Premiership Rugby
Premiership Rugby is an English professional rugby union competition. The Premiership consists of twelve clubs, and is the top division of the English rugby union system. Premiership clubs qualify for Europe's two main club competitions, the European Rugby Champions Cup and the European Rugby Challenge Cup. The team finishing at the bottom of the Premiership each season is relegated to the second division, the RFU Championship; the winner of the Championship is promoted to the Premiership.
The competition has been played since 1987, and has evolved into the current Premiership system. The current champions are Saracens. The most recently promoted side are Newcastle Falcons, who will return to the top flight in 2020.
History
Beginnings: English domestic rugby union until 1972
The governing body of rugby union in England, the Rugby Football Union, long resisted leagues as it was believed that the introduction of leagues would increase 'dirty' play and put pressure on clubs to pay their players. Instead, clubs arranged their own fixtures and had traditional games. The only organised tournaments were the County Cups and County Championship — the former played by clubs and the latter by County representative teams. The Daily Telegraph and a few local newspapers — such as the Yorkshire Post — compiled 'pennants' based on teams' performances, but as the strength of fixture lists varied, it was at best an estimate of a team's performance throughout a season.1972–1995: Leagues and cups
In 1972 the RFU sanctioned a national knock-out cup — the RFU Club Competition, the predecessor to the Anglo-Welsh Cup — followed first by regional merit tables and then, in the mid-1980s, by national merit tables. One of the casualties of the move to competitive leagues was the loss of some traditional games as the new fixture lists didn't allow time for all of them.The league system has evolved since its start in 1987 when the Courage Leagues were formed — a league pyramid with roughly 1000 clubs playing in 108 leagues each with promotion and relegation.
In the first season, clubs were expected to arrange the fixtures on mutually convenient dates. The clubs involved were Bath, Bristol, Coventry, Gloucester, Harlequins, Leicester, Moseley, Nottingham, Orrell, Sale, Wasps and Waterloo. That first season was an unqualified success, with clubs in the upper echelons of the national leagues reporting increased crowds, interest from both local backers and national companies, and higher skill levels among players exposed to regular competition. The fears that leagues would lead to greater violence on the field proved largely unfounded.
By the next season, the RFU allocated fixed Saturdays to the league season, removing the clubs' responsibility for scheduling matches. There was no home and away structure to the leagues in those early seasons, as sides played one another only once.
Initially two teams, Bath and Leicester, proved to be head and shoulders above the rest in the Courage League, and between them dominated the top of the table.
In 1994 the league structure expanded to include a full rota of home and away matches for the first time. The 1994–95 season was the first to be shown live on Sky Sports, a relationship which continued until the 2013–14 season when BT Sport acquired the exclusive rights.
1996: The dawn of professional rugby union
The league turned professional for the 1996–97 season when the first winners were London Wasps, joining Bath and Leicester as the only champions in the league's first decade. Clubs like Saracens, Newcastle and Northampton were able to attract wealthy benefactors, but the professional era also had its casualties, as clubs like West Hartlepool, Richmond and London Scottish were forced into administration when their backers pulled out.2000–2002: Premiership, Championship and playoffs
The start of the 2000–01 season brought with it a re-vamping of the season structure. In 2000–2001 an 8-team playoff was introduced. However, the team finishing top of the table at the end of the regular season was still considered English champions.Halfway through the 2001–02 season, with Leicester odds-on to win their fourth title in succession, it was controversially decided that the winners of the 8-team playoffs would be crowned English champions. There was an outcry from fans and this proposal was dropped.
2003–2014: The ascendancy of the playoffs
From the beginning of the 2002–03 season, a new playoff format was introduced to replace the 8-team Championship. The format required the first-placed team in the league to play the winner of a match between the second- and third-placed teams. Critically, the winner of this game would be recognised as English champions. Although Gloucester won the league by a clear margin, they then faced a three-week wait until the final. Having lost their momentum, they were beaten by second-placed Wasps in the play-offs. The playoff structure was reformatted in the 2005–06 season in which the first-placed team would play the fourth placed team in a semi-final.Since the implementation of the playoff system, only four teams have won both the regular season and playoffs in the same year; Leicester in 2000–01 and again in 2008–09 and 2009–10, Sale Sharks in 2005–06, Harlequins 2011–12 and Saracens in 2015–16.
Of all the Premiership teams, Wasps have made a reputation for playing the competition format to perfection, peaking at the right time to be crowned English Champions in 2003, 2004, 2005 and 2008. Wasps did not lead the league standings at the end of the season in any of these years. Conversely, Gloucester have garnered an unfortunate reputation for leading the table at the end of the regular season, only to fall short of winning the Premiership title, losing finals in 2003, 2007, and 2008. Gloucester's single victory in the playoffs, in 2002, occurred when league leaders Leicester were still considered English champions, meaning Gloucester's Championship victory was considered secondary.
The 2011–12 season saw Harlequins add their name to the trophy on their first attempt, winning 30–23 against the nine-times champions Leicester. Leicester would have to wait until 2012–13 for their 10th championship, where they defeated Northampton in the final.
The 2013–14 Aviva Premiership season saw Northampton become the 8th different team to win the trophy. This was achieved when they defeated Leicester Tigers in the semi-final 21–20, thus denying Leicester a 10th Consecutive Final. In the final, they defeated Saracens 20–24 with a try in the last minute of extra time to win the 2013–14 Aviva Premiership.
2014–2019: US initiatives
With the future of the Heineken Cup uncertain beyond 2013–14, due to a row between England's Premiership Rugby Limited and France's LNR on one side and the sport's governing bodies on the other, Premiership Rugby Limited explored several moves toward expanding its brand into the United States. In May 2013, Premiership Rugby Limited and U.S.-based RugbyLaw entered into a plan by which the two organisations were to help back a proposed U.S. professional league that could have begun play as early as 2014. The first phase of the plan was to involve two preseason exhibitions featuring an "American Barbarians" side that would combine international veterans and young American talent. The "Barbarians" were intended to play matches in August 2013 in the U.S. and London, but those plans fell through, and the matches were indefinitely delayed.In August 2013, Leicester Tigers chairman Peter Tom confirmed that Premiership Rugby Limited had discussed the possibility of bringing select Premiership matches to the US. The first match played in the USA was on 12 March 2016 when London Irish were defeated by Saracens at the Red Bull Arena in the New York Metropolitan Area. This match was intended to be the first of a three-year deal which would have seen London Irish play one home match each season in the US, but their relegation from the Premiership at the end of the 2015–16 season scuttled that plan. A new deal was reached with American sports marketing company AEG in 2017 which was intended to see at least one Premiership match taken to the US for four seasons starting in 2017–18. The first match under the new deal was held on 16 September 2017, with Newcastle Falcons taking their home fixture against Saracens to the Talen Energy Stadium in the Philadelphia suburb of Chester, Pennsylvania. In 2018–19, although no match was scheduled to take place in the US, the round 6 match between Saracens and Harlequins was the first broadcast on network television in the US of a Premiership Rugby game. The game was shown live on NBC. In 2019–20, once again no matches were scheduled to take place in the US.
2018 also saw a revamp of the league's secondary competition with the launch of the Premiership Rugby Shield.
2019 salary cap investigation into Saracens
In March 2019, allegations emerged that Saracens may have broken the league's salary cap, the story was initially printed in the Daily Mail and claimed Saracens chairman Nigel Wray had invested in companies with players such as Richard Wigglesworth, Mako Vunipola, Billy Vunipola and Maro Itoje. In June, Premiership Rugby announced that they would investigate the allegations. In November 2019, Saracens were found to have been in breach of the salary cap regulations due to failure to disclose player payments in the 2016–17, 2017–18 and 2018–19 seasons, which would have taken them over the senior player cap. They were handed a 35-point deduction for the 2019–20 Premiership Rugby season and fined £5.3 million. The judgement found that Saracens had been reckless in entering into the arrangements with players without disclosing them to Premiership Rugby.On 18 January 2020, Premiership Rugby announced that Saracens would be relegated to the RFU Championship for the 2020–21 season. Premiership Rugby CEO Darren Childs said this punishment was due to Saracens lack of cooperation in a mid-season audit to prove compliance in the 2019–20 season. Due to the COVID-19 Pandemic, it was determined that the Newcastle Falcons would be promoted and replace the Saracens in Gallagher Premiership for the 2020-2021 season.
On 23 January 2020, Lord Dyson's full report into Saracens' spending was published, it revealed that Saracens had overspent the salary cap by £1.1m in 2016–17, £98,000 in 2017-18 and £906,000 in 2018–19. These included £923,947.63 of property investments between Nigel Wray and three unnamed Saracens players. It also included Saracens claim that the Salary Cap was unenforceable under competition law, this defence was rejected.
On 28 January 2020, Premiership Rugby applied a further 70 point deduction for the 2019–20 season to ensure Saracens would finish bottom of the league table.
Clubs
Current clubs map
Current clubs chart
- Note: Capacity listed for rugby union games may differ from official stadium capacity
All time
Four clubs—Bath, Gloucester, Leicester and Wasps—have appeared in every season to date. Harlequins have only missed the 2005–06 season. Six other clubs have appeared in at least 20 seasons: Saracens, Northampton, Sale, London Irish, Bristol and Newcastle.
Coventry, Liverpool St Helens, Moseley, Nottingham, Rosslyn Park, Rugby and Waterloo only appeared during the amateur era, whereas Exeter, Leeds, London Welsh, Richmond, Rotherham and Worcester have only appeared during the professional era.
Below, the 2019–20 clubs are listed in bold; ever-present clubs are listed in bold italics. Years listed are the calendar years in which the seasons ended.
| Seasons | Team | Dates |
| 33 | Bath | 1988–2020 |
| 22 | Bristol | 1988–1998, 2000–2003, 2006–2009, 2017, 2019–2020 |
| 3 | Bedford | 1990, 1999–2000 |
| 1 | Coventry | 1988 |
| 10 | Exeter | 2011–2020 |
| 33 | Gloucester | 1988–2020 |
| 32 | Harlequins | 1988–2005, 2007–2020 |
| 8 | Leeds* | 2002–2006, 2008, 2010–2011 |
| 33 | Leicester | 1988–2020 |
| 2 | Liverpool St Helens | 1989, 1991 |
| 25 | London Irish | 1992–1994, 1997–2016, 2018, 2020— |
| 2 | London Scottish | 1993, 1999 |
| 2 | London Welsh | 2013, 2015 |
| 4 | Moseley | 1988–1992 |
| 22 | Newcastle | 1994, 1998–2012, 2014–2019, 2020– |
| 28 | Northampton | 1991–1995, 1997–2007, 2009–2020 |
| 5 | Nottingham | 1988–1992 |
| 10 | Orrell | 1988–1997 |
| 2 | Richmond | 1998–1999 |
| 4 | Rosslyn Park | 1989–1992 |
| 2 | Rotherham | 2001, 2004 |
| 2 | Rugby | 1992–1993 |
| 27 | Sale | 1988, 1995–2020 |
| 29 | Saracens | 1990–1993, 1996–2020 |
| 33 | Wasps | 1988–2020 |
| 2 | Waterloo | 1988–1989 |
| 5 | West Hartlepool | 1993, 1995–1997, 1999 |
| 14 | Worcester | 2005–2010, 2012–2014, 2016–2020 |
Sponsorship
Structure
Referees
Referees in the Premiership are selected from the RFU's Professional Referee Unit. The Professional Referee Unit consists of 15 referees with match appointments decided by PRU management team of ex-international referees Ed Morrison, Brian Campsall and Tony Spreadbury.List of Premiership Referees
Source:
- Wayne Barnes
- Matthew Carley
- Sara Cox
- Karl Dickson
- JP Doyle
- Tom Foley
- Simon Harding
- Andrew Jackson
- Greg MacDonald
- Craig Maxwell-Keys
- John Meredith
- Luke Pearce
- Dean Richards
- Christophe Ridley
- Ian Tempest
- Tim Wigglesworth
Regular season
The Premiership Rugby season typically runs from September to June and comprises 22 rounds of matches, with each club playing each other home and away. The results of the matches contribute points to the league as follows:- 4 points are awarded for a win
- 2 points are awarded for a draw
- 0 points are awarded for a loss, however
- *1 losing point is awarded to a team that loses a match by 7 points or fewer
- 1 additional point is awarded to a team scoring 4 tries or more in a match
Playoffs
Relegation
There is a system of promotion and relegation to and from the Premiership. The last placed club after the 22 regular season rounds of the Premiership is relegated into the RFU Championship. Through the 2016–17 season, the winner of the Championship play-offs was promoted to the Premiership for the subsequent season; the Championship play-offs were then scrapped and replaced by automatic promotion for the top club on the final Championship table.Promotion and relegation are subject to Minimum Standards Criteria. If the team scheduled for promotion does not meet these standards, then there is no relegation/promotion, as in the 2011–12 season when London Welsh won promotion from the Championship. They were denied promotion under the criteria, reprieving Newcastle Falcons from relegation, but successfully appealed against their block and achieved promotion anyway.
European competition qualification
The top six teams qualify for the next season's European Rugby Champions Cup whilst the team in seventh place may advance to a playoff for another place. Teams that do not qualify for the Champions Cup play in the European Rugby Challenge Cup.Champions
Between 1987 and 2002, the team at the top of the league was crowned English champions. Since 2002–03, the winner of the league has been determined by a Premiership Final, which takes place at Twickenham and consists of two rounds of knock-out play amongst the top four teams. Most seasons at least one team has been relegated at the end of the season, although in 1995-96 there was no relegation to allow division expansion, and in 2001-2 Leeds were given a reprieve because the Division One champions did not have a suitable ground to allow promotion.| Season | Champions | Final | Runners-up | Relegated |
| 1987–88 | Leicester | N/A | Wasps | Sale, Coventry |
| 1988–89 | Bath | N/A | Gloucester | Liverpool St Helens, Waterloo |
| 1989–90 | Wasps | N/A | Gloucester | Bedford |
| 1990–91 | Bath | N/A | Wasps | Liverpool St Helens, Moseley |
| 1991–92 | Bath | N/A | Orrell | Rosslyn Park, Nottingham |
| 1992–93 | Bath | N/A | Gloucester | Rugby Lions, West Hartlepool, Saracens, London Scottish |
| 1993–94 | Bath | N/A | Leicester | Newcastle Gosforth, London Irish |
| 1994–95 | Leicester | N/A | Bath | Northampton |
| 1995–96 | Bath | N/A | Leicester | No relegation |
| 1996–97 | Wasps | N/A | Bath | Orrell, West Hartlepool |
| 1997–98 | Newcastle | N/A | Saracens | Bristol |
| 1998–99 | Leicester | N/A | Northampton | West Hartlepool |
| 1999–00 | Leicester | N/A | Bath | Bedford |
| 2000–01 | Leicester | N/A | Wasps | Rotherham |
| 2001–02 | Leicester | N/A | Sale | No relegation |
| 2002–03 | Wasps | 39 – 3 | Gloucester | Bristol |
| 2003–04 | Wasps | 10 – 6 | Bath | Rotherham |
| 2004–05 | Wasps | 39 – 14 | Leicester | Harlequins |
| 2005–06 | Sale | 45 – 20 | Leicester | Leeds |
| 2006–07 | Leicester | 44 – 16 | Gloucester | Northampton |
| 2007–08 | Wasps | 26 – 16 | Leicester | Leeds |
| 2008–09 | Leicester | 10 – 9 | London Irish | Bristol |
| 2009–10 | Leicester | 33 – 27 | Saracens | Worcester |
| 2010–11 | Saracens | 22 – 18 | Leicester | Leeds |
| 2011–12 | Harlequins | 30 – 23 | Leicester | Newcastle |
| 2012–13 | Leicester | 37 – 17 | Northampton | London Welsh |
| 2013–14 | Northampton | 24 – 20 | Saracens | Worcester |
| 2014–15 | Saracens | 28 – 16 | Bath | London Welsh |
| 2015–16 | Saracens | 28 – 20 | Exeter | London Irish |
| 2016–17 | Exeter | 23 – 20 | Wasps | Bristol |
| 2017–18 | Saracens | 27 – 10 | Exeter | London Irish |
| 2018–19 | Saracens | 37 – 34 | Exeter | Newcastle |
| 2019–20 | Saracens |
Winners
Player records
Bold italics denote players active in the 2019–20 Premiership.All records relate to 1997 onward when National League One was re-launched as the Premiership.
Appearances
Source:| Rank | Player | Club | Years | |
| 1 |  Richard Wigglesworth | Sale, Saracens | 2002– | 283 |
| 2 | Steve Borthwick | Bath, Saracens | 1998–2014 | 265 |
| 3 | George Chuter | Saracens, Leicester | 1997–2014 | 262 |
| 3 | Phil Dowson | Newcastle, Northampton, Worcester | 2001–2017 | 262 |
| 5 | Charlie Hodgson | Sale, Saracens | 2000–2016 | 254 |
| 6 | Tom May | Newcastle, Northampton, London Welsh | 1999–2015 | 247 |
| 7 | Hugh Vyvyan | Newcastle, Saracens | 1998–2012 | 245 |
| 8 | Simon Shaw | Bristol, Wasps | 1997–2011 | 237 |
| 9 | Andy Goode | Leicester, Saracens, Worcester, Wasps, Newcastle | 1998–2016 | 236 |
| 10 | Stuart Hooper | Saracens, Leeds, Bath | 2000–2016 | 232 |
Points
Source:| Rank | Player | Club | Years | Points |
| 1 | Charlie Hodgson | Sale, Saracens | 2000–2016 | 2,625 |
| 2 | Andy Goode | Leicester, Saracens, Worcester, Wasps, Newcastle | 1998–2016 | 2,285 |
| 3 | Stephen Myler | Northampton, London Irish | 2006– | 1,754 |
| 4 |  Nick Evans | Harlequins | 2008–2017 | 1,656 |
| 5 |  Gareth Steenson | Exeter | 2010– | 1,606 |
| 6 | Olly Barkley | Bath, Gloucester, London Welsh | 2001–2015 | 1,605 |
| 7 | Jonny Wilkinson | Newcastle | 1997–2008 | 1,489 |
| 8 | Owen Farrell | Saracens | 2010– | 1,338 |
| 9 | Freddie Burns | Gloucester, Leicester, Bath | 2009– | 1,336 |
| 10 | George Ford | Leicester, Bath | 2010– | 1,303 |
Tries
Source:| Rank | Player | Club | Years | Tries |
| 1 | Tom Varndell | Leicester, Wasps, Bristol | 2004–2017 | 92 |
| 2 | Mark Cueto | Sale | 2001–2015 | 90 |
| 3 | Chris Ashton | Northampton, Saracens, Sale | 2008– | 85 |
| 4 | Christian Wade | Wasps | 2011–2018 | 82 |
| 5 | Steve Hanley | Sale | 1998–2007 | 75 |
| 6 | Paul Sackey | Bedford, London Irish, Wasps, Harlequins | 1999–2014 | 69 |
| 7 | Matt Banahan | Bath, Gloucester | 2007– | 68 |
| 8 | Tom Voyce | Bath, Wasps, Gloucester, London Welsh | 2000–2013 | 66 |
| 9 | Jonny May | Gloucester, Leicester | 2010– | 65 |
| 10 | James Simpson-Daniel | Gloucester | 2000–2013 | 63 |
Attendances
Salary cap
The English Premiership operates a salary cap, set by the Premiership Rugby Board, specifying the money a club can spend on the player salaries of its squad per season. In the 2017–18 season, the base cap was £7 million, with an "academy credit" of up to £800,000.A club may use the academy credit on a player that: joined the club before his 18th birthday; is under age 24 at the start of the season; and earns a salary of more than £30,000. Under the credit scheme, the first £100,000 of a qualifying player's salary is not counted against the cap.
Exclusions
Since the 2015–16 season, each club has been allowed to exclude two players from the cap calculations, an increase from one in prior seasons.The first "excluded player" slot can be filled by any player on a team's current roster who meets any of the following criteria:
- Played with his Premiership club for at least two full seasons before he was nominated as an excluded player.
- Played with his Premiership club for the full season before being nominated as an excluded player, after having played outside the Premiership.
- Played outside the Premiership in the season before he was nominated.
Media coverage
In the United Kingdom, the main rights are currently held by BT Sport under a new deal signed on 16 March 2015 replacing the former £152m deal signed on 12 September 2012. The new deal sees BT broadcast up to 80 live matches per season until the end of the 2020–21 season along with extended highlights of all matches and midweek programming. UK rights are also held by Channel 5 who will simulcast 5 matches live on a free-to-air basis, with a different commentary team as opposed to BT's commentary team, and also show a weekly highlights programme through the duration of BT's deal. In Australia the Premiership is available on beIN Sports. In the United States, the Premiership is available across NBC Sports since spring 2016. It will also be broadcast in China from 2017.Talksport and BBC Radio 5 Live, along with various BBC Local Radio stations broadcast commentary and magazine programming.