Tony Rea has spent the week preparing the London Broncos team for Saturday night's televised match against Hull KR, but as a former chief executive, the current coach concedes that the most important issues facing the club are off the field.
Perhaps it suits him to say that, as the Broncos made a slow start to the season with home defeats against Widnes and Wakefield at The Stoop before they claimed their first win at the fourth attempt in impressive style at Salford last Friday. But the worryingly small attendances at those opening two home games – which attracted an aggregate of 4,743 to The Stoop, the Twickenham base of Harlequins that the Broncos have continued to share since abandoning the Quins name two years ago – have again raised major questions about the future of the club.
Nigel Wood, the chief executive of the Rugby Football League, conceded in an interview with BBC London 94.9 this week that the current situation is causing major concern to the governing body. "It is almost inconceivable to consider yourself a national sport without having a strong presence in the capital," he said. "We just have to make sure that we get that presence right. It is probably not right as it is and we need to work with all the stakeholders to improve that."
"There are some big decisions coming up, and we've got to make sure we make good decisions," added Rea, who first came to London as a hooker in the first Super League season back in 1996 and was tempted back from Australia last July for his third stint as coach. "My take on it having been on the inside and recently the outside is that the club's been so resilient for so long that the rewards have got to come at some point. It's really easy not to believe, but if we get these decisions right we can make it better than ever."
It is where the Broncos play from next season, however, that is currently exercising the minds of David Hughes – the long-serving chairman with a long-suffering wallet – and his latest chief executive, Gus Mackay, the former Zimbabwe cricketer. The Stoop remains an option, but it is clearly not working at the moment.
They have explored others in On the Road fixtures, and will return to Gillingham's Priestfield Stadium for the game against Warrington in June. But the club's preferred solution would be either sharing a stadium that is on the tube and ideally reasonably central – Craven Cottage, where they began life as Fulham back in 1980, was perfect, but is alas now unavailable – or a home of their own.
That makes Rea's on-field task, of building on the seven-try romp at Salford to challenge for a return to the play-offs after a six-season absence, appear comparatively straightforward. But Hull KR also claimed a much-needed win of their own, 26-12 at home to previously unbeaten Warrington, and were the highest scorers of Super League's first five rounds with 148 points.
There will be further evidence of rugby league's dainty footprint in London and the south on Sunday when the Skolars face Hemel Stags at the New River Stadium, both Championship One teams having won their opening Northern Rail Cup fixtures last weekend.
The Skolars under-16s played a cross-code friendly on Wednesday against Saracens on their new artificial pitch at Barnet Copthall, another of the numerous grounds used by London in the past. "We need to pull all the strands together to come up with a credible plan that the whole of the rugby league community in London can get behind and buy into," added Wood. "It's not any one person's problem – it's our problem."
No comments:
Post a Comment