ROCHDALE HORNETS owner Andy Mazey admits that he was disappointed last week by the refusal of Championship clubs to give their backing to a merged competition below Super League in 2024.
The clubs from the two lower divisions met last Wednesday, with the League One sides keen to impress on their Championship colleagues their misgivings about the future of the third tier as a separate competition.
League One is set to contain only eight clubs next year, or nine if Newcastle Thunder can be revived to reach the starting line.
“The structure is broken and I wrote to Tony Sutton (chief executive), Simon Johnson (chair) and Robert Hicks (director of operations and legal) at the RFL in April to tell them the competition wasn’t sustainable,” Mazey told League Express.
“At last week’s meeting, five solutions were put forward.
“They were all about us getting through 2024 but the Championship clubs were strongly of the opinion that they wanted to retain that competition in its present form.”
“There have been proposals for loop fixtures, but that is not ideal for anyone, and particularly those clubs that would have to visit Cornwall twice.
“There was also a suggestion of including some Super League reserves sides in League One, and from a development aspect I can understand that. That would be good for Super League but not for League One clubs.
“The Championship is a strong competition, and I wouldn’t disagree with that, but we need to recognise that all levels of the game need to come together.”
Last Thursday, League Express editor Martyn Sadler published his proposal for a merged Championship and League One competition (see https://www.totalrl.com/combining-the-championship-and-league-1-and-creating-a-viable-fixture-list/).
Mazey signalled his support for that structure on X (formerly known as Twitter), posting: “Martyn Sadler talking complete and utter sense.”
