Clubs could demand £1 million extra funding from RFU over proposed hybrid league
As some Championship clubs worry proposal is a Trojan horse to a Premiership takeover of the the league
By Daniel Schofield, Deputy Rugby Union Correspondent 22 February 2022 • 6:27pm
Last year saw Saracens beat sides such as Ealing Trailfinders to win the Championship title Credit: GETTY IMAGES
Premiership clubs could demand up to £1 million each in extra funding from the Rugby Football Union to place its reserve teams in the proposed hybrid league with Championship teams.
As
Telegraph Sport revealed, the Rugby Football Union council will vote this week on a proposal from the Championship Strategic Review Working Group that would
radically reshape English rugby’s second tier. Telegraph Sport understands that the group’s preferred model would be to run a cup competition featuring Championship and Premiership reserve teams as a “proof of concept” in the 2023/24 season.
This would then lead to the launch in the 2024/25 season of a hybrid league featuring Premiership reserve teams, Championship sides partnered with a Premiership teams such as Hartpury with Gloucester and “aspirational” Championship teams who want to achieve promotion. Cornish Pirates, Jersey Reds and Ealing Trailfinders or Doncaster Knights, depending on who wins promotion this season, would likely to be included this group. Under one model, the teams would compete in a conference style system flowing into a knockout competition.
Other
Championship teams fear being permanently locked out of the second tier, unless they were willing to sacrifice their independence by partnering with a Premiership side.
“The Cup competition sounds good in principle but it feels very much like a Trojan horse to a Premiership takeover of the Championship,” a Championship chairman told Telegraph Sport. “Once you have decided on a direction of travel, how much are you allowed to deviate from that path? It would be a disaster for the game. You would be robbing the league of all its integrity and its meaning. It is a Premiership takeover of the second tier and the RFU are helping them do it.”
However, the concept has not received universal support among Premiership clubs, who are wary of having to finance a team to compete in a separate competition. Most clubs maintain a squad of between 40-50 players but injuries often mean that only 30 are only available at any one time and some clubs have already intimated to the RFU they would need a seven-figure budget to run a fully independent second team.
“Squads are getting smaller so there would be challenges putting two teams out every week,” Lee Blackett, the Wasps director of rugby, said. “To make it work, including your senior academy your squad would need to be in your 60s if not 70s. I have a Championship background from where it started. It is a great competition for the club game, it develops a lot of players and coaches to come to that next level. Definitely I am fully behind youngsters playing as much as possible.”
The RFU maintains that Friday’s vote will only decide a “direction of travel” and there would be further Council votes to sign off the creation of the hybrid league. Alternative options include leaving the league intact or in tandem with the Cup competition. However, Conor O’Shea, the RFU’s rugby performance director, is adamant that the status quo is not commercially viable in the long run. They believe a hybrid league could be bundled into the Premiership’s broadcasting arrangements, creating more revenue for the remaining Championship teams. The strategic review is composed of Premiership and Championship representatives as well as RFU executives and independent experts.
When O’Shea presented his vision to the National Clubs Association, representing clubs below the Championship, at the end of January, one observer stated that clubs where overwhelmingly hostile to the idea. “We were all aghast at the prospect,” a club chairman said. “I haven’t yet met anyone who doesn’t hate it.”
Meanwhile Ealing Trailfinders and Doncaster Knights, who meet in a top of the table clash on Saturday, remain in the dark as to whether they are eligible for promotion this season. An RFU board meeting will decide whether they have met the minimum standards criteria necessary for promotion to the Premiership in addition to winning the title.
Both teams have proposed extending their grounds to meet the minimum 10,000 capacity, although Ealing’s is phased over three years. They believe a precedent has been set by Saracens whose capacity was reduced to 8,000 when they were promoted last year as they redevelop their stand.
The teams have received little feedback on their applications and there are growing concerns over the enduring radio silence.
RFU accused of imposing move that could harm grassroots game
By Daniel Schofield
The Rugby Football Union has been accused of imposing an “undemocratic” mandate upon the grassroots game by allowing semi-professional teams to field reserve sides in the lower leagues.
In a mirror of the controversial Championship proposal, the RFU Council passed a resolution that will allow lower XVs from National One and National Two (levels 3 and 4) to compete at levels 8-9-10 for the 2022/23 season. The measure has proved to be highly unpopular with the grassroots clubs who cite safety concerns of facing semi-professional players and also fear it will exacerbate the player drain.
However, clubs in the constituent bodies would need a two-thirds majority vote to block the proposal from coming into force. At Hertfordshire Rugby Union, 16 of the 25 constituent clubs voted against the proposal but at 64 per cent that fell short of the margin needed to stop it.
For Chris Strack, who is director of rugby at Barnet Elizabethans in Herts/Middlesex 1 (level 9), the RFU’s measure has already created a bitter rift within the county. “It is creating factions within constituent bodies such that clubs are prepared to break away,” Strack said. “If we are put in a league with lower XVs we will refuse to play them. There is no real detail about how you could stop the tighthead prop from a Nat 2 club saying I don’t fancy travelling to Devon this weekend but I’m happy to play in the local fixture for the 2s. That could be really dangerous.
“The two thirds majority is undemocratic and is designed to suit the bigger clubs in the pyramid. The clubs from the bottom upwards vote no, but the clubs from the top down vote yes. They say one vote, one club but actually a yes vote is worth two votes.”
The measure was part of a wide-ranging future competition structure passed by the RFU Council that will come into effect for the 2022/23 season. It is understood that the Middlesex, Essex and Hampshire unions have all voted to block the lower XV after passing the two-thirds threshold.
The RFU insist they brought in the resolution after feedback from the community game that reserve teams were not getting enough game time. However Strack argues that this will benefit the big clubs in the pyramid at the expense of the smaller teams. “The concern is you see a flow from the smaller clubs to the bigger clubs and the smaller clubs will just end up folding,” Strack said.
“There are a finite number of players and if they realise they can get £50 a game playing for a bigger club’s second team then that is going to make it really hard for smaller clubs to retain players.
“Grassroots rugby is really struggling with numbers, particularly since the pandemic, and needs to find its feet before the RFU tries to push something like this through. Instead they have thought we can get a square peg into a round hole by using a bigger hammer.”
