York are ready for the challenge of their debut season in Super League, and chairman Clint Goodchild believes the hard work they have put in will reap benefits for the club and the sport.

WAY back in 1898, York’s first match as a Northern Union club saw them face Hull KR. By a strange quirk of fate, the Knights’ first encounter as a Super League club some 128 years later will come against the same opponent.

Much has naturally changed in the intervening century or so, but then much has changed just within the last decade as a club which found itself facing closure following the 2016 season has now brought top-flight men’s rugby league back to the Minster City for the first time in 41 years.

And much has changed in the last four years since Clint Goodchild took ownership from club saviour Jon Flatman – York scaling the heights of the women’s game as two-time Grand Final winners, the men securing an 1895 Cup triumph at Wembley and, perhaps most significantly, ensuring the work has been done off the field which culminated in the Knights satisfying an independent panel they deserved to be elevated to this year’s expanded 14-team Super League along with Toulouse Olympique.

“It’s an interesting journey,” Goodchild told Rugby League World. “There are so many ups and downs along the way, and somebody said the other day there is a sense of overnight success here but it certainly doesn’t feel like it.

“It’s one of those where we’ve just made incremental improvements or adjustments over the four years since I’ve been around and now we’ve got our chance to step onto the big stage and show what we’re all about.

“Hopefully we can continue to do the city proud. It feels like 30 seconds some days and 30 years on others, but I’m very privileged to have been on the ride.”

In many ways, York is an ideal place for Super League expansion – on the periphery of rugby league’s traditional heartland but with a strong lineage of the sport being played there, while at the same time being a globally-renowned city both historically and culturally.

In a national sporting sense, it is perhaps more recognised for the exploits of the Knights’ LNER Stadium co-tenants York City, currently flying high in the fifth tier of English football, than its rugby achievements though.

Not that Goodchild, who originally hails from the Queensland outback and made his fortune though his MYOL Group, has found any issues convincing commercial partners to get behind the club as they aim to put York firmly on the rugby league map.

“York sells itself,” Goodchild said. “It’s a worldwide brand, it’s such a recognisable city and the history here – both sporting and ancient – is proud.

“I haven’t had to convince anyone about anything, it’s about executing to a certain level where people want to be a part of it and anyone who represents this city with pride, it’s a very magnetic thing and people want to be involved and want to get behind you and show up.

“That’s what I’ve experienced from day one of being in this city. This is such a proud region, they want to see that brand of York, whether it be football, rugby league, rugby union – it could be marbles, they just want to see York do well.”

Having to wait until November 13 to find out whether they would be promoted or be spending another season in the Championship left York’s commercial team with barely eight weeks to sell sponsorship and season tickets, with the club having taken the decision to hold off until the panel had reached its decision.

Despite that, Goodchild expects season ticket sales to surpass last year’s 1,300 record by two-and-a-half to three times for the Knights’ Super League bow.

On-field recruitment had already been well under way though, notably with the big-name signing of prop Paul Vaughan from Warrington Wolves announced midway through last year, and the chairman is impressed with the leadership qualities he has already shown.

The Australian international’s signing has been supplemented with more experienced Super League heads like Josh Griffin, Danny Richardson and Justin Sangaré, along with those at the younger end of the scale in St Helens duo Jon Bennison and Will Roberts, ex-Leeds Rhinos three-quarter Jack Smith, and exciting Sydney Roosters front-row Xavier Va’a.

That approach to recruitment represents part of Goodchild’s long-term vision for becoming an established Super League outfit.

“For lack of a better term, for every old boy we bring in we have to bring in a youngster to offset that, to try to keep that balance within our squad and give ourselves some longevity, and something which is consistently building,” Goodchild said.

“We never want to have a drop-off point where we have these incredible players and we’re going to get a great deal of success out of them for two years, but then we’re going to have to reinvent ourselves and recruit at that level again and again and again.

“We just want to evolve – evolution not revolution is kind of the recruitment policy.”

The first test for Mark Applegarth’s new-look team comes on February 12 against a Hull KR team which swept all before them in 2026, and the Knights got a taste of what Willie Peters’ all-conquering Robins were about this time last year when they went down 44-2 at home in a third-round Challenge Cup tie.

Goodchild is confident the attendance for their first Super League home game will eclipse the Knights’ record 5,369 crowd at the aforementioned cup clash, and is eager to give the reigning champions a bloody nose.

“We’ll welcome them with a handshake, make sure they’ve got a comfortable seat, and then we genuinely hope they leave with a frown on their face,” Goodchild, who praised Hull KR’s executives for the guidance they have provided him in building up York’s operations, said.

“I’m glad it’s against them. I wish they weren’t as strong as they are…but it’s our chance to go and show what we’re all about.

“We just want to really knuckle down and very much buy into the concept of hard work got us here, and hard work will get us to the next level.

“It’s all about doing the hard work and making sure we’ve got our heads screwed on.”

First published in Rugby League World magazine, Issue 517 (February 2026)