The 2023 season of the Championship, officially known as the Betfred Championship, is a professional

rugby league Rugby league football, commonly known as just rugby league and sometimes football, footy, rugby or league, is a full-contact sport played by two teams of thirteen players on a rectangular field measuring 68 metres (75 yards) wide and 112 ...

club competition organised by the

Rugby Football League The Rugby Football League is the governing body for professional rugby league in England, and until 1995 for the whole British Isles. The name Rugby Football League previously also referred to the main league competition run by the organisati ...

as its second-tier competition. It runs concurrently with its first-tier competition,

Super League XXVIII {{Infobox rugby football league season , title = Super League XXVIII , league = Super League , logo = , pixels = , duration = 27 rounds + playoffs , no_of_teams = 12 , hig ...

, and its third-tier competition, the 2023 League One season. Fourteen clubs – thirteen from England and one from France – are competing to gain promotion to next year's Super League, while avoiding relegation to the 2024 League One season. British

bookmaker A bookmaker, bookie, or turf accountant is an organization or a person that accepts and pays off bets on sporting and other events at agreed-upon odds. History The first bookmaker, Ogden, stood at Newmarket in 1795. Range of events Bookma ...

Betfred Betfred is a bookmaker based in the United Kingdom, founded by Fred Done.Pronounced to rhyme with "bone". It was first established as a single betting shop in Ordsall, Greater Manchester, Ordsall, County Borough of Salford, Salford, in 1967. Its ...

are

naming rights Naming rights are a financial transaction and form of advertising or memorialization whereby a corporation, person, or other entity purchases the right to name a facility, object, location, program, or event, typically for a defined period of t ...

sponsors for the competition.

Teams

In the previous season, the

Leigh Centurions The Leigh Leopards are a professional rugby league club based in Leigh, Greater Manchester, England, who compete in the Betfred Super League. The club was founded in 1878, and is one of the original twenty-two clubs that formed the Northern R ...

were promoted from the Championship to the Super League after defeating the

Batley Bulldogs Batley is a market town in the Metropolitan Borough of Kirklees, in West Yorkshire, England. Batley lies south-west of Leeds, north-west of Wakefield and Dewsbury, south-east of Bradford and north-east of Huddersfield. Batley is part of th ...

44–12 in the Championship Grand Final, while the

Dewsbury Rams The Dewsbury Rams are a professional English rugby league club based in Dewsbury, West Yorkshire that compete in the Championship. They play their home games at the Tetley's Stadium, on Owl Lane. The Rams' main fanbase comes from their hometo ...

and

Workington Town Workington Town R.L.F.C. is a semi-professional rugby league club playing in Workington in west Cumbria. Their stadium is Derwent Park, which they share with Workington Comets, a speedway team. They became Rugby League Champions in 1951 and ...

were relegated from the Championship to League One after finishing eleventh and twelfth on the regular season table, respectively.

Toulouse Olympique Toulouse Olympique or TO XIII is a professional rugby league club in Toulouse, south-west France. Founded in 1937, two years after the French Rugby League Federation, the club is a six-time winner of the French Rugby League Championship. The cl ...

, who are based in the southern French city of

Toulouse Toulouse ( , ; oc, Tolosa ) is the prefecture of the French department of Haute-Garonne and of the larger region of Occitania. The city is on the banks of the River Garonne, from the Mediterranean Sea, from the Atlantic Ocean and from Par ...

, return to the Championship after a single season in the Super League, in which they finished in last place and were subsequently relegated to the Championship. Based in the town of

Keighley Keighley ( ) is a market town and a civil parish in the City of Bradford Borough of West Yorkshire, England. It is the second largest settlement in the borough, after Bradford. Keighley is north-west of Bradford city centre, north-west of Bi ...

West Yorkshire West Yorkshire is a metropolitan and ceremonial county in the Yorkshire and Humber Region of England. It is an inland and upland county having eastward-draining valleys while taking in the moors of the Pennines. West Yorkshire came into exi ...

, the

Keighley Cougars The Keighley Cougars are a professional rugby league club from Keighley in West Yorkshire, England who compete in League 1, the third tier of English rugby league. Keighley's home ground, Cougar Park has a capacity of 7,800. History Early y ...

also join the Championship, after finishing their 2022 campaign as champions of the League One regular season, which earned them automatic promotion to the Championship. They last competed in the Championship in

2014 File:2014 Events Collage.png, From top left, clockwise: Stocking up supplies and personal protective equipment (PPE) for the Western African Ebola virus epidemic; Citizens examining the ruins after the Chibok schoolgirls kidnapping; Bundles of wat ...

. The

Swinton Lions The Swinton Lions are a professional rugby league club based in Swinton, Greater Manchester, England, which competes in the Championship. The club has won the Championship six times and three Challenge Cups. Before 1996, the club was known s ...

from Sale in

Greater Manchester Greater Manchester is a metropolitan county and combined authority, combined authority area in North West England, with a population of 2.8 million; comprising ten metropolitan boroughs: City of Manchester, Manchester, City of Salford, Salford ...

also return to the Championship after a single season, winning promotion to the Championship from League One after defeating

Doncaster Doncaster (, ) is a city in South Yorkshire, England. Named after the River Don, it is the administrative centre of the larger City of Doncaster. It is the second largest settlement in South Yorkshire after Sheffield. Doncaster is situated in ...

in the League One Play-off Final.

Rule changes

Changes in the operational rules were announced on 1 February 2023. On-field, the main change is that teams awarded a penalty for an offence at a scrum can now kick for goal. Previously such penalties were differential precluding the team from kicking for goal. The green card process has been clarified so that if the referee calls "time off" for a player to receive medical attention, the player must leave the pitch for two minutes. Teams will be allowed to name an 18th player (fifth interchange player) in the squad who can play if three or more players are withdrawn due to failing a head injury assessment (HIA). Off-field the graduated return to play process that applies after a player has suffered a

concussion A concussion, also known as a mild traumatic brain injury (mTBI), is a head injury that temporarily affects brain functioning. Symptoms may include loss of consciousness (LOC); memory loss; headaches; difficulty with thinking, concentration, ...

will be a minimum of 12 days (up from 11 in 2022). Changes have also been made to the disciplinary process where the periods of suspension for the various grade of offences have been reduced but the use of fines increased.

Results

Regular season table

Broadcasting

The 2023 Championship season is the second of two seasons to be televised under a broadcasting deal between the Rugby Football League and Premier Media Broadcasting agreed in October 2021. In late 2022, Viaplay Group acquired Premier Media Broadcasting for £30 million, and subsequently took over operations of Premier Media Broadcasting's channels and rebranded them to Viaplay Sports.

Viaplay Group Viaplay Group AB, formerly known as Nordic Entertainment Group AB (NENT Group), is a Swedish media and entertainment company headquartered in Stockholm. The company operates the namesake video streaming services Viaplay and Viafree, advertising ...

are broadcasting the Championship's Monday evening games, along with two Summer Bash games and all five play-off games, via their

Viaplay Sports Viaplay Sports and Premier Sports are a group of pay television sports channels owned by Viaplay Group. Viaplay Sports holds exclusive live UK and Republic of Ireland TV rights to La Liga, Scottish League Cup, Elite Ice Hockey League, NHL an ...

channels in the United Kingdom and Ireland.

References

External links

Betfred Championship
at Rugby Football League {{RFL Championship

RFL Championship The Championship, known as the Betfred Championship for sponsorship reasons, is a professional rugby league competition. It is the Rugby Football League Championship Second Division, second-tier competition organised by the Rugby Football Lea ...

Rugby Football League Championship

Championship In sport, a championship is a competition in which the aim is to decide which individual or team is the champion. Championship systems Various forms of competition can be referred to by the term championship. Title match system In this system ...