Notre Dame @ Navy - Aviva Stadium, Sept 1st 2012.

[heffo]

Why is Croke Park missing out on this opportunity? Is anyone in CP marketing the venue or do they just wait for people to ring up and ask if they can use the field?

A little matter of the quarter finals this weekend in Croke Park

[the Deel Rover]

Why is Croke Park missing out on this opportunity? Is anyone in CP marketing the venue or do they just wait for people to ring up and ask if they can use the field?

A little matter of the quarter finals this weekend in Croke Park

It's on the 1st September Heffo .

[heffo]

Why is Croke Park missing out on this opportunity? Is anyone in CP marketing the venue or do they just wait for people to ring up and ask if they can use the field?

A little matter of the quarter finals this weekend in Croke Park

It's on the 1st September Heffo .

Shi*e!

I was told the reason Croke Park didn't get it - it was their 1st choice, will find out.

[deiseach]

There's a football semi-final that weekend.

[Hardy]

The general point, though - is anybody knocking on doors saying we're open for rock concerts, American football, monster trucks, Duffy's circus, etc?

[Premier Emperor]

Supposedly there are 35,000 yanks travelling over to Ireland for this. Which is more than are travelling to London for the Olympics! Codswallop surely?

These figures usually are.
I never believe the figures where people claim an event brings X amount of millions or billions to the local economy either. They are always exaggerated.

[AZOffaly]

Not sure if Croker were involved in the discussions about this, but I'd guess that they wanted to make sure they had a sold out venue for this, to test the waters. Notre Dame is a huge name, and if they were seen to be playing in front of 2/3 full stadium, the PR on it from the organisers would be tricky. This way they have a 45k, 50k stadium which will be full, and rocking with the marching bands etc, and the optics will be much better.

Croker would be great but in 1996 I'd say there was about 40-50k at the game and the stands wouldn't have looked overly full on TV in the states.

[heffo]

The general point, though - is anybody knocking on doors saying we're open for rock concerts, American football, monster trucks, Duffy's circus, etc?

Of course they are, they've had high level talks with NFL officials about getting an NFL game there, were over in Parkhead two weeks ago about linking up with Celtic.

[AZOffaly]

Supposedly there are 35,000 yanks travelling over to Ireland for this. Which is more than are travelling to London for the Olympics! Codswallop surely?

These figures usually are.
I never believe the figures where people claim an event brings X amount of millions or billions to the local economy either. They are always exaggerated.

I agree. I can't see 35k from the States coming. That said these figures are coming from Travel Agents, so maybe there is a big appetite from Notre Dame especially. There are some class tours that the Yanks can do on the 'auld sod' and the take up from Notre Dame alumni may well be very high, especially as the euro weakens against the dollar.

Having said all that, I'd be shocked if there are more than 25k American visitors, so I think there should be a few tickets floating around.

[AZOffaly]

The general point, though - is anybody knocking on doors saying we're open for rock concerts, American football, monster trucks, Duffy's circus, etc?

Of course they are, they've had high level talks with NFL officials about getting an NFL game there, were over in Parkhead two weeks ago about linking up with Celtic.

The NFL were impressed with Croke Park. Dan Rooney is the owner of the Steelers, and the Ambassador to Ireland. He liaised between the NFL and Croker to organise a visit etc. Wembley has been a great success for the NFL, but is beginning to get a little 'samey' so I wouldn't be surprised if the NFL brought a game to Ireland and/or Continental Europe in the near enough future.

[deiseach]

Not sure if Croker were involved in the discussions about this, but I'd guess that they wanted to make sure they had a sold out venue for this, to test the waters. Notre Dame is a huge name, and if they were seen to be playing in front of 2/3 full stadium, the PR on it from the organisers would be tricky. This way they have a 45k, 50k stadium which will be full, and rocking with the marching bands etc, and the optics will be much better.

Croker would be great but in 1996 I'd say there was about 40-50k at the game and the stands wouldn't have looked overly full on TV in the states.

Those big college games always look wedged, I can see how they'd want to protect that image

[deiseach]

The general point, though - is anybody knocking on doors saying we're open for rock concerts, American football, monster trucks, Duffy's circus, etc?

Have you any reason to suspect they're not, apart from not getting an American football game played there slap-bang in the endgame of the All-Ireland championships?

[AZOffaly]

Not sure if Croker were involved in the discussions about this, but I'd guess that they wanted to make sure they had a sold out venue for this, to test the waters. Notre Dame is a huge name, and if they were seen to be playing in front of 2/3 full stadium, the PR on it from the organisers would be tricky. This way they have a 45k, 50k stadium which will be full, and rocking with the marching bands etc, and the optics will be much better.

Croker would be great but in 1996 I'd say there was about 40-50k at the game and the stands wouldn't have looked overly full on TV in the states.

Those big college games always look wedged, I can see how they'd want to protect that image

Absolutely. College football places a huge emphasis on tradition. Part of that tradition is that big names like Notre Dame, Michigan, Ohio State, Penn State, USC, Texas etc etc etc always play in front of packed houses with huge attendences. Most of these stadiums would hold well over 70k, and up to 110k in places like Michigan. The colour, pageantry and atmosphere at these games is as much a part of the experience as the game itself in many cases, so to project that back to the states with one of the biggest names in Football playing in front of a stadium with a good few empty seats would certainly be underwhelming, and would make any repeat venture that little more difficult.

A full house in a new stadium, albeit with about half the capacity of some of those stateside, would be a much better aesthetic product for the organisers to hang their hat on.

[deiseach]

Absolutely. College football places a huge emphasis on tradition. Part of that tradition is that big names like Notre Dame, Michigan, Ohio State, Penn State...

Having said all that, some traditions are not working keeping

[Capt Pat]

With 35000 fans travelling a long distance, tickets usually show up on the day. But I heard that all those tickets were sold through travel companies in packages. So if there were cancellations those  tickets might end up back with ticket master or the Aviva Stadium.

It iscon my doorstep so I can go fishing for tickets on the day
.