Re: Opening SL weekend sees attendances tumbling by 12.66% : Thu Aug 08, 2013 6:47 pm  

Des wrote:

snip

I agree totally that attendances and the game in general is much stronger now than at the begining of SuperLeague, and I think the move to Summer was definitely the right call. However, you can't rest on your laurels just because things are better than they once were.
We seem to be at a crossroads in the sport, which I think has been acknowledged by the RFL with their plans to re-structure.
The game itself is still excellent, nothing has really changed there (apart from banning the shoulder charge), the players are more athletic than ever - although I do think we've sanitised the half-backs a little, I miss the real skillful ball players (Lee Briers is about the best we've had recently in this regard, and he'd have been ordinary back in the day). But, the lack of spirit shown in many of the league games is an issue, and the more people I speak to who are rugby fans (whether that be at games, mates in the pub, or with my rugby team mates), the more I hear people are getting a little bored with it - yet they all still love the game, they just want it to mean something more often.

Re: Opening SL weekend sees attendances tumbling by 12.66% : Thu Aug 08, 2013 7:24 pm  

Des wrote: Whilst I agree with William's main thrust (that crowds are down this year) if you look back through the stats for all clubs, you'll see that for the last 17 years since the advent of Super league, the general trend for crowds in the top division for regular season games is to rise steadily by a few hundred to 1000 a year. Yet attendances during the SL era have declined markedly in the Challenge Cup, in internationals and in the lower divisions. Des wrote: Crowds now are far more consistent (bar the odd blip due to blizards) than they used to be. That'll be the cheap season ticket purchasing culture these days. Fans will be more consistent in turning up because they've already paid. Unfortunately, that culture doesn't extend to paying for fixtures outside the provision of the cheap season ticket. This means that fixtures which are more meaningful... like Challenge Cup games and SL play-offs are often very poorly attended these days. The increased lack of genuine quality competition and intensity between teams doesn't help either. Des wrote: Last year I went to see Saints play Wakefield at home at what was a terrible match, and there were 14000 on (and some argument about the gate IIRC, the crowd on this site is 13k and that is the figure I've used). This year the same game got 12k. Saints V Wakefield this season was subject to a very cheap groupon ticket offer otherwise the fixture would have been way more than just over 8% down on the same fixture last season and probably closer to 20% down which would be in line with Saints overall percentage drop in attendances this season. Des wrote: If you're selective about your time-frame, anyone can show a drop or an increase using statistics. You are entitled to call it a selective time-frame, but comparing the SL attendances from 2009 to 2013 makes sense because it's the closest we get to a like-for-like comparison... ie, licensing, 14 teams, 27 fixtures each, 8 team play-off system, etc. And SL attendances in 2013 thus far are the lowest of the lot! Des wrote: Only by sampling a longer time period can you identify real trends, and the trend for SL crowds is inexorably up since the competition began and in my mind that can only be a good thing. But not since 2009... not since licensing... not since the 14 team SL... not since the Top 8 play-off system were introduced... not since it has become increasingly apparent that the SL regular season has become utterly meaningless under that structure and policy... and it's definitely not a good thing that attendances at internationals... in the Challenge Cup... in the Championship... in the SL play-offs... are all absolutely dreadful and getting worse. Des wrote: Saints averages since 200 below for refrerence. Note these are only home games and do not include any Magic weekends as these figures skew the average. I beleive in some cases playoff figures are included depending on the year. If anyone is that bothered they can argue about this but I couldn't be bothered to strip these out. Don't worry about any inconsistencies in your data set. I doubt any of the usual suspects who are uncomfortable with this thread will be accusing you of fudging the figures.

Des wrote: Whilst I agree with William's main thrust (that crowds are down this year) if you look back through the stats for all clubs, you'll see that for the last 17 years since the advent of Super league, the general trend for crowds in the top division for regular season games is to rise steadily by a few hundred to 1000 a year. Yet attendances during the SL era have declined markedly in the Challenge Cup, in internationals and in the lower divisions. Des wrote: Crowds now are far more consistent (bar the odd blip due to blizards) than they used to be. That'll be the cheap season ticket purchasing culture these days. Fans will be more consistent in turning up because they've already paid. Unfortunately, that culture doesn't extend to paying for fixtures outside the provision of the cheap season ticket. This means that fixtures which are more meaningful... like Challenge Cup games and SL play-offs are often very poorly attended these days. The increased lack of genuine quality competition and intensity between teams doesn't help either. Des wrote: Last year I went to see Saints play Wakefield at home at what was a terrible match, and there were 14000 on (and some argument about the gate IIRC, the crowd on this site is 13k and that is the figure I've used). This year the same game got 12k. Saints V Wakefield this season was subject to a very cheap groupon ticket offer otherwise the fixture would have been way more than just over 8% down on the same fixture last season and probably closer to 20% down which would be in line with Saints overall percentage drop in attendances this season. Des wrote: If you're selective about your time-frame, anyone can show a drop or an increase using statistics. You are entitled to call it a selective time-frame, but comparing the SL attendances from 2009 to 2013 makes sense because it's the closest we get to a like-for-like comparison... ie, licensing, 14 teams, 27 fixtures each, 8 team play-off system, etc. And SL attendances in 2013 thus far are the lowest of the lot! Des wrote: Only by sampling a longer time period can you identify real trends, and the trend for SL crowds is inexorably up since the competition began and in my mind that can only be a good thing. But not since 2009... not since licensing... not since the 14 team SL... not since the Top 8 play-off system were introduced... not since it has become increasingly apparent that the SL regular season has become utterly meaningless under that structure and policy... and it's definitely not a good thing that attendances at internationals... in the Challenge Cup... in the Championship... in the SL play-offs... are all absolutely dreadful and getting worse. Des wrote: Saints averages since 200 below for refrerence. Note these are only home games and do not include any Magic weekends as these figures skew the average. I beleive in some cases playoff figures are included depending on the year. If anyone is that bothered they can argue about this but I couldn't be bothered to strip these out. Don't worry about any inconsistencies in your data set. I doubt any of the usual suspects who are uncomfortable with this thread will be accusing you of fudging the figures.

Re: Opening SL weekend sees attendances tumbling by 12.66% : Thu Aug 08, 2013 7:42 pm  

William Eve wrote:

But not since 2009... not since licensing... not since the 14 team SL... not since the Top 8 play-off system were introduced... not since it has become increasingly apparent that the SL regular season has become utterly meaningless under that structure and policy... and it's definitely not a good thing that attendances at internationals... in the Challenge Cup... in the Championship... in the SL play-offs... are all absolutely dreadful and getting worse.

So nothing to do with summer rugby then?

Or do you think if we go down to 12 teams, top 5 play-off and P&R we'll be fine?

Re: Opening SL weekend sees attendances tumbling by 12.66% : Fri Aug 09, 2013 4:42 am  

William, I'm not suggesting that there aren't problems that need addressing and I actually stated that in my original post.

I was unaware of the Groupon offer, but plucked the Wakefield game out because I happened to be at the corresponding fixture last year and it's a game that I've often attended for various reasons through the years and remember the often terrible gates.

One could look at several other fixtures against teams that Saints haven't traditionally had good crowds against, where this year, the gates are still higher than the corresponding fixtures for all but last years exceptional season. As a side point; There have always been free tickets given away by clubs. When I was at school over the border in Wigan during their glory years I could have attended every match for free if I wanted to as the teachers at school used to regularly receive offers. The people who went though were people who would have gone to the match anyway, and I think with offers such as this, often maybe a thousand is added to the gate, but the people who get the tickets are often people who would attend no matter what, but like a bargain. Whilst the point about the free tickets at Wigan is empirical experience, I seem to recall reading an academic article regarding distribution of free tickets where most attendees would normally have attended whether the ticket was free or not, but I can't find it at the moment.

If we just look back to 2009, Saints crowds this year are still up on that season though without the spectacular growth of last year, and up on 2008, the last year there was P&R and a 12 team division. I don't think a four year window is a suitable time period to identify a long term trend, but even in that period the general trend for Saints crowds is up. I would expect an improvement in the Stadium atmosphere brought on by construction works, plus a more competetive side would contribute to continuing this trend in the next few years.

Anyway, I'm not arguing that things need to be done to improve the league and gates generally in the long term, but that is being looked at by the powers that be.

Our sporting culture is tinged by football, and explaining the current competition to a potential new fan brought up on the culture of home and away is often greeted with the response "but why?".

The current league structure is not "fair", but at least all clubs play each other "home and away" now, though the magic weekend means that it still isn't a level playing field. To my mind the magic weekend should be a one off event, maybe nines, sevens or some truncated version with an overall winner declared at the end, as otherwise we end up with an odd no. of games which inbalances the league. In the old 12 team structure the season wasn't fair on top clubs either. Saints always ended up playing against Wigan 3 times in 3 high intensity games and having too many of these devalues the fixtures. If you want to add games to the end of the season to flesh out the league you need to do something like the SPL do where the league is split somehow after home and away fixtures are complete, and the top and bottom teams then play each other to finalise league placing, or otherwise just play home and away once. The problem with that is there is no incentive for the final 6 games of the season for the bottom placed teams and this would need to be addressed.

The playoff format is way too complicated. I would go with a league split, followed by a top 5 with an automatic place in the final for the league leaders and the other 4 playing off for the final place, or even a top 4 with two semis and a final (1 play 4, 2 play 3), home advantage to the higher placed team.

I also think the rules of the game need to be altered to make scrums competitive and reduce injuries in the game. Reducing the distance between defence and attack 5m or 7m rule would reduce blowout scores, put more emphasis on creative halfback play and handling and reduce the gap created by fitness between top sides and part timers in the cup competetions, rather than forward brute force and ignorance, and make the game easier to justify to outsiders brought up on union and other sports who will otherwise query the illogicality of the scrum as it currently exists, but that's a whole other can of worms outwith the scope of this topic...

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Re: Opening SL weekend sees attendances tumbling by 12.66% : Fri Aug 09, 2013 6:58 am  

Have we got the latest figures on here? There is so much discussion its hard to find the numbers.

Re: Opening SL weekend sees attendances tumbling by 12.66% : Fri Aug 09, 2013 8:15 am  

William Eve wrote:

Yet attendances during the SL era have declined markedly in the Challenge Cup, in internationals and in the lower divisions.

have they?

Re: Opening SL weekend sees attendances tumbling by 12.66% : Fri Aug 09, 2013 8:17 am  

For those citing attendances at football as an indication that it's only RL that's suffering, outside of a small handfull of Prem clubs, there are discounts galore and very few sellouts over the past few years. Prime example was last weekends Burnley v Blackburn .... local derby, opening fixture of a new season, hyped to death by Sky, tickets priced at £15 (50% discount) yet attendance was just over 12,000 ...... down from 21,000 last season!

I'll bet there isn't a thread similar to this in Tartball Land screaming about the complete collapse of Championship level football.

People simply haven't got money to throw at any league based sports events week after week - they are holding money back for one-off games.

Re: Opening SL weekend sees attendances tumbling by 12.66% : Fri Aug 09, 2013 8:41 am  

BogBrushHead wrote:

For those citing attendances at football as an indication that it's only RL that's suffering, outside of a small handfull of Prem clubs, there are discounts galore and very few sellouts over the past few years. Prime example was last weekends Burnley v Blackburn .... local derby, opening fixture of a new season, hyped to death by Sky, tickets priced at £15 (50% discount) yet attendance was just over 12,000 ...... down from 21,000 last season!

I'll bet there isn't a thread similar to this in Tartball Land screaming about the complete collapse of Championship level football.

People simply haven't got money to throw at any league based sports events week after week - they are holding money back for one-off games.

Shush don't tell gutters, he thinks other sports are riding the crest of an Olympic wave whilst SL is being left behind

Re: Opening SL weekend sees attendances tumbling by 12.66% : Fri Aug 09, 2013 9:08 am  

Leeds utd have been running loads of cheap deals as well.

Re: Opening SL weekend sees attendances tumbling by 12.66% : Fri Aug 09, 2013 1:41 pm  

William Eve wrote: Yet attendances during the SL era have declined markedly in the Challenge Cup, in internationals and in the lower divisions. SmokeyTA wrote: have they? Yes they have. Reference: Chapter 6.

William Eve wrote: Yet attendances during the SL era have declined markedly in the Challenge Cup, in internationals and in the lower divisions. SmokeyTA wrote: have they? Yes they have. Reference: Chapter 6.