War of the Roses (Again)

5 hours ago, Gerrumonside ref said:

The truth is Yorkshire is inward looking in many ways which is good and bad whereas Lancashire’s two major cities have exploded onto the world stage really in reputation and importance over a number of measures.

The sporting rivalry is really about regions within Lancashire eclipsing any need to be too concerned with what’s happening to Yorkshire.

The genie is out the bottle and is difficult to put back.

Exactly…..they would be delighted with West Riding v East Riding, winners to play North Riding. It could be sponsored by Harry Ramsdens.

There needs to be a serious conversation about what the game wants from a mid season window. The long term goal for me has to be Tier 1 internationals twice a year, and that means England or GB playing multiple matches here, and overseas every year. That will bring in a new market for ticket sales and TV viewers, and give more to aspire to for kids interested in playing the game. How we get there isn't obvious but a revival of top level Roses matches could act as a stepping stone to that goal. If there are other goals that are seen as a priority, then lay those out and see if they can also be achieved this way or if there is a better alternative.

I can see a lot of positives if it was done right:

2 or 3 weeks rest for most players is good to keep up standards in the Super League, England players need competitive matches where they can test out different combinations, a stepping stone to the England team would let more players showcase themselves, Yorkshire v Lancashire has history and is a real rivalry not an invented one, a series could be combined with an international game in London or France if the window was wide enough, it historically attracted paying fans and TV interest.

10 hours ago, sam4731 said:

Everything has to start somewhere. I know we've done WotR before but this is a new era and if we do it properly, it could be as big as SOO one day.

10 hours ago, gingerjon said:

So far, your idea is: play it, market it.

The rivalry between NSW and Queensland was real and already had a RL angle. Is it really going to ruin your season if Lancashire lose to Yorkshire?

I haven’t read through all the comments of this thread yet, but these back to back posts from page one tends to be the recurring themes for promoters and detractors.

I place myself in the promoters basket. As a youngster, SOO was very important to me. I am far less invested in SOO than I once was. I even have some less than favourable feelings around the series due to selection criteria. Nevertheless, I still watch the SOO every year for the spectacle and high quality fixture that it is, rather than having any highs or lows based on the performance of NSW. 

Another point detractors always bring up is that the WOTR wasn’t successful before. Neither were all rockets to the moon and neither were NSW v Qld fixtures. Origin was a concept devised (copied) in the early eighties to change the annual state v state fixture and it worked.

I don’t see a better opportunity to give a wider number of elite English players a quality high stakes annual representative fixture/s than WOTR. To me, it’s not a case of can it work, it’s more a case of making it work. I think that starts with how @Bedfordshire Bronco put it, fish where the fishes are. To me, that means making the WOTR series an unmissable fixture for any RL enthusiast.

North of the M62 v South of the M62? That would set pulses racing. 

I return to the idea of a regional comp: 

Cumbria, South Wales, Occitanie, London/SE, Yorkshire, Lancashire

Top players get games against each other; comp has a cosmopolitan feel rather than a Northern one, with 3 countries involved.

53 minutes ago, Archie Gordon said:

I return to the idea of a regional comp: 

Cumbria, South Wales, Occitanie, London/SE, Yorkshire, Lancashire

Top players get games against each other; comp has a cosmopolitan feel rather than a Northern one, with 3 countries involved.

 

With some tweaking, I think this is the only way rep fixtures could ever work.

But you'd need to reduce the number of club fixtures, spend money on the structure and development, and do more than just hold a half-baked game in Warrington and hope RL's usual fans turn up...

49 minutes ago, gingerjon said:

...

But you'd need to reduce the number of club fixtures, 

...

You say that like it's a bad thing. SL doesn't need a 27-game regular season.

Agree on the other stuff. It would need a decent budget and TV interest to launch it - that is difficult to envisage but not impossible. RLC ought to exist for this very thing. By that, I don't mean this particular plan but I do mean (a) finding a way to bring representative (international) rugby into the mid-season calendar in a regular/permanent way and selling it and (b) developing new comps (assets) to monetise. It seems easiest to me to try and crack both (a) and (b) in one go.

2 hours ago, Archie Gordon said:

I return to the idea of a regional comp: 

Cumbria, South Wales, Occitanie, London/SE, Yorkshire, Lancashire

Top players get games against each other; comp has a cosmopolitan feel rather than a Northern one, with 3 countries involved.

 

I think if there was a Yorkshire vs Lancashire game then Cumbria vs London/SE could be played at the same time but wouldn’t include them all together in the same tournament

29 minutes ago, Archie Gordon said:

You say that like it's a bad thing. SL doesn't need a 27-game regular season.

I see it as a barrier rather than a bad thing.

The clubs have shown time and again that gate income across 13 home games is key for them.

5 minutes ago, JM2010 said:

I think if there was a Yorkshire vs Lancashire game then Cumbria vs London/SE could be played at the same time but wouldn’t include them all together in the same tournament

Then you've just made it the most boring set up imaginable.

4 minutes ago, gingerjon said:

Then you've just made it the most boring set up imaginable.

But Yorkshire and Lancashire putting 80+ points on London is exciting???

Just now, JM2010 said:

But Yorkshire and Lancashire putting 80+ points on London is exciting???

Would they? I have no idea.

We already know that standalone Roses fixtures generate no excitement, interest or profit. If we're going down this road, doing something that has failed because nobody cares enough for it not to fail is not a way forward.

As said, the only reason it is even being suggested is because the alternatives are being poorly done. There has been literally zero movement to re-establishing the game away from that.

Which rather tells you something.

I can't remember if anyone put down a Yorks-Lancs match as their favourite game ever on the thread we had.

I think all other types of RL games were featured though.

An observation there about just how significant and engaging a standalone Roses match or series has been and would be.

2 minutes ago, gingerjon said:

Would they? I have no idea.

We already know that standalone Roses fixtures generate no excitement, interest or profit. If we're going down this road, doing something that has failed because nobody cares enough for it not to fail is not a way forward.

As said, the only reason it is even being suggested is because the alternatives are being poorly done. There has been literally zero movement to re-establishing the game away from that.

Which rather tells you something.

I’m sure you know enough about RL to know they would put a big score on London. I wasn’t even saying we should bring the Roses back my point was that if they did then London shouldn’t play against Yorkshire or Lancashire 

6 minutes ago, JM2010 said:

I’m sure you know enough about RL to know they would put a big score on London. I wasn’t even saying we should bring the Roses back my point was that if they did then London shouldn’t play against Yorkshire or Lancashire 

In my imagined county set up the top tier would be Yorkshire, Lancashire, Cumbria - with a play off between the bottom side and the top of the tier below (let's say North Wales, South Wales, London) for P&R.

I'd not be bringing back Yorks v Lancs as a context free dirge.

Just now, JM2010 said:

...

I wasn’t even saying we should bring the Roses back my point was that if they did then London shouldn’t play against Yorkshire or Lancashire 

Of course they should. They have plenty of decent players to choose from. To start with they would be well beaten but not embarrassed. This is the route that lots of successful sports take who don't seem much concerned by running comps that include a mix of close games and blowouts.

Are the enough elite players out there to fill these squads to provide a high quality enough spectacle?  Assuming all the overseas players we pack into our game wont be a consideration?

Would IMG veto this? It portrays a parochial image that IMG have been brought in to move the game away from. It immediately tells the rest of the nation to " butt out" of this local scrap. There's less chance of this happening than Boris Johnson defecting to Labour in the upcoming general election.

33 minutes ago, gingerjon said:

In my imagined county set up the top tier would be Yorkshire, Lancashire, Cumbria - with a play off between the bottom side and the top of the tier below (let's say North Wales, South Wales, London) for P&R.

I'd not be bringing back Yorks v Lancs as a context free dirge.

I like this idea. Cumbria could be competitive and their fans would definitely get behind them. The 2nd tier could be used for development areas such as London, N Wales and S Wales. My only concern would be if there are any other areas that could compete with London in the 2nd tier. What kind of team could N Wales, S Wales or maybe even the North East put out?

32 minutes ago, HawkMan said:

Would IMG veto this? It portrays a parochial image that IMG have been brought in to move the game away from. It immediately tells the rest of the nation to " butt out" of this local scrap. There's less chance of this happening than Boris Johnson defecting to Labour in the upcoming general election.

In thier questionnaire they had a specific question about rep football...they specifically mentioned WOTR from memory 

20 hours ago, sam4731 said:

Nothing on here has convinced me that it isn't at least worth a punt. Like I said, maybe fans wouldn't get behind Lancashire but maybe putting the players in the spotlight rather than the teams is the way to go.

Make the Yorkshire vs Lancashire the headline but really focus in on the rivalries between the players in the marketing.

At the end of the day, fewer and fewer people care about internationals now so let's give a fiery match for neutral fans to enjoy.

This is the bit we need to address and if the will was there it would be eminently do-able as proven by most other sports.

1 hour ago, Spidey said:

Are the enough elite players out there to fill these squads to provide a high quality enough spectacle?  Assuming all the overseas players we pack into our game wont be a consideration?

Past experience is that most of the first choice Lancashire squad will withdraw a day or two before the game due to groin strains or whatever, because no-one cares who wins. Scousers vs Woolybacks could be absolutely massive if we had a few more James Grahams though. 

Apart from the fact that hardly anyone in Lancashire is interested and it's never attracted much interest in the previous 120+ years, what is the claimed benefit of playing this game? Is it going to make money - doesn't sound like it? Is it going to raise the profile of RL in some way? Do soccer, rugby union or cricket have a representative level between the club game and internationals anywhere in the UK?  Does this happen anywhere else in professional sport in Europe or North America. Or is purely an Australian thing that won't work anywhere else.

2 hours ago, Bedfordshire Bronco said:

In thier questionnaire they had a specific question about rep football...they specifically mentioned WOTR from memory 

Do we know what the responses were?

Also, do we know what the players think?

I'll throw in a representative nine's competition over a nice warm weekend mid-summer instead of Magic. England, France, Wales, Scotland, and Exiles from Aus, NZ, Samoa, Tonga.

19 hours ago, JohnM said:

The World Vs Yorkshire.

There has to be some niggle between the two parties to stoke the thing up in the weeks leading up to the game. Lancs Vs Yorks, Red Roses has lost all its sting. 

It has to be this. Surely Yorkshire folk would want to win to prove how great Yorkshire is (not that they need any convincing), and as a citizen of the rest of the world, I'd seriously hate it if they won.