Defence?

The crowd declared is, funnily enough, the crowd that attends.

The tickets freely available for the RFL and rugby league fans for any Wembley Final is 72,000. That leaves a MAXIMUM of another 18,000 or so. The RFL does not have any jurisdiction on how the remaining Club Wembley etc tickets are sold or distributed, but very many of them are either used by debenture holders, or sold through entertainment packages and the like.

As proof that you are talking out of your arris, take 2010. So far as the RFL was concerned, it was a sellout. In other words, all 72,000 saleable tickets were sold.

If you were right, therefore, the official attendance would have been a capacity 90,000. Agreed? However it was 85,217. This means that in fact on top of the 72,000, another 13,217 seats were used by owners, or sold through other outlets. And 4000-odd weren't.

But don't let me stop you from believing your nutty conspiracy theory.

My recollection of recent finals have been many empty seats, plus a sply populated club section this seems to be supported by what clips are on the well known site. This then seems to make your comments total bullpooh - but at least thats consistent for you.

Domination of the competition by a couple of clubs has killed interest. Look at the semis over the years:

2012: Leeds, Wigan, Huddersfield, Warrington
2011: Leeds, Wigan, St Helens, Castleford
2010: Leeds, Wigan, Warrington, Catalans
2009: Warrington, Huddersfield, Wigan, St Helens
2008: Hull FC, Wakefield, St Helens, Leeds

so in the last 5 seasons we have, in the last four

Leeds: 4/5 years
Wigan: 4/5 years
St Helens: 3/5 years
Warrington: 3/5 years
Huddersfield: 2/5 years
Hull FC: 1/5 years
Wakefield: 1/5 years
Catalans: 1/5 years

so we have basically four dominant clubs who will usually knock one of themselves out before the semis, and the other 3 will contest them.

A better statistic might be that not since 2008 have only two of the group of Wigan, Warrington, St Helens & Leeds made the semis

This is the problem. How you solve it is another matter. Generally among Rhinos fans there was an attitude of 'it's our 4th semi in 5 years, been to the Galpharm plenty, if we win I'll go to Wembley, if not, who cares, can save money and watch it on Telly'.

How do you solve that? You could take it off the telly, but that'd be even worse for national exposure. You could but the CC on sky, getting more money in, and more people to go along to it, but that'd be 90% of terrestrial RL coverage gone.

I think a better way to go might be to try and drive expansion of the competition. We have enough clubs to make a full 8-round tournament workable. Enter all Championship & Championship 1 clubs plus the SL, then you have 34 teams. National Conference is 44, then the 10 teams of the French Elite Championship, then qualifying for 10 teams from the regional conferences.

From 64 teams you run a random-draw knockout competition over 6 rounds, leading to a final at Wembley. This means that a lot of non-SL clubs will get a high-profile game against SL opposition, or that they'll at least get a game against a team likely to bring some fans, and generate some press coverage. Organise to screen 2 games per round with the BBC. This presents a great opportunity for 'the spirit of the cup', for instance Warrington Wizards v Warrington Wolves, played at Wilderspool, or London Skolars v London Broncos, played at Brisbane Road, etc.

This means 1) that fans of big clubs are likely to have new away trips they haven't done before/regularly, 2) that some cup upsets will occur (e.g. Fev beating Cas) and that, 3) given the dispersal of the draw, more teams from outside the 'big four' will get to a big game, such as a quarter or semi final. Meaning that reaching a semi is a bigger occasion, that more fans will go and watch such games, and that RL games from around the country are more likely to get reported. If, for instance, Nottingham Outlaws are playing Warrington, you might go and watch that game, where you almost certainly wouldn't for a regular outlaws game.

That said, I think much better marketing needs to be done, and prices need to be adjusted to attract neutrals to the cup. 'Big Games' should be exhibitions (as indeed, Leeds v Wigan was), and we should be encouraging fans to go and watch irrespective of whether their team is playing or not. At £20 a head, that isn't going to happen. £10 adults, £5 concessions and £1 U-16s will get people into the games.

N.B. I'd add that if those measures were succesful in raising attendances, I'd keep price reductions and move to bigger grounds. Starting off at the level of the Galpharm, DW Stadium, Valley Parade etc., we should be aiming to move up to filling grounds the size of Elland Road, Bramall Lane, Anfield for semis like Hull FC v Wigan, or Warrington v St Helens.

Hey I go every year and sadly (I wish it wasn't like this honest) there are plenty of empty seats and they are NOT Club Wembley seats either which I believe are 10K by the way.
I think the Challenge Cup shows up how many fans get freebies, corporate sponsored and cheap tickets for SL games as they are full paying matches and look at the crowds!!!
But I am sure plenty on here will leap to defend the RFL and its policy of 'inflating' crowds to look good (by counting ALL tickets issued wether they attend the match or not) its an old chestnut this and like Marmite you like it or you don't.

No we weren't.