The problem in holding an event of this size is the sheer number of considerations these guys have to contend with.
Judging, atmosphere, logistics, access, security, site design, field layouts, real time management ....the list goes on...and on.
Huge strides have been made of late with a designated crew almost eliminating the anomalous standard of logistical organisation we sometimes used to see at these Millennium events.
This was primarily achieved by adopting a single crew to set up all the events in the series and I think this has been a complete success.
The choice for venue isn't a good one especially when one thinks of what we really need, and that is car parking, and then a flat area of grass for playing and a flat area for vendors.
All adjacent to each other.
This is hardly asking for the 'Hanging Gardens of Babylon' because ostensibly all we need is open spaces.
On the surface, Crystal Palace does seem like a bit of a capture but the practicalities such as security suggest otherwise.
The tournament will always rattle around inside that stadium and therefore makes it almost impossible to create an atmosphere and ballers are now becoming more demanding in less practical aspects of our event promotions and wanting an 'atmosphere'.
Hardly surprising as Laurent has whetted people's appetites with his tournaments and the guys over here get to hear about what the NPPL put on offer.
I do think finances was a consideration when selecting Crystal Palace this year and I think the Millennium guys did the best of a bad job in putting it on there because even though the wind tried to spoil things, the Millennium crew had now morphed into some sort of SAS disaster attack squad and after honing their expertise in Paris when all hell broke loose one night, the problems in Crystal Palace were put to bed with no more than a flutter.
With so many of a tournament's requirements now being met such as logistics, judging, schedule etc, then perhaps 2007 is the year it all gets nailed and we can enjoy tourneys that parallel the NPPLs in the States because out of all the things a promoter now has to provide, the 'atmosphere' side of things is relatively easy to accomplish because it is an emergent property of site design and things like music. side shows etc.
All in all the Campaign Cup was a success on many levels but it also highlighted what the modern day ballers require for their entry fee and I'm pretty sure from what I have heard of the plans for 2007, these should be in place next year.