Rotorua 'International' Stadium
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It's shit. It's shit to get to (I'm lucky to have a mate who lives around the corner) the facilites are crap, and it's bad enough in the dry, let alone the wet.
In the 90s the surface was one of the best around apparently, doubt that's true today.
Certainly was an odd choice. What was the crowd size?
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Even if the stadium was of a higher standard, theres a really solid argument that the game could have been held in Dunedin or Christchurch. Revenue may have been greater and ultimately it's a national representative side who's major fixtures can and should be shared around the country. Lions fans would have been compelled to travel to the South Island to spend their coin, and as the third biggest and best venue in the country, FBS certainly makes more sense than Rotorua's shitty ground when hosting a major international match. The rotorua experience was an embarrassment to rugby in NZ.
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@Catogrande said in Rotorua 'International' Stadium:
Please pardon my possible ignorance, but wasn't Rotorua partly picked due to the cultural importance? Not suggesting that should outweigh common sense, just asking really.
Also probably partly picked for fan tour schedules. Look at the packages and a lot of them were starting a week or so before Test 1 so games needed to be in the vicinity eg Hamilton, Rotorua.
Unfortunately Tauranga, despite it's riches still can't get its shit together and build anything decent -
It's a good stadium for a day game when the weather is sunny as you can maximise the caldera effect of the venue when sitting/standing on the embankment. When it's wet you stand on the embankment at your own risk. We stood at the top near the paths.
The surface is still very good. The in goal area was smaller than in the past. Food/drink facilities are poor.
The crowd was 28K and they reckon the majority were from out of town.
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I had a great experience there for the 2011 RWC. It helped that while waiting for a cousin to pick me up, I bumped into some South Africans who had stashed a crate before the game.
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I went with WTW and after the game we played Mexi back at the hire mini van for two hours waiting for traffic to move. Apparently the volunteers threw their hands up and just walked away the caos was that bad.
Also they said everyone should bus to the game so a lot did but after the game there was no cones/barriers for people to form long queues so people just mad rushed to the doors of bus.
Really poorly executed the whole day.
I thought it was really easy to get beer and food though.
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@Hooroo said in Rotorua 'International' Stadium:
I went with WTW and after the game we played Mexi back at the hire mini van for two hours waiting for traffic to move. Apparently the volunteers threw their hands up and just walked away the caos was that bad.
Also they said everyone should bus to the game so a lot did but after the game there was no cones/barriers for people to form long queues so people just mad rushed to the doors of bus.
Really poorly executed the whole day.
I thought it was really easy to get beer and food though.
Yep the bus queues were a shambles. Even when we left 20 mins early there were heaps of people getting on them with a lack of cones and just one hi-vis Nazi yelling at people who had no idea where they were supposed to be so they just jumped on the nearest bus.
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First of all.
I'll concede that some things are beyond the locals control.
28,000 crowd in a town that is pretty much about 70,000 population. That is quite amazing. And it is going to cause some chaos due to infrastructure not set up to cope with one off exceptional events.
Secondly. A modest stadium with a big grass amphitheater is the perfect cost effective way to provide for very occasional extraordinary crowds, with the only upkeep in the fallow years in between is a mower. This is how most of the provincial unions operated; Okara Oaek, Rugby Park New Plymouth etc etc.
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My experience in 2005, which I would have moaned about on here 12 years ago:
Travelled from Tauranga to Rotorua with 2 adults and 2 kids. Gave ourselves plenty of time thinking we'd judged it to allow getting some takeaways in Rotorua and get there an hour early (gave ourselves 3 hours for a 1 hour journey in normal times).
The traffic jam started almost at Hamurana. We got in the stadium literally as they were kicking off. What on earth do you do with 2 waist high kids in a stadium with 25,000 people standing? And your late?
We found a spot near the corner flag with an obstructed view (obstructed by the grandstand), and could see half the field. Looked at big screen for the other half. This area had hundreds of people deciding that a view of half the field was the best spot available.
No complaints about locals. Just a complaint about how kid un-friendly it was. It wasn't rainy that day, but either because night time and dew, or because it's so full - no one on grass was sitting.
Didn't get home until midnight or after.
I went to the Lions tour match in 83 at same stadium. Back then they let in 35000 and the local population was only about 50,000 then. I think my much more organised than me parent got us there in time for curtain raiser and I sat on the concrete terrace part. Day game, soup in a flask etc, John Carleton got 2 tries.
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@Rapido said in Rotorua 'International' Stadium:
So in summary. Napier or New Plymouth which upgraded their grounds for 2011 should have hosted this tour match.
Yarrow Stadium should have been the option if you base it on stadium quality.
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@antipodean Samoa v Namibia at Rotorua was pretty good in '11. Not a huge crowd, nice day, kids could get a seat and watch the game. I imagine this was a very different animal.
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woop finally remembered my password.. so i can join the rant!
totally agree with what Shark said.. this was a fucking disgrace.
biggest disappointment to for me was that the Maoris game in '05 was one of the most epic days of sport i've been to - the game was amazing and town after was epic! Always said if this game was 1/10th of that game would still be a good outing. unfortunately wasn't even 1/100th. As noted this game partly there for 'culture' reasons.. prob the no1 reason it needs to not be there so the team isn't distracted by all the other sh*t and just focuses on the 80 mins on the field - which they totally failed to turn up for.
Rolling into town I expected to see the place heaving with camper vans and people spilling out of every available joint. it wasn't even that busy. We stopped for a quick couple of beers and some banter with some young poms on their OE on the waterfront before heading to the pub. Pub wasn't that busy then headed to the game.
Heard stories that the queue to get a bus from town was 1km long. only 10 buses were rolling. guess thats why pub wasn't busy every fuker queuing for a ride. Heard Lions fans were paying up to $100 to any local driving past to give them a ride to the ground.
Not helped by the weather but fcuk me what a joke. I couldn't believe that people were sitting on the terraces. prob cause they went an hour before to try and get on that side for a 'seat' and ended up freezing their ar$es off on a wet bit of concrete that just meant there was ZERO atmosphere from any fans. a couple of portaloos somewhere was all the pissers i saw miles away from where i was. luckily had chucked a few beers and a hippie in my jacket so didn't nened to queue for hours to get a beer like others. Was basically just a matter of hoping the game would end so we could piss off elsewhere.
Getting back already discussed. As Hooroo said we just stood around the van playing drinking games and the traffic was just going nowhere... we then ran out of beers (I should point out that you should never really on Hooroos "local knowledge" to find you some more..)..
even the fast food joints there were fcuked - we waited 45 mins for a bunch of retards in Wendys to put some burgers together. Picked up some lions supporters who were walking to their accom about 10k's away cause they couldn't get any transport - they'd already walked for an hour when we picked them up at Wendys.
Got back to the Tron at 2am! plan was to hit the town there for some beers but since it was about 3hrs after schedule everyone was well and truely asleep!
if it wasn't for the company and fun we had in our van the whole thing would have been a disaster!
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other thing i forgot to say is that i feel as tho this tour has been a bit of a dud.. Dunedin sounded ok - but I was kinda expecting something along the lines of 2011 type atmos but there's just been nothing. I work in the viaduct and have seen feck all supporters floating around.. Will be interested to see what the tron is like this arvo and what the test is like on the weekend.
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@WillieTheWaiter said in Rotorua 'International' Stadium:
other thing i forgot to say is that i feel as tho this tour has been a bit of a dud.
I think the weak pound has a lot to do wtih that. Brisbane in 01 was epic - there must have been 30,000 fans in town, and they just took over.
Haven't seen that many yet, but Rotorua was bloody busy. Not sure when and where you are, but it was standing room only in a lot of places when we were about mid afternoon.