To all Hattons Solicitors National Conference League clubs

The NCL League Management has unanimously taken the decision to strongly recommend to the clubs that they accept the invitation of the Rugby Football League to play as the “The Conference League (North)” from March 2012 onwards.

Therefore, the NCL Club’s meeting on Monday April 4th, is set to be the biggest day in the history of the Hatton’s Solicitors National Conference League when all 38 clubs will be asked to vote to support the Management’s recommendation to operate a summer season for 2012 and onwards.

Under Licence to the RFL, the NCL Management Committee will administer the new 2012 summer competition to the same operational and competition rules as the ones they currently operate for their winter league.

Once the League is up and running, the RFL and NCL will work together to fine tune these operational rules over the 2013 and 2014 seasons to ensure the ongoing success of the Tier Three competition.

This Summer League will operate at Tier Three level in the new pyramidal structure and will sit directly under Super League, (which is Tier One), the Championship and Championship One, (which sit in Tier 2), and will provide a direct promotion opportunity into the Championship for any clubs with such ambitions.

It’s a momentous decision, but the NCL Committee met with the RFL representatives last week, and unanimously voted to recommend to the clubs that they accept a series of proposals (shown in Appendix A1) that would take the NCL into a new level of competition.

For your information these agreed proposals are as follows (more detail is in the attached Appendix A1): -

i) Subsidy for all clubs to equalise travel costs.
ii) Priority support for club facility improvement and upgrade
iii) Payment of match officials and development of NCL pool of referees.
iv) Competition support through full time administrator
v) Technical and performance support from Super League and Championship clubs
vi) Coaching support and development
vii) Development and implementation of workload reducing administration technology complete with training.
viii) Player compensation payment revision.

With the National Youth League already playing in summer and Junior League’s seemingly set to follow, it would seem only a matter of time before the game would naturally progress to a summer competition as youngsters want to continue playing in the season where they have first learned to enjoy the game.

But instead of drifting towards that inevitability the NCL now has the opportunity to be in charge of its own destiny.

We know it is a huge call, but as a League we have never been frightened of meeting challenges, which we believe will take the National Conference League and the amateur game forward.

Nor is it the intention to leave any of the current membership behind!

We are aware that some of our Clubs will have operational reasons that they feel will inhibit a desire to change playing seasons, but the NCL Management undertake to work with these clubs and the RFL to ensure they can make the changes happen and secure the future of their clubs.

With the same management structure, operational and competition rules, it should ensure that any clubs’ concerns over administration and management are suitably addressed.

The only change that the club’s players and administrators would see to what they do now is that they will play in summer rather than winter!

This is now an opportunity to ensure that you are in command of the way your club, your league and your sport is driving forward to meet the challenge of the 21st century.