‘DON’T FALL INTO PREM SUPER TRAP’
Ealing Trailfinders v Saracens
Championship Play-Off Final first leg, Today, 4.30pm
BY aLeX spink
BEN WARD says English rugby must abandon any thoughts of a closed-shop Premiership.
Ealing Trailfinders’ director of rugby pits his team against Saracens today in the Championship Final first leg – with a place in the top flight up for grabs.
The Rugby Football Union are currently debating whether to pull up the Premiership drawbridge for the next three years – which would be a devastating move for whichever club comes out on the wrong end of this two-leg showpiece.
Ward said: “Promotion and relegation is really important in this country. It’s what makes the leagues as competitive as they are.
“Everything we are hearing, especially with the football European Super League, is that promotion and relegation matters.
“Some of the games at the moment, with there being no relegation, and you’re not even looking at the result, it doesn’t matter.
“Even if we were a Premiership side I’d still be an advocate of promotion and relegation.”
Saracens’ counterpart Mark McCall already sees Ealing as a “mid-table Premiership side” in terms of their rugby ability.
Ward added: “There are a lot of misconceptions around the promotion and relegation issue – [the argument] that the Premiership should be ring-fenced as no team has the ability to go up.
“But if you look at the funding and the way it’s spread out there’s a reason why no team can ‘go up’ and that’s because the funding is so distorted. And uneven.”
Ealing also put to bed last night any concerns over whether their ground is up to Premiership standard.
Ward said: “Should we win the play-offs, we meet and satisfy all conditions to take our place in the Premiership.”
The second leg of the Championship Final takes place at Saracens’ StoneX Stadium a week today.