Quote Pepe="Pepe"Of course we can be a force.
As far as attendances go, we were better than Quins, Huddersfield, Wakey and Salford, when in SL. In 2005, when we were relegated and playing terrible, we actually increased our attendances. With a good team, having some modest success, we would have been getting close to the magic 10,000 imo.
..............2002 2003 2004 2005
Widnes: 6510 6511 6153 6794
Wakey: 3889 4017 4806 5100
Salford: 4199 n/a 3996 4093
Quins: 3803 3546 3458 4003
Hudds: n/a 4722 4362 5853
All those other clubs have now increased their attendances. Some of them still can't get what we were getting through the gate in 2005 even now though. There is no doubt we would have also increased our attendances if we were still in SL. We'd probably be hovering around the top 6 best supported clubs in the game.
We have everything in place that is required to be a success; Stadium, some of the best player and training facilities in the sport, Youth development, large amateur catchment area, a tradition of producing some of the finest players to pull on an RL shirt, the best attendances in our division, great sponsors and a great backer.
We have the, largely, untapped areas of Cheshire, Sth Merseyside and North Wales to tap into, as well as having a borough including of Both Widnes and Runcorn with a combined population of 114,662. Halton borough council own 10% of the club and are helping the club promote themselves in all the schools in the borough. The people of both these towns own the stadium and also attend the games. It’s not just Widnesians who attend.
WTF more could anyone ask?'"
I'm a Wigan fan and I think exactly the same. The proof is in the pudding. What more to the RFL want. IMO they should realise they have cocked up and put you in next time round for sure. Widnes would be like another Hull KR, but even better with the quality facilities.
Thanks for all the feedback from all of you.
I am sure if you came back to super league you could be hitting 9,000 against saints, us and wire easily. With some success, even just finishing half way up the table, having not been in super league for so long your attendances would be around 7,000. How the RFL can say Wakey offer more to super league than you, I will never know!
What sort of away support would you be bringing to our place?
I think the most impressive attribute for Widnes is the fact they have kept the youth development going out of super league. Its nothing short of amazing. You add the stadium, attendances and all the rest of the potential, I really can see why you were all so upset when the franchise was announced.
A bit of a contrast really, we cheated to stay in super league, you have been cheated out of it.
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