Re: 2024 fixtures : Fri Nov 24, 2023 4:54 pm  

Mild Rover wrote:

To be fair, for objective assessments based on data, why would IMG need to visit any club?

It’s not like last time with the independent assessments when somebody presumably mooched around Odsal, had lunch, decided SL needs Bradford… “B?”

This has got to be better than a system influenced by whether a Club Chairman and assessor have a shared interest in philately or fondness for pickled eggs or go back years and years.

(To be fair, even if the criteria raised a few suspicions last time, the assessments themselves didn’t cause it to fail).

Simple answer is IMGs data can be flawed and they should be visiting all the clubs they are rating
Given that this is a sport played at a stadium or ground as it is at your club,it should be imperative that they visit the clubs facilities particularly when you play in a three sided ground with an open end now filled with street food vendors,made out to be an exciting development when its just an excuse for not developing a new stand or standing area.
If IMG have not seen this then they should.
Think what would happen to the rating of Leeds if they decided to remove the open end standing area and fill it with street food vendors.
If your point of why would IMG need to visit any club then HKR is a prime example and i think you got lucky

Re: 2024 fixtures : Fri Nov 24, 2023 7:44 pm  

Mild Rover wrote:

To be fair, for objective assessments based on data, why would IMG need to visit any club?

It’s not like last time with the independent assessments when somebody presumably mooched around Odsal, had lunch, decided SL needs Bradford… “B?”

This has got to be better than a system influenced by whether a Club Chairman and assessor have a shared interest in philately or fondness for pickled eggs or go back years and years.

(To be fair, even if the criteria raised a few suspicions last time, the assessments themselves didn’t cause it to fail).

The point I am making is not that an obviously tainted Club Chairman is having a go at the RL board thats pretty predictable, but that the game is in turmoil and although they all voted for the IMG stuff almost en Bloc, as soon as their globally formed recommendation's don't suit the clubs involved ( as with the magic weekend scrapping idea and the grading of certain clubs) they turn on the people they are as a game paying millions to, over the next ten years, to sort the game out.

On another of your points of course its necessary for IMG to visit the clubs before their final assessment they need to get a feel for the place and the community and the supporters and where the game is doing reasonably well already and what can be learnt from that? They need to see the commitment around the clubs and most importantly the folks who are running the club, their visions, philosophy and aims for the future. They need to see the stadia in which they play and the atmosphere around the game that they generate, although it might suit some of the clubs for IMG not to visit the arena's in which our great game is played out!!!!! There is good practise around already, Is it not important to know where the game is now, where it is already doing OK and what plusses there are already to build on?? You don't get that from number crunching on a computer.

Then look at the money involved for it's important, of course it is, but certainly not everything!! For instance, has anyone on here , many of whom have invested thousands on our beloved club over the years, been approached by IMG to gleen their views?? there have been a few global questions asked but nothing down in the real grass roots of the game.

You can't do everything by looking at spreadsheets the future of the game isn't based on finance alone, but on the place of clubs is their community and the commitment they have going forward, their vision to build in the future and, although it might not suit you, the passion of the people who support them.

Re: 2024 fixtures : Fri Nov 24, 2023 9:03 pm  

bonaire wrote:

Its a bit like appointing one of the big four accounting firms like KPMG to do your companies end of year accounts.Cost you a lot more money than employing a small medium company but you get nothing extra other than a big name company stamp signing off your accounts

Wasn't it KPMG / Deloitte that designed the "every minute matters" super 8s/ middle 8s? Another idea the rfl probably spent top whack on and didn't really give it too much time to bed in

Re: 2024 fixtures : Sat Nov 25, 2023 1:24 am  

Steve0 wrote:

Wasn't it KPMG / Deloitte that designed the "every minute matters" super 8s/ middle 8s? Another idea the rfl probably spent top whack on and didn't really give it too much time to bed in

They would be better off employing the advertising company that work for Aldi.
They know how to market a company and its products.
That expertise could easily be adapted to marketing Rugby League

Re: 2024 fixtures : Sat Nov 25, 2023 8:46 am  

Don’t remember seeing so many people enquiring about the Catalans away fixtures, gonna be a big following for the July fixture in particular

Re: 2024 fixtures : Sat Nov 25, 2023 8:46 am  

bonaire wrote:

They would be better off employing the advertising company that work for Aldi.
They know how to market a company and its products.
That expertise could easily be adapted to marketing Rugby League

If we know anything, in an ever increasing e-world, is that youth understand the value and reach of various online platforms far better than anyone else. We as a fuel company ran some brainstorming camps over a number of weeks to get some new ideas for marketing all of our products , including the newly established EV charging installations division. The ideas that fed back were varied and predictable, from the usual management members, but the younger guys were full of innovative and, to the less informed , alien concepts, that seemed too complex and away from our previous strategies , at first to many of us. We were wrong, I don't mind saying and its the very ideas that these colleagues suggested that have seen by far the better results, in terms of new uptake. We need to invite young and hungry marketing execs to forward new ideas, as the current ideas seem set to continue the games seemingly terminal decline and further constriction. A younger target audience require an approach that chimes with them, not just retweaking of previously failed attempts to market our game.

Re: 2024 fixtures : Sat Nov 25, 2023 10:37 am  

HU8HFC wrote:

Don’t remember seeing so many people enquiring about the Catalans away fixtures, gonna be a big following for the July fixture in particular

Was a huge following there in 2019, 2500 I think, boiling hot day and we lumped 50 points on them. Dont think we knew how good we had it sometimes

Re: 2024 fixtures : Sat Nov 25, 2023 10:42 am  

bonaire wrote:

I think it will be the other way round Steve
Dont think the RFL will want IMG to stick around
The idea of employing them is to enhance the game and given they are supposed to be one of the best in their field seems to me they have done sweet FA.
Its marketing that this sport needs not spreadsheet Charlies,and that could have been done much more efficiently and economically by employing a hungry small/medium sized company to market the game.
Its a bit like appointing one of the big four accounting firms like KPMG to do your companies end of year accounts.Cost you a lot more money than employing a small medium company but you get nothing extra other than a big name company stamp signing off your accounts

The game would be better off employing a marketing agencies for the big events. I get bombarded with online ads whenever Union have an event such as Premiership game at Wembley, Barbarians game etc.

Id also bring back free coaches for away teams to SKY games, even just 4 coaches means 200 fans in the away end. Even Huddersfield would muster that if its a freebie. Cost over the course of a season would be minor, could look at giving National Express or whoever free advertising in return. Even just a small number of away fans boosts the atmosphere.

Re: 2024 fixtures : Sat Nov 25, 2023 12:34 pm  

I think IMG have already put a bill in for nearly half a million to the RFL .

[Mild Rover]

Re: 2024 fixtures : Sat Nov 25, 2023 12:44 pm  

The Dentist Wilf wrote:

The point I am making is not that an obviously tainted Club Chairman is having a go at the RL board thats pretty predictable, but that the game is in turmoil and although they all voted for the IMG stuff almost en Bloc, as soon as their globally formed recommendation's don't suit the clubs involved ( as with the magic weekend scrapping idea and the grading of certain clubs) they turn on the people they are as a game paying millions to, over the next ten years, to sort the game out.

On another of your points of course its necessary for IMG to visit the clubs before their final assessment they need to get a feel for the place and the community and the supporters and where the game is doing reasonably well already and what can be learnt from that? They need to see the commitment around the clubs and most importantly the folks who are running the club, their visions, philosophy and aims for the future. They need to see the stadia in which they play and the atmosphere around the game that they generate, although it might suit some of the clubs for IMG not to visit the arena's in which our great game is played out!!!!! There is good practise around already, Is it not important to know where the game is now, where it is already doing OK and what plusses there are already to build on?? You don't get that from number crunching on a computer.

Then look at the money involved for it's important, of course it is, but certainly not everything!! For instance, has anyone on here , many of whom have invested thousands on our beloved club over the years, been approached by IMG to gleen their views?? there have been a few global questions asked but nothing down in the real grass roots of the game.

You can't do everything by looking at spreadsheets the future of the game isn't based on finance alone, but on the place of clubs is their community and the commitment they have going forward, their vision to build in the future and, although it might not suit you, the passion of the people who support them.

As a fan of the game, I understand the sentiment.

Sending two consultants out into the field to assess those intangibles for 3 weeks, though - that’s not going to fly. If the RFL was paying them by the hour I’m sure they be up for it, mind you. But there’d still no doubt be some Chairman complaining that they only sent juniors, they only stayed a couple of hours and the ~£30k it cost could have been better spent. On the last point, I’d have to agree.