some old toffee about corporate and building crowds 2)that we couldn’t get into SL by staying at Ealing. Let’s ignore (1) until such time as the club put in even a modicum of effort on point. On 2 it seems to me that unless someone goes bust/ nearly bust Toronto/ Widnes or there is a pandemic leading to the spaffing up the wall of parachute payment. One goes up then down again and uses the parachute to make a tilt at going back up ad nauseum. So after Saturday it looks like Leigh go up and Toulouse down. Next year we have to contend with a monied up Toulouse and Rovers etc etc. We’ve no chance of going up as a PT organisation anytime soon so the whole thing is crackers. Then there is the issue of the huge rental costs of maintaining 3 grounds. What monied up businessman, of which London has loads, would look at that and think it was only well spent. Spending on players and youth set up yes, playing in a big old empty barn and training on the floor of a bar No.

Yes

Good luck to all those going today, you will need it