The owners of Swinton Lions have decided to change the name of the club to Manchester Lions. Some of the fans have raised a petition to protest this.
For those who want to add their support:
https://l.facebook.com/l.php?u=https...3gT4tUybpuj3An
The owners of Swinton Lions have decided to change the name of the club to Manchester Lions. Some of the fans have raised a petition to protest this.
For those who want to add their support:
https://l.facebook.com/l.php?u=https...3gT4tUybpuj3An
While I do feel for the few loyal fans who are upset by this, the text of that petition basically reads like an explanation of why a change of this nature is absolutely necessary. As the petition says, they are perennial strugglers with no geographical base and a core support of 3-400.
How the mighty have fallen.
I heard their chairman speaking about it.
Frankly they cannot carry on existing out of Swinton with crowds in the low hundreds.
I get it's a major change but I in reality it's a case of change or die.
This is understandably quite emotive and when you see recent history you do get it. We had a CEO who saw us as Merseyside Saints till Eamon chased him. Warrington would have become a Widnes feeder club as Cheshire all within the last twenty years or so.
Then you go onto life outside of Super League. Oldham are playing on a rented field which is for those who remember it Houghton Road ex St Helens Town and in the opposite end of town to the historic fan base. Crowds are now 500 and it only serves the current owner, the club is basically dead living on RFL handouts etc.
Swinton. Andy Mazey the owner was heavily involved in Leigh until Beaumont had a bigger wallet. Mazey on and off the field has done a good job, crowds on the up (850) figure and the team doing well. The previous poster is right they will never return to M44 its been far too long now. The club has lurched from crisis to crisis over 30 years or more.
The sad but logical answer is if you are playing out of Sale or the Belle Vue Speedway Arena "re-brand" to focus on Manchester and a new audience "hopefully" Swinton has always associated to Manchester and not Salford so in many ways it makes sense. The RFL is a basket case and central funding will diminish and a few clubs will die in that process sadly.
They have nothing to lose as they have nothing. The game at junior level is fast disappearing from these former bedrock places. Sadly neglected by the super league clubs and the RFL in general. They used to hold the Lancashire cup final and many of the Challenge cup semi's there. Have attended on many occasions but so long ago.
Don't blame The Directors announcing they have all resigned! it is being reported, if I invested my own money into a RL Club what was not moving forward I would have to choose if I want to throw my money away! At times there has to be change, names, grounds everything to develop and more important to resign. A sad day, I remember so well as a kid Lancashire Cup Finals at Station Road, what experiences they were! games were Saturday afternoons and as you walked out of the ground The Manchester Evening News had a mobile printing van and they would be selling copies of the paper with match reports and football scores in the big stop press! days when we attracted Major Crowds regular to our game! not like now.
This just in.
https://swintonlionsrlfc.co.uk/news/board-statement/
Swinton diehards probably need to can the petition and open up a justgiving page , having chased off their benefactor.
It will end up as a members club similar to Hornets and then realise it is not sustainable without a benefactor to plug what remains from central funding. Once central funding goes its goodnight Vienna with what fans are left realising what they had in Mazey who is pretty good to be fair.
It's a shame. I saw them at Leigh a few weeks back and they were pretty good and lost a close game. Yes back in the day they had players like Stopford and Blan but those days are gone. If Bradford can't even play in their home city, what next?
I remember two great Premiership finals; 1976 and 1977 at the old Station rd. I think the last time i went there with my old dad was in the Murphy coaching era when fans were listening to one of his half time team talks in the changing rooms under the old stand. It involved loads of expletives and not much else. Happy days though!
HaHa carbon copy.
Remember both. 76 Prem final my second ever game.
Had my ear cocked like all the other fans listening to Murphy bollock everyone after Tommy
Frodsham ran rings round Saints for 40 mins.
Happy days.
I’m sure Eric Ashton was coach in 76/77 !
Unfortunately I think the actions of what I am sure are passionate fans may have actually signed the death warrant for their own club.
Echo some of the above. Think my first Saints cup final was the 1976 Premiership at Station Road against Salford.
Think my last visit there was Gary Connolly's debut in a Challenge Cup game?
Emotions always run high with stuff like this so one hopes time is a healer, everyone calms down and there is a proper conversation as to the future direction of the club.
I’m not convinced Manchester rebranding would be a panacea for their problems. It would take a huge effort to attract a materially bigger audience to their fixtures. That said their fans appear to have a choice: exist as a community driven club or take a bit of a punt on Mazey’s vision (assuming he comes back).
Post script: my memory of Swinton as a kid was Lockers doing his arm there (twice), Devine’s awful ankle injury at Maine Road and the ‘ghosts’ of a grand past at Station Road. Loved that ground...