Leeds Rhinos reduce capacity to 9,999

[FawnFrenchieMum]

This doesn’t sit right with me but interested in other people’s thoughts.

Leeds Rhino’s capacity at the Boxing Day match reduced to 9,999 to avoid the need for covid passes (needed for events over 10,000).

Clever, right, wrong?

Inevitable.

Legal

A few league one clubs have done it too in football that float around a 9k average. I don't think it's sneaky or two fingers to the establishment per se, I just think they don't want the hassle it will bring for the sake of a few extra hundred people through the gate.

Marching on together

Fab

Inevitable

Not really in the spirit but certainly within the letter of the law and I don’t really blame them. If you want to blame someone then blame the government who pull arbitrary figures out of their arses, not the venues pushing right up to those limits.

I don't see the issue. Government says over X capacity risk is higher therefore covid passes needed. Options are:

-Remain at X+whatever capacity and implement covid passes to reduce risk, or
-Reduce risk by reducing capacity to below X

Perfectly sensible, reasonable and within the law.

What is full capacity?

Sensible. If they said you needed covid passes for weddings with more than a hundred guests, and you were planning to invite 102, wouldn't you cut your list by 2? Same thing on a larger scale.

I can understand why they would do it. The extra hassle for checking all the Covid passports and the grief from fans due to the inevitable delays.
It would probably be my solution to the issue. Doesn't seem fair if it means fans will miss out, but there's so much not fair about the solutions that have been implemented due to the pandemic.

Do Leeds Rhinos normally get more thatn 10000 spectators?

Completely understandable and reasonable. The sooner the stupid idea of pointless passes is dropped, the better,

@ThroughThickAndThin01 full capacity is 19700.

For the boxing day game they would easily get 10,000+ .
And the standing areas do get very full for home games.

@HeatonGrove yes, they do for regular Super League matches.
They have one of the highest home attendances in the league.

I doubt they would get more than that for a Boxing Day friendly anyway so this makes it much easier administration wise

Essentially the vaccine passport is the state imposing the financial costs of implementing a restriction on private businesses. So of course some of them are going to find it cheaper to lose some capacity instead. If you're a massive venue then it makes sense to suck up the extra costs, but of course venues at the margin will just opt out.

Ok just Google’d and capacity is around 21000. Tbh I’d rather go if there were less than 10000 people there and much more spacing. Wouldn’t care who was jabbed or not.

@HeatonGrove

Do Leeds Rhinos normally get more thatn 10000 spectators?

They do. One of the highest supported clubs.

But they are probably aware of inevitable delays, at Christmas no less, and probably not worth that hassle for a pre season friendly.

Capacity is 19,700 so a huge drop which will allow for social distancing not that people will and remove the extra man power needed and the longer waiting time in crowds outside while everyone is checked.

@SparklyLeprechaun

Sensible. If they said you needed covid passes for weddings with more than a hundred guests, and you were planning to invite 102, wouldn't you cut your list by 2? Same thing on a larger scale.

I wouldn’t cut unless cutting down a lot - so not to 99. The passport is to reduce the risk of spread. Obviously it is just lowering it. I would make clear to all guests and be very angry if any hassled staff checking. The staff at the venue working hard me ti enjoy my event also deserve lower risks through tested/vaccinated customers.

Clever. A few clubs have done this because they don't actually have that many people attend anyway so they have just reduced it down

Good for them.

Fair point about the delays and extra man power needed to do the checks, I never thought of that. I think I was thinking it was purely not to put people off who were unvaccinated but cba with tests etc.

Perfectly legal and probably means people can socially distance more. Fine with me.

the average attendance at a leeds rhinos game pre covid was about 13,000 in a nearly 20,000 capacity stadium. So already not ram packed.

rugby league prides itself on being a family sport - attendance by all age groups is encouraged and lairy behaviour is very frowned upon. Its all very civilised.