Stalled and stagnant Sydney clubs

[The Great Dane]

You seen many people from sub continent or asia for that matter at Rugby League?

Uhhh yeah.

An admittedly small, but solid, portion of the Raiders fanbase are of Asian heritage, and you will see them at every home game and wearing gear around town.

The suggestion that's not happening in Sydney says more about the clubs in Sydney, and their utter failure to sell themselves within those communities, than it does about those communities.

 

[Iamback]

Uhhh yeah.

An admittedly small, but solid, portion of the Raiders fanbase are of Asian heritage, and you will see them at every home game and wearing gear around town.

The suggestion that's not happening in Sydney says more about the clubs in Sydney, and their utter failure to sell themselves within those communities, than it does about those communities.

Do you think the Dragons do less now than Before? Rockdale demographic has changed over the years.

 

[The Great Dane]

Do you think the Dragons do less now than Before?

Less what exactly?

Rockdale demographic has changed over the years.

Demographics have changed in every city over the years.

Roughly 50% of Australia's population is either born overseas or has at least one parent that was, so adapting to those changes is par for the course of being in the professional sports business in this country, and that's without even getting into other forms of demographic change that can have a big impact (particularly class).

If you can't adapt to those demographic changes then maybe you should consider relocating to a more hospitable market or dropping to a lower tier competition where your business is more sustainable. Radical I know, but that's how the well run competitions solve that problem.

 

[mongoose]

It shouldn't even be hard for the NRL as it has people with heritage from all over, 50% of our players have black skin.

You would think AFL and cricket would have a harder job (well cricket is an easy sell to people from the subcontinent) as a much larger proportion of their player base are Anglo's.

 

[The Great Dane]

You would think AFL and cricket would have a harder job (well cricket is an easy sell to people from the subcontinent) as a much larger proportion of their player base are Anglo's.

I'm no expert, but from what I've seen the AFL does have a harder time.

The AFL still has serious issues with racism where most accusations of racism in the NRL these days are media beat-ups, and though I obviously don't have data to back this up (if it exists at all it's not public information), from what I have seen grassroots and junior Aussie Rules is by far the least diverse football code in the country. It honestly wouldn't even be close.

 

[Get Rid of The Donkeys]

Uhhh yeah.

An admittedly small, but solid, portion of the Raiders fanbase are of Asian heritage, and you will see them at every home game and wearing gear around town.

The suggestion that's not happening in Sydney says more about the clubs in Sydney, and their utter failure to sell themselves within those communities, than it does about those communities.

Dragons are one club that should be promoting itself to people of East Asian descent. There's plenty of East Asians in Southern Sydney and the "dragon" is of great spiritual importance in China. The Sunnybank Dragons onionball club has tapped into the large Chinese community that makes up Sunnybank's population and has grown astronomically over the last 20 years.

 

[siv]

Most migrant parents do not change their sport allegances just because they came to Australia

Its the first or second generation kids who grew up locally that start being interested

It is even more pronounced in cultures like China, SE Asia or India who have very little interested in contact sports

Chinese have been in Australia since the gold rush yet still dont play sport much. So its not a recent issue.

 

[Perth Red]

There's still 60% plus of the population to aim at! 20k crowds shouldn't be difficult, every other city in the world with a top flight team in their respective sport is managing it. Tribalism is supposed to be a strength of interest on following a club but I dont see it reflected in crowds.

 

[Iamback]

There's still 60% plus of the population to aim at! 20k crowds shouldn't be difficult, every other city in the world with a top flight team in their respective sport is managing it. Tribalism is supposed to be a strength of interest on following a club but I dont see it reflected in crowds.

Hahahaha NBA doesn't even draw 20k average.

Or not top flight enough for you?

 

[Perth Red]

Hahahaha NBA doesn't even draw 20k average.

Or not top flight enough for you?

In which city is NBA seen as bigger than the NFL or MBL clubs based there? Not to mention they play 20 home games and play in indoor arenas which by their nature have ltd capacities. Whats the % of capacity for NBA clubs crowds? Probably over 90% for most of them

 

[Iamback]

In which city is NBA seen as bigger than the NFL or MBL clubs based there?

The Knicks and Nets are bigger than the Jets or Giants.
Bulls are bigger than the Bears
Celtics are bigger than the Patriots

so quite a few

 

[Iamback]

Cricket is big in Pakistan. Yet NRL draws more then the PSL
NRL out draws Top 14 in France

On the global scale NRL does pretty well

 

[Perth Red]

The Knicks and Nets are bigger than the Jets or Giants.
Bulls are bigger than the Bears
Celtics are bigger than the Patriots

so quite a few

In which case they would be selling out their capacities every game I would think? In fact just looked and all those clubs you mentioned are at 93-100% capacity attendances and 18-21k crowds. My point stands, to be avg'ing 14k where the sport is the main game in the city is much lower than pretty much any sport around the world in developed nations. Especially when Sydney should be benefitting from away fans given how many games feature clubs from the same city playing each other.

 

[Perth Red]

Cricket is big in Pakistan. Yet NRL draws more then the PSL
NRL out draws Top 14 in France

On the global scale NRL does pretty well

Top 14 isnt the main sport in France, soccer is. How does NRL compare to League 1? , having worked in Pakistan I can tell you most people couldn't afford to watch professional sport on their wages and yet for a comp with just 6 teams played for 8 weeks they still avg 14.5k which is same as Sydney NRL avg.

Not really, NRL is 27th in the world for attendances, and the main concern is it hasnt changed for nearly two decades. Thats the point of the thread, how do we get the stagnation moving! It seems for the last ten years the NRL has been saying new stadiums will foix the problem. It may yet but it seems we need more than just new venues.

 

[Iamback]

In which case they would be selling out their capacities every game I would think? In fact just looked and all those clubs you mentioned are at 93-100% capacity attendances and 18-21k crowds. My point stands, to be avg'ing 14k where the sport is the main game in the city is much lower than pretty much any sport around the world in developed nations. Especially when Sydney should be benefitting from away fans given how many games feature clubs from the same city playing each other.

2024-2025 NBA Attendance - National Basketball Association - ESPN

Find out the 2024-2025 attendance numbers for every NBA team.

www.espn.com

Here has the % but some start at 75%

Indoor does lower the capacity but it does make weather not an issue.
Population is also different but point is if the NBA can make it work on 14k crowds. Then NRL can too

 

[Perth Red]

N

2024-2025 NBA Attendance - National Basketball Association - ESPN

Find out the 2024-2025 attendance numbers for every NBA team.

www.espn.com

Here has the % but some start at 75%

Indoor does lower the capacity but it does make weather not an issue.
Population is also different but point is if the NBA can make it work on 14k crowds. Then NRL can too

NBA works because A) the avg ticket price is $100 B)the TV deals are massive (ten times the NRL deal) so can fund clubs accordingly and C) global merch sales are off the charts (over $1.3billion revenue a year). In summary it doesnt need big crowds. NRL revenue, even as a % based on club costs, isnt even close to it hence why clubs need to generate more revenue of their own. And people at games and buying full memberships is a great way to do that. The biggest attended clubs in Australia earn $30-40million plus from fan spend alone (around 40-50% of revenue). Most NRL cllubs earn less than $5million (around 5-10% of revenue)

 

[Get Rid of The Donkeys]

In which city is NBA seen as bigger than the NFL or MBL clubs based there? Not to mention they play 20 home games and play in indoor arenas which by their nature have ltd capacities. Whats the % of capacity for NBA clubs crowds? Probably over 90% for most of them

I saw an NBA Mini between Phoenix Suns and LA Lakers last night. Phoenix win to improve their record to 63-16, making in their most successful season. That's 79 games. I'm guessing they have about 40 home games. The arena they played in was huge and looked sold out.

 

[The Great Dane]

Hahahaha NBA doesn't even draw 20k average.

Or not top flight enough for you?

The NBA's attendance is strictly limited by the nature of having to play in arenas, so you're not comparing like for like.

On top of that the NBA's average ticket price dwarves the NRL's, depending on the team it varied between US$58 to US$473 in 2021. I think it's fair to say that if the NRL was trying to push tickets at a similar price that it's average attendance would totally tank, where as if the NBA had the room in their arenas and had a similar average ticket price to the NRL's that it's attendance numbers would absolutely explode.

So how about we compare ourselves to one of our closest competitors instead of leagues under totally different market pressures to ours, like the AFL for example... Before you start making excuses, attendances similar to the AFL's are definitely achievable in the NRL if we make some changes to how we do things.

 

[The Great Dane]

In which city is NBA seen as bigger than the NFL or MBL clubs based there? Not to mention they play 20 home games and play in indoor arenas which by their nature have ltd capacities. Whats the % of capacity for NBA clubs crowds? Probably over 90% for most of them

TBF the NBA is definitely more culturally relevant than the MBL, and has been for a decade or more.

So with the exception of some of the larger MBL teams, the NBA would be bigger in most cities at this point.

 

[cumbrian Mackem]

F#ck off tigers. Just seriously f#ck off and take the dragons with you.