2024 RFL Championship

The 2024 RFL Championship, (officially known as the Betfred Championship for sponsorship reasons), is a professional rugby league club competition. The second tier of the British rugby league system comprises 14 clubs – 13 from England and one from France.

The season comprises 26 rounds in the regular season with the top six teams taking part in the play-offs to determine the champions.

Team changes

London Broncos won promotion to the Super League at the end of 2023 and are replaced by Wakefield Trinity who were relegated from Super League. Promoted from League 1 in 2023 are Dewsbury Rams and Doncaster who replace the 2023 relegated teams, Keighley Cougars and Newcastle Thunder.

Structure changes

There is no automatic promotion from the Championship to Super League at the end of the season. This is due to the introduction of the grading scheme where clubs are graded by a number of factors, not all based on on-field performance.^[1]

The Summer Bash round which sees all the fixtures played at one location over a weekend has been dropped for 2024 following disappointing attendance figures for the 2022 and 2023 events which were played in Leeds and York respectively.^[2]

Following a review of the league structure below Super League, the RFL announced that by the start of the 2026 season, the Championship and League 1 would be equalised in size at 12 teams each. The first step will be to reduce the Championship from 14 clubs to 13 at the end of the 2024 season. This will be achieved by the bottom two clubs being relegated to League 1 but only the League 1 champions being promoted. The team finishing third-bottom this season will play the team winning the League 1 play-offs for the 13th spot in the 2025 Championship.^[3]

Rule changes

A number of changes have been introduced for 2024.^[4]

The "six again" rule has been amended so that set restarts will only be awarded if the ball is in the defending team's half of the field. Infringements in the attacking team's half will result in a penalty to the attacking team.

The use of the 18th man will be allowed after two players (reduced from three) have failed head impact assessments or a player is unable to continue through injury (not just a head injury) resulting from foul play where the opposing player was sin-binned or sent-off. The use of the green card by the referee ordering injured players off the field for treatment will be discontinued in the Championship.

A team awarded a penalty at a scrum will have the option to reset the scrum instead of taking the penalty.

For disciplinary processes a category of "reckless tackle" has been introduced.^[5]

On 26 February 2024, the RFL announced that changes would be made to the 'head on head contact' rule that was previously implemented to start the season. This came after Nu Brown of Super League club Hull FC was controversially shown a red card for a tackle during his side's match against Warrington Wolves.^[6] The RFL stated that the rule will be amended, "emphasising that it applies only to initial contact".^[7]

Clubs

West Yorkshire

Barrow

Doncaster

Sheffield

Swinton

Whitehaven

Widnes

York

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Locations of English teams competing in the 2024 Championship.

Bradford

Batley

Dewsbury

Wakefield

Featherstone

Halifax

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Locations of the 2024 RFL Championship teams in West Yorkshire

Toulouse

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Locations of 2024 RFL Championship teams in France

Team	Location	Stadium	Capacity
Barrow Raiders	Barrow-in-Furness	Northern Competitions Stadium	6,000
Batley Bulldogs	Batley	Mount Pleasant	7,500
Bradford Bulls	Bradford	Odsal Stadium	22,000
Dewsbury Rams	Dewsbury	Crown Flatt	5,100
Doncaster	Doncaster	Eco-Power Stadium	15,231
Featherstone Rovers	Featherstone	Millennium Stadium	8,000
Halifax Panthers	Halifax	The Shay	10,401
Sheffield Eagles	Sheffield	Olympic Legacy Park	1,320
Swinton Lions	Sale	Heywood Road	3,387
Toulouse Olympique	Toulouse	Stade Ernest-Wallon	19,500
Wakefield Trinity	Wakefield	DIY Kitchens Stadium	9,333
Whitehaven	Whitehaven	Recreation Ground	7,500
Widnes Vikings	Widnes	DCBL Stadium	13,350
York Knights	York	York Community Stadium	8,005

Results

Table

Pos	Team v t e	Pld	W	D	L	PF	PA	PD	Pts	Qualification
1	Wakefield Trinity	11	11	0	0	404	118	+286	22	League Leaders Shield and qualify for semi-finals
2	Sheffield Eagles	11	8	0	3	306	186	+120	16	Semi-finals
3	Widnes Vikings	11	7	1	3	278	191	+87	15	Eliminators
4	Toulouse Olympique	11	7	0	4	314	190	+124	14
5	Bradford Bulls	11	7	0	4	269	202	+67	14
6	Featherstone Rovers	11	6	0	5	306	229	+77	12
7	Batley Bulldogs	11	5	0	6	181	234	−53	10
8	Doncaster	11	4	1	6	215	279	−64	9
9	York Knights	11	4	0	7	241	255	−14	8
10	Swinton Lions	11	4	0	7	242	290	−48	8
11	Whitehaven	11	3	2	6	210	308	−98	8
12	Halifax Panthers	11	4	0	7	208	313	−105	8	Play-off v League 1 play-off winners
13	Barrow Raiders	11	4	0	7	195	331	−136	8	Relegation to League One
14	Dewsbury Rams	11	1	0	10	140	383	−243	2

Player statistics

Top 10 try scorers

Rank	Player (s)	Club	Tries
1	Lachlan Walmsley	Wakefield Trinity	13
2	Kieran Gill	Bradford Bulls	9
	Connor Jones	Featherstone Rovers
	Connor Wynne
5	Zac Fulton	Bradford Bulls	8
	Maxime Stefani	Toulouse Olympique
7	Joe Burton	Batley Bulldogs	7
	Matty Dawson-Jones	Sheffield Eagles
	James Glover
	Rhys Williams	Swinton Lions
	Max Jowitt	Wakefield Trinity
	Jake Maizen	Whitehaven RLFC
	Joe Brown	York Knights

Top 10 goal scorers

Rank	Player	Club	Goals
1	Max Jowitt	Wakefield Trinity	51
2	Jordan Lilley	Bradford Bulls	43
3	Tom Gilmore	Widnes Vikings	42
4	Jake Shorrocks	Toulouse Olympique	41
5	Cory Aston	Sheffield Eagles	40
6	Dec Patton	Swinton Lions	28
7	Louis Jouffret	Halifax Panthers	27
8	Jake Carter	Whitehaven RLFC	26
9	Josh Woods	Batley Bulldogs	24
10	Connor Robinson	Doncaster RLFC

Top 10 point scorers

Rank	Player	Club	Points
1	Max Jowitt	Wakefield Trinity	130
2	Jake Shorrocks	Toulouse Olympique	94
3	Tom Gilmore	Widnes Vikings
4	Jordan Lilley	Bradford Bulls	93
5	Cory Aston	Sheffield Eagles	92
6	Louis Jouffret	Halifax Panthers	70
7	Connor Robinson	Doncaster RLFC	61
8	Danny Addy	Featherstone Rovers	58
9	Jake Carter	Whitehaven RLFC
10	Dec Patton	Swinton Lions	56

As of 18 June 2024: (Round 8)

Discipline

Red cards

Rank	Player	Club	Cards
1	Brad Walker	Barrow Raiders	1
	Eribe Doro	Bradford Bulls
	Gareth Gale	Featherstone Rovers
	Matty Marsh	Sheffield Eagles
	Jordy Gibson	Swinton Lions
	Sitaleki Akauola	Toulouse Olympique
	Harrison Hansen

Yellow cards

Rank	Player	Club	Cards
1	Adam Gledhill	Batley Bulldogs	2
	Dane Manning
	Mitchel Souter	Bradford Bulls
	Dec Patton	Swinton Lions
	Lambert Belmas	Toulouse Olympique
	Edene Gebbie	Whitehaven RLFC
	Ryan King
	Will Dagger	York Knights
2	Ryan Johnston	Barrow Raiders	1
	Ryan Shaw
	Jarrad Stack
	Brad Walker
	John Davies	Bradford Bulls
	Zac Fulton
	Tom Holmes
	Fenton Rogers
	Jorge Taufua
	Ronan Dixon	Dewsbury Rams
	Jacob Hookem
	Kieran Rush
	Marcus Walker
	Yusuf Aydin	Featherstone Rovers
	Brad England
	Josh Hardcastle
	Ben Reynolds
	Jacob Fairbank	Halifax Panthers
	Kevin Larroyer
	Matty Dawson-Jones	Sheffield Eagles
	James Glover
	Bayley Liu
	Joshua Eaves	Swinton Lions
	Richard Lepori
	George Roby
	Gavin Rodden
	Robin Brochon	Toulouse Olympique
	Éloi Pélissier
	Dominique Peyroux
	Reubenn Rennie
	Luke Bain	Wakefield Trinity
	Max Jowitt
	Mason Lino
	Derrell Olpherts
	Lucas Castle	Whitehaven RLFC
	James Newton
	Matty Fleming	Widnes Vikings
	Ryan Ince
	Danny Langtree

As of 18 June 2024: (Round 8)

Broadcasting

The two-year deal with Viaplay expired at the end of the 2023 season. As of November 2023 no new deal has been arranged with any provider.

References