Club hits out at ‘inappropriate’ entry charge for community game but say they will ‘reluctantly’ play the match
Coventry Bears have hit out at what they say is an inappropriate charge to attend their away game at Birmingham Bulldogs this weekend.
Birmingham are charging £6 (£4.50 early bird) for people to attend the Midlands Premier Division match, which sits at tier five of the rugby league pyramid.
Although small entry fees are relatively common at the higher levels of the community game, Coventry have expressed their unhappiness at the charge, which they say they weren’t consulted on.
A club statement said: “Our strong belief is that there should be no barriers to watching games at this community level and charging entry for a tier 5 local community match is inappropriate.
“All Coventry Bears games are completely FREE with no charge. We have many young players and families new to the game associated with our club and indeed the wider Midlands community and we wish to make games as accessible as possible. Growing participation is our clubs primary focus.
“We believe that clubs should raise funds for sports development through relevant funding applications and other means.
“Our players and coaches have worked incredibly hard in pre-season and we want to ensure that they are not affected by issues outside their control. As such the club is still reluctantly participating in this community match.
“We have raised our concerns with relevant authorities and other community clubs in the league structure and we hope that Birmingham Bulldogs will reconsider it’s position going forward.”
Bulldogs looking at sustainable future
Birmingham Bulldogs are the reigning Midlands champions and play at Avery Fields, a community venue in Edgbaston which is home to rugby union side Bournville. The Bulldogs were founded in 1989 and during their history have had brief link ups with Bradford Bulls and Hull FC. They played in National League 3 in 2004.
Iwan Rewko from the Ukrainian Rugby League Federation is due to be the guest of honour at the game, which kicks off the new season.
In a recent episode of the Rugby League Outsiders podcast, Birmingham put forward their reasoning for charging for entry.
Bulldogs reps Sean Sudworth and Stuart Hood said: “We had a report done to see what we need to do to make the club sustainable, such as why players don’t stay, finances etc. One of the complaints we had was player safety, so why we were looking to move to Avery is to solve those problems.
“That’s not for us to make a profit from, that’s to pay for our school coaching etc. That’s what it’s designed to do. Part of that report we found out how much people were prepared to pay to come in in. We’re not stupid, we take on board what other clubs are saying. We’ve also now given them 20 tickets to their own club, so that solves anything. And unlike some clubs who said we were going to charge for players and physios to come in, we never were, it was totally untrue.
“If we owned the bar and we owned the facilities, then 100% (t would be free). The difference up north is the rugby league club is your own, but we’re having to hire these facilities, and we don’t get anything from bar sales.”
Coventry warmed up for the new season with a 38-30 friendly defeat to Elmbridge Eagles last weekend.
The Bears reverted to a community club when the League One club was rebranded to Midlands Hurricanes, as part of a wider strategy to grow the game in the area.
A relatively common charge for entry in the community game is around £3, with clubs also generating funds through the sale of match programmes and raffles.
Advance tickets are being sold via Eventbrite for the game on Saturday May 6, which kicks off at 2.30pm.