Mailbox: Rugby league is hidden away as a secret
Mailbox gives you the chance to get your voice heard and start the debate with the rugby league audience. Want to be featured? Email the editor: james@loverugbyleague.com
Dear Editor,
I entirely agree with your comment that the fans need to be heard. I have written to Red Hall several times and, as yet, have never had the courtesy of any acknowledgement or reply.
My main concern is that RL is becoming a best kept secret as a result of a total lack of any serious marketing or promotion from the top.
Only Super League is ever mentioned anywhere on any of the BBC media outlets. Look North, based in Leeds only ever mention local Super League teams, and never cover any Championship or League 1 games, often big local West Yorks derbies, and yet find time to cover football all through the various leagues. The red button and RL website only cover Super League issues.
Us diehard RL fans know how and where to obtain any amount of news and current affairs on the game. However, there is no way the many thousand potential new followers can whet their appetites as they are not made aware by the general sporting media.
Call it conspiracy theory, but, notice how the big money backers of football and RU, and recently NFL and Women’s football, are insisting that their products have maximum blanket coverage and promotion across the media. Where is RL?? No sponsorship or backers so no coverage. Hidden away as a secret and yet as a family sporting product much more thrilling and enjoyable but still kept away from the general public eyes.
Championship, League 1 and grassroots all need serious and professional sponsorship and marketing from the top to ensure a healthy future development of the game. It is not good enough to keep using RL web sites and social media as excuses for media coverage.
To conclude, could we please begin a debate on getting rid, once and for all, of the embarrassing and cringeworthy promotional videos featuring cartoon ‘blockheads’ cavorting around the Pennines, how typically parochial and self conscious of RLHQ.
Surely we have a library of fast action tries and big hits, emphasising all that is good about our game and the superb athletes many from other sports admire and respect. Other sports do it with huge impact. The only people who seem to continue to put our game down are the faceless ‘salaries’ at Red Hall.
I could continue,
Yours in RL
Phil Slade.
Mailbox gives you the chance to get your voice heard and start the debate with the rugby league audience. Want to be featured? Email the editor: james@loverugbyleague.com