The Magic Weekend is a concept that has gone down extremely well with all rugby league fans since its creation.
With people from around the UK – and France – able to mingle in a festival of rugby league, it is truly a concept that everyone can get behind.
But something that comes up most years is where the Magic Weekend should be held. Newcastle’s St James’ Park has been a firm favourite with fans and there has been much clamour to see the concept stay in the Toon.
Of course, with an event such as the Magic Weekend, it’s not just the quality of stadium that needs to be taken into consideration but also proximity to a big city and the access to entertainment and accommodation.
A total of 62,154 fans turned up at the home of Newcastle for this year’s event, which proved to be an increase on the 60,866 of 2021.
The sport’s chief commercial officer Rhodri Jones had previously revealed a decision will be taken quickly for Magic Weekend’s home in 2023.
“We’ll do the post-event review, internally with the clubs and also with Newcastle United and Newcastle council because they are part of the tripartite agreement we have here,” Jones told the PA news agency.
“There is a view to come back here next year but we’ll only trigger that once we’ve done the review. There is an aspiration from the Newcastle side to have us back.
“We’ve had a great weekend. The city centre has been busy, hotel and accommodate rates are high and so they are very keen to have us back but we need to do our own analysis and make a decision fairly quickly.”
It’s also been revealed that there has been interest from elsewhere to host the event – and it has been a stadium from the past, with Jones confirming it is from a stadium ‘closer’ to the M62 corridor heartland.
“I had an interesting text from one stadium on Saturday saying they were watching and it looked great and they would be interested in having a conversation,” Jones revealed.
“It’s closer to the heartland and a stadium that we’ve been to before but, to be fair to Newcastle, they’re in pole position based on the number of years we’ve been here, the relationship we’ve got with the stadium and the way the fans just love coming to Newcastle.”
A stadium that has hosted Magic Weekend before and that is nearer the heartland points to either the Etihad Stadium in Manchester or Anfield in Liverpool, but is it worth going away from Newcastle?
The evidence suggests no, and there is a big leaning towards St James’ Park once more being the host for 2023.
With that in mind, the date is perhaps more likely to change considering the fact that the Challenge Cup is set to revert back to August and a fixture jam around ‘big occasions’ would not sit well with rugby league fans.
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