GRADINGS will continue to determine Super League participation in 2027 – but the system has been tweaked to give greater importance to clubs’ on-field performance and finances.

To do so, the catchment pillar has been removed entirely, in the biggest change to the grading system since it was introduced in full ahead of the 2024 season.

The full changes to the metrics which determine clubs’ league status will have to wait until the next grading handbook is released, but the broad move was agreed at Wednesday’s RFL Council meeting in Wakefield.

In addition, clubs who are not interested in a Super League place will no longer be obliged to provide grading scores.

That follows complaints from some Championship clubs that the exercise took up considerable resource for no reward.

The catchment pillar awarded 1.5 points, out of the total 20, based on the population of the local authority each club is based in.

That penalised clubs who share a district – such as Wakefield, Castleford and Featherstone – while London Broncos didn’t even score full points because they were judged purely on the borough of Merton.

An amendment that allowed clubs to sign a development agreement with another district and add then their population – Hull FC, for example, achieved Grade A this year after doing so with North Lincolnshire – also proved controversial.

The RFL’s interim chief executive, Abi Ekoku, said: “As an ambitious, aspirational club, there’s no catchment. There shouldn’t be.

“The catchment pillar was easy to manipulate, and some clubs were disadvantaged in certain areas, so those points have been taken and allocated to performance and financial sustainability.

“One point will go to performance, and half a point will go to financial sustainability. All round it means you’ve got a better balance to it.”

Ekoku is confident the grading system will now be more robust, especially in regard to finances.

“That financial enhancement, and the analysis that’s gone into it, was directly out of the Super League expansion discussion and has closed a lot of loopholes,” he explained.

”What’s proposed now is an improvement. It’s still grading, just grading-plus.”

Ekoku also expressed confidence that Super League would remain at 14 clubs beyond this season, after a late change saw two clubs added for next season via an independent panel.

”I think the Super League clubs have committed to 14 and there’s no plan to change or retract,” he said.