Stan A. Einstein wrote:Lysaght Dancer wrote:My view is that we need to focus on getting ourselves a ground ASAP or lobby the council urgently to take over RP once the Dragons inevitably fail.
For all the talk about us being bad off the field just look at the Dragons. They have a big team of commercial staff but are giving away a thousand tickets a game and still can’t get over 3k spectators. People are calling their chairman Comical Butty because they keep announcing attendances of over 4K when there is only 2k there.
To think Newport RFC used to get 8k every week. It’s clear that County is now the primary sport in Newport and that the terribly run Dragons will be gone before we know it - if this is the case we need to start lobbying now and start planning to take over RP if we can as their is no way the WRU will allow the Dragons to carry on like they are.
Just pause for a moment. I agree entirely about our need to lobby the Council for County to have a proper stake in Rodney Parade.
However to work it has to be done in conjunction with the rugby. Neither the rugby or us are big enough alone to finance the development of a 21st century stadium. Working together we might be able to. Working together with the City Council I think the three together most certainly can.
It seems there is a lack of understanding of the complexities of who owns pro rugby at the ground.
We can’t ‘work with the rugby’ because the Dragons are the WRU and the WRU are the Dragons.
‘the rugby’ in this case will cease to exist if the WRU decide to knock pro rugby in the area on the head, which is looking increasingly likely. The WRU only took on the Dragons because they got the asset on the cheap. So if they go, the rugby goes.
Newport RFC (who’s asset was taken from them for 30 peices of silver) who are now semi pro will not attract anything north of 1000 fans even for big games.
So if we ended up taking a stake in RP then it will be as us as the lead party, it will be us with the biggest stake and will be us who the council will be more interested in.
And the only way we can get RP is if we pay the WRU £6-£7m. This will require a couple of million from the council, a lot of private funding and a big massive mortgage.