Imagine if we did have to gift home advantage to the SL club like an amateur side. When asked by RL authorities why we explained “well it would look big and clever to have a spanking new ground to grow into (although we’ve made only minimal efforts on that front we have big plans) but the problem is although it costs an arm and a leg and we can’t train there (unlike our previous ground) we can’t actually access it for weeks on end over the season.” Hmmm. Said the RL authorities “Any plans for that to change in the future?” “ Plans? WTF are those?”

Let's hope we don't get spanked by Wigan a la 2013, because we know what that started......thanks again Dave

It would certainly be disappointing, I guess we'll see how it plays out.

As much as PL is a great facility, it's not designed to have a small rugby crowd rattling around inside it. Its the facility we should be aiming to move towards down the line, off the back of building consistently competitive squads and dare I say it, a larger following in the long run. I much preferred the atmosphere at RP on Saturday, to any of the PL home games we've had so far this season. A smaller venue and a bit less glamorous yes, but I felt it helped to build a better overall atmosphere.

PL is a nice new stadium with decent transport links. No one can say it doesn’t look the business but as you say a nice stadium 3/4 + empty can only look so good.
I can’t get a sense of whether the corporate is better but am willing to accept it is. How much interest there is in corporate and how much it is growing month on month is difficult to know. When the fan zone is open the food options for the general punter are slightly better, when not, they are identical to Ealing.

The one thing I do know is if we get to an average gate of 1500 -1750 whilst a mid table Championship side outside the heartlands and parachuted into an area with no residual buy in for RL then we will have done well. How that matches up to financial targets I don’t know but I do think the 5000 is pie in the sky. So if I’m right although a little tin pot Ealing is a better fit especially with the big new(ish) stand and scope to add some more seating. I do think despite the small crowd rattling around the ground The atmosphere at PL is decent now we are all in the east stand but the idea of inhabiting a ground where 3 sides are closed and the fourth side 1/3 full is a difficult sell and there is no suggestion that is likely to change anytime soon. We experimented with opening 2 sides against Widnes after. the flawed awareness raising campaign. We were truly (but completely predictably) dreadful and have never got anywhere near those crowd numbers again. I also wonder how easy is it for those from the North to drive down and park near PL (as opposed to Ealing). I suspect that is a popular method of getting to games in London historically that we may well have curtailed. All told I can’t make the case for PL over Ealing. We don’t even seem to be actively engaging with the community which I assume is more difficult now we only have access to players for a short while and have next to no back room staff. As for RP well it’s tinpot in the same way as Ealing was and the seating area was very very poor (borderline dangerous). Transport wise I suspect driving there may not be too bad but I’m unclear on parking options and the transport link, which is well situated, is a train which is more fiddly than a tube. I thought the atmosphere was decent. The club house was good although I didn’t have the patience to wait for the burger van to get its act together. On balance I prefer PL.
Any way we dress it up we are in some strife and our bungled re-launch run simultaneously with a shambolic move to PT meant we missed a chance to make a good 1st impression....and then there is the decamping to away games and Kent for weeks on end that really doesn’t make any sense and kills momentum. I suspect our average crowd numbers are probably what they were last year circa 750-950. All things considered that’s not bad but also not good enough to justify the expense.

They've already started either lying or not releasing the figures. The chances of getting over 1,000, which was claimed last year with some fantastic attendances announced in 50's is minimal.
Hughes and Hughes Jr haven't a fickung clue what to do and Hockey Hobby is as much use as Gus. The Corporate guy has sold SFA and again and again, they are concentrating on the 50 or so discounted corporate tickets to cover Loubsers Wages.

I know I've banged on about this for 2 decades, but christ on a bike they're useless....the lot of them!

IMG really should take a long hard look at Skolars and promote them if anyone come licencing, because the shambles at AFC is nothing more than a joke.

Remember when Hughes said "playing at a 2nd or 3rd tier Rugby or football club wasn't the future".......he's lost his bloody marbles!

Under Hughes the club will only go backwards. How long will it take some people to realise this ?

BigTime wrote:All told I can’t make the case for PL over Ealing. Agreed. I like Ealing as a venue and as a facility built with rugby foremost in mind and in a part of London with genuine rugby credentials, it more often than not felt conducive to a good atmosphere. Others may well know better than me, but it also felt as though we were a genuinely valued tenant. It also enabled us to have that 'one club' approach. I'd more often than not come down and watch the reserve/junior grade games beforehand and it was a nice little way of helping to bump the crowd numbers up a little. So much talk in RL currently about making games a day out and an event and we seem to have put ourselves in a facility at PL that while nice, isn't really conducive to any of that. Although circumstances are obviously greatly changed since, it is interesting to look back on 'Mr London's' comments on Ealing from 2017, in the context of where we are at currently; “It’s the one place we’ve settled,” Hughes says. “We can train on the artificial surface every day, and we’ve brought all our junior teams under one venue. I see no reason why we’d need to change again. The challenge for us now is to build a gate and a local fanbase. We’ve dined out on excuses whenever we’ve moved around the city. Now, London Broncos have a venue that works.” posting.php?mode=quote&f=27&p=19431293

BigTime wrote:All told I can’t make the case for PL over Ealing. Agreed. I like Ealing as a venue and as a facility built with rugby foremost in mind and in a part of London with genuine rugby credentials, it more often than not felt conducive to a good atmosphere. Others may well know better than me, but it also felt as though we were a genuinely valued tenant. It also enabled us to have that 'one club' approach. I'd more often than not come down and watch the reserve/junior grade games beforehand and it was a nice little way of helping to bump the crowd numbers up a little. So much talk in RL currently about making games a day out and an event and we seem to have put ourselves in a facility at PL that while nice, isn't really conducive to any of that. Although circumstances are obviously greatly changed since, it is interesting to look back on 'Mr London's' comments on Ealing from 2017, in the context of where we are at currently; “It’s the one place we’ve settled,” Hughes says. “We can train on the artificial surface every day, and we’ve brought all our junior teams under one venue. I see no reason why we’d need to change again. The challenge for us now is to build a gate and a local fanbase. We’ve dined out on excuses whenever we’ve moved around the city. Now, London Broncos have a venue that works.” posting.php?mode=quote&f=27&p=19431293

Hughes talks about dining out on excuses but there's no such thing as a free lunch. He has never put the required effort and investment into building a crowd. He can only hold himself to account for slowly killing the club.

To be honest I thought at first that Ealing's ground would have to work really hard to become as good as 'tinpot'!

But over time, and with the new stand built behind the other goal, it did improve greatly.
I know it would have needed a complete rebuilt on both sides to even have a hope of becoming top flight but we're in no way, shape or form likely to be an SL side any time soon - so I reckon we could have carried on there in the Championship. If nothing else we could have possibly have regular double headers with the academy and womens sides, and with the all weather pitch we wouldn't find ourselves being away from home for months, including two 'home' games in Kent ( which admittedly are easy for me to get to).
Ealing now is on the Liz line so a lot easier to get to from out East ( when it's running!).

Nothing wrong with PL, I do like the ground in terms of it's size but I don't think the move has done us too many favours to be honest.
First game of this season was good, result notwithstanding, with a crowd of 1500-1700 but crowds have dropped quickly to just a few hundred now. We could all fit in to 2 or 3 blocks of the East stand if the club doesn't want to pay for stewards to keep the whole stand open! - and if we have a cup run we're unable to play there because AFC's teams will want to use the ground, as owners there always going to get first dibs.
I don't see how having to go to RP for cup ties at short notice gives a good impression-although giving up home advantage would be even worse.

Overall I have to agree with your last sentence ' not bad but not good enough to justify the expense'.

RfE wrote:Overall I have to agree with your last sentence ' not bad but not good enough to justify the expense'. Hughes probably saw the move to PL as a easy way to tick off some IMG scoring criteria but he has failed to address other important areas which required work. Unclear to me how the amended critera announced today might affect our scoring. https://www.seriousaboutrl.com/revealed ... ria-72332/

RfE wrote:Overall I have to agree with your last sentence ' not bad but not good enough to justify the expense'. Hughes probably saw the move to PL as a easy way to tick off some IMG scoring criteria but he has failed to address other important areas which required work. Unclear to me how the amended critera announced today might affect our scoring. https://www.seriousaboutrl.com/revealed ... ria-72332/