By Zippy
July 20 2004

In yesterdays sports editorial a letter was featured from a fan of Cardiff enlighting us on his distorted view of "The Facts", I've written a reply which I've sent in and follows below.

Fan-ing the flames

The "debate" goes on! Or does it? Well the vitriol from certain sectors of the former Warriors' heartland continues to pour forth. However, this is rarely accompanied by real FACTS.

In your paper on July 4 2004 you published a letter from Mr J Evans, a Warrior/Ponty fan, who questioned the commitment of some of the "faithful". In WoS, published on the 12th July, Kevin McGrath bites back. Let's examine his comments: " gates of 10,000 plus against Wasps, 7,000 against Perpignon and 5,000 against Munster and Cardiff (which were both televised live) shows that the region was building a considerable supporters' base that compared favourably with Cardiff, Newport and the Neath/Swansea axis ."

Now for real facts! Below are the average home attendances for the Welsh "home" Celtic League games. The figures are taken from the Celtic League's website and compiled by myself!

Team Total Average % of Wales average
Llanelli 65,980 5,998 28.37%
Blues 48,040 4,367 23.50%
Dragons 44,468 4,043 19.12%
Ospreys 43,295 3,936 18.62%
Warriors 30,757 2,796 13.23%

The Warriors hardly shape up as he'd have us believe.

Mr McGrath added that the Warriors were: " building a base that compares favourably ." I'll let the general mass of readers evaluate that comment for themselves! I probably should not mention that even GLASGOW had better attendance figures than the "Rugby Heartland" of Wales!

Let us look at the fixture that Mr McGrath "selects" for comment Wasps 10,000: This was a Heineken Cup game coming on the back of an excellent win at the Wasps ground. The "feel-good factor" would have a positive affect on the game as would a large contingent of "away" supporters.

Perpignon, attended by 7,000: A "big game" against the previous season's Heineken Cup finalists. No particular boost from the away team. A good crowd!!

Munster, attended by 5,000: A game at Sardis Road! The last competitive game at Sardis Road for the great Neil Jenkins. Surely a factor that would put a few thousand on the attendance on its own.

Cardiff, attended by 5,000: Only 5,000 for a game between Bridgend/ Ponty and C*****f., don't make me laugh! Ponty would have filled Sardis Road on a Wednesday night in December. Here we have Jenks' last ever competitive game in Ponty. Also there was the small matter of Gareth Thomas and the fact that it was his last game for the region. If you also count the number of Cardiff fans at the ground you would see that the Warrior support at that game was poor. So why did the Warriors fail if all the fans were of the same ilk as Kevin McGrath? Well, simply they were not!

For every supporter who saw every game at both Sardis Road and the Brewery Field, who made 300-mile round trips to the likes of London Welsh, who spent "thousands" on merchandising and travel, there were more who did not see every game (or saw none at all!)

Far more did not make the 20 or so mile round trip to the Brewery Field from the Valleys. Far more did not spend anything on merchandising and travel. Also, I am of the opinion that Samuels, for all his comment now, wanted shot of the region. He stated that he wanted to safeguard the region. Why then did he sell it to the WRU when he knew that they only wanted four regions?

Why did he not put a clause in the sales contract to ensure that the region was allowed to continue for a minimum period of time or ownership would revert back?

I am saddened for the genuine fans of the Warriors who feel let down.

But they must look within the region for the root causes of the failure and not at C*****f or the rest of the regions.

Marc Wakeham

Cardiff

 

Looking To The Future

 

Sir - In Response to Mr Wakeham's fanning the flames last week.

Lets take a look at the Wasps fixture, the official crowd given was 10,800 as that is the fire safety limit at the Brewery Field. However estimates suggest the crowd was hundreds higher.

That alone makes it the highest crowd for a regional team in Wales last season,

Mr Wakeham suggests that no one bought any Warriors merchandise, this is wrong, the Warriors shirt was the biggest seller in Wales last year.

Does this not prove there was the potential of large support for the Warriors?

The Cardiff game was scheduled for a Saturday and another sell out was expected but the fixture was changed last minute to a Friday for television coverage.

Of the Warriors 12 home Celtic League games 83% were covered by television at unsociable hours for fans.

People have put a lot of focus on the Celtic League attendances, can we consider that the Celtic League is little more than a joke tournament, the Irish don’t care about it and the Scots use it as a warm up to the European Cup.

Hardly a tournament to bring in the unconverted is it?

But perhaps its time to look to the future, we MUST not repeat the mistakes of Scottish rugby who made two pro teams and abandoned the “Heartland” of the Borders. By the time they gave the Borders a pro team Scottish rugby had gone to the dogs.

Cardiff and the Ospreys are giving lip service to the former Warriors supporters and I doubt any will attend another regional game.

The Warriors must come back in some shape or form, to start with a Connacht style “Development Region” to bridge the gap between premiership and the regions.

And then it gives fans the chance to prove there is a market for the Warriors.

Where does the money come from? Sell the Stadium, its crippling the game.

 

Zippy

Bridgend