Celtic And Salford Join Super League

22 Jul 2008 | tshego

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Rugby league clubs Celtic Crusaders and Salford City Reds have been announced as the 2 new teams to join the expanded Super League next season.

19 clubs applied to join the newly expanded 14-team Super League with the existing 12 teams joined by Celtic and Salford.

Salford are currently top of National League One, with the Crusaders third with the new licenses running until 2011, with no relegation during that period.

Widnes and Toulouse as well as Leigh, Halifax and Featherstone from the National League, were the clubs to miss out.

Of the existing Super League clubs, Castleford and Wakefield were thought to be most at threat of exclusion but they have kept their places.

Commented RFL executive chairman Richard Lewis: ‘It was a difficult decision. There were 19 good applications, but in the end there are going to be five disappointed clubs.’

A five-man RFL panel assessed the 19 applications based on four key criteria: stadium facilities, finance and business performance, commercial and marketing, and playing strength including junior player production development.