Bradford Bulls Pledge 10'000 campaign - keep away please. : Thu Sep 23, 2010 4:57 pm
As a lifelong supporter of my local club, I was pretty horrified at the sight of the Bradford Bulls Pledge 10'000 promotion bus parked in the car park of the Yorkshire Mill Village (less than one mile from Mount Pleasant) in Batley this morning. I understand the bus also visited not only the Birstall area, from where my club draws a good number of fans, but the cente of Dewsbury. Batley has a professional Rugby League club, as does Dewsbury, and we struggle year after year to attract fans on a miniscule promotional budget. In reality, we have to rely on our on-field success to attract floating, and fickle local supporters.
As well as this cynical and selfish campaign in our towns being both morally and ethically wrong, Batley and Dewsbury are not even located in the same local authority as Bradford.
In 1996, the Batley and Dewsbury clubs lost hundreds of existing and potential fans to Bradford Bulls, following a similarly cynical promotion drive, which included a school visitation programme in the Heavy Woollen district, despite the existence of similar schemes run by our professional sporting organisations.
If any Bradford Bulls supporters wish to bicker with me over their right to advertise in other towns that already have long-standing Rugby League clubs, I would like to ask them how they would feel about, lets say, a Leeds Rhinos drive to attract fans from the Bradford area, which included a blue and amber promotional bus parked in the middle of Forster Square.
Its commendable of the Bulls to come up with this scheme to increase their crowds, but don't do it at the expense of lower league clubs that face a constant struggle to survive, and don't have the finances to compete with you to any extent. To bring your promotion to within less than a mile of both our respective grounds isn't just morally dubious, its also hugely disrespectful.
