Premiership rugby clubs have failed in their bid to end relegation to the Championship for the upcoming season, league sources have confirmed to ESPN.
First reported in the Times, Premiership clubs offered to increase their annual funding of the division below by £500,000 — from £1.7 million per year to £2.2m — but failed to get Championship clubs to approve the deal.
“The issue of promotion and relegation has been discussed in the English game for more than 20 years and the debate will continue,” a Premiership Rugby spokesperson said. “We said last season we would search for a solution that had agreement from the whole of the English game.
“This is just a question of timing and constructive discussions will continue.”
Premiership clubs were hoping to complete the deal before the start of the season but were unable to come to an agreement with the second division clubs holding out for a higher offer.
The Premiership wanted to add a team to the division — swelling the league to 13 teams — and continue one more season of automatic promotion from the Championship, without a team going the other way.
The following seasons would see the bottom team from the Premiership and the top team from the Championship would go head-to-head in a playoff to fill the final spot in the top division.
The league are keen to keep relegation apart of club rugby in England, as is not the case in the foreign leagues such as the Top 14 and Pro 14.
Approval for the rule change did not take place in time to be added to the agenda at the final Rugby Football Union council review before the start of the Premiership season, meaning that the any change to the relegation system cannot happen before the start of the competition.