Warrington Wizards
Warrington Wizards was formed in 2005. The Wizards were formally known as Warrington Woolston Rovers, and under that name they were the inaugural winners of National League Three in 2003 when they beat Teesside Steelers in the Grand Final at Winnington Park, and they were runners up to Coventry Bears in the 2004 Grand Final at Halton Stadium, Widnes.

Last season saw the Wizards miss out on the ‘Minor Premiership’ in the final game when they were narrowly beaten at eventual Grand Final Winners Crusaders Colts, and they were then defeated in the Eliminated semi final play off at home by Featherstone Lions.

The Wizards did have a very successful run in the very prestigious 2008 Carnegie Challenge Cup with a 1st Round away win at St Marys University, Twickenham and then a superb home win over Stanningley in the 2nd Round put them into the hat with the professionals in the 3rd Round where they drew the plum tie at Salford City Reds and put in a very creditable performance before losing 66-10 against the full time side.

The Wizards play their home games at the world famous Wilderspool Stadium, former home of Warrington Wolves, where they had a then record 108-0 victory over Birmingham Bulldogs in June 2005, which was the first time that a hundred points had been scored on the ground. This has since been surpassed by the Wizards when they defeated Cottingham Phoenix 124-0 in May 2007.

This season will see a very exciting RLC National competition with the addition of Carlisle Centurions and Nottingham Outlaws bringing the number of teams in the league to eleven.

The Wizards will have Alan Kilshaw as their Head Player/Coach this year. Alan has returned to the club after a season as Warrington Wolves Reserves Assistant Coach and will be assisted by Nick Settle.

Carlisle Centurions RLFC
Rugby league has had a tenuous hold in Carlisle going back to the 1920s when a professional side was formed to play at Harraby Greyhound Stadium, close to Gillford Park where the Centurions now play. Unfortunately this venture collapsed after just six games and as far as we can tell, Rugby League as an organised sport died with it until the early 50’s when a Carlisle amateur side played two seasons in the Cumberland League.

Rugby League then disappeared from north Cumbria until 1980/81 when a pro side was formed to play at Brunton Park, home of Carlisle United AFC. In 1988, the club was relocated to Gillford Park and continued in operation there until 1997 when after the close of the season the club was merged with Barrow RLFC and played out of Barrow in the south of the county.

Happily, a local amateur team called St Nicholas Arms (later known as Carlisle Saints) kept the code alive at Gillford Park until the formation of the Centurions in 2003; a formation incidentally that owes itself to former dual-code international Bev Risman who took a lead role in the game in the city in 2002/3/4. Thereafter, the two clubs continued in parallel for a few years with Saints playing in the Cumberland League in winter and the Centurions in summer.

Since their formation in 2003, the Cents have had some modest success reaching the Grand Final of the Harry Jepson Trophy in 2003, their inaugural season when they were narrowly beaten at Wilderspool by Bridgend.

They then had a brief season and a half in NL3 before travelling difficulties caused serious player-availability issues and they were forced to withdraw midway through the 2005 season. The club was reformed in 2006 and re-entered the regional competition winning the regional trophy in that year and the two subsequent years. Unfortunately, the club failed to again reach the Final of the Harry Jepson Trophy and were beaten semi-finalists in 2006/7/8 losing to Liverpool, Coventry and Nottingham respectively.

The club has enjoyed the services of experienced coach Geoff Grieves since its rebirth in 2006 and has enjoyed as a consequence over three years of stability and growth. The club has cut its early reliance on out-of-season West Cumbrian BARLA players and focused instead on gaining new recruits from outside of either rugby code and also from local RU clubs. 

Dewsbury Celtic
Dewsbury Celtic is one of the most famous names in amateur Rugby League and a club with a very long and proud history. The club’s roots emerged as far back as the late 1870’s. Match reports from 1879 have been unearthed showing matches played against Heckmondwicke C & FC, the famous Hull White Star FC who later evolved onto today’s Super League Club, Hull FC . The club changed their name to Dewsbury Celtic in 1910.

From the mid 1950’s, Dewsbury Celtic were the kings of the amateur game, only old Lancashire foes Pilking ton Recs could hold a light to them. In an era when only the best of the amateur game emerged to take on the pros in the Challenge Cup, Celtic proved their pre-eminence seven times.On the local front Celtic continued to win trophies on a regular basis, these included the Yorkshire Cup, Leeds League titles and George Oldroyd Trophy 13 times between 1953 - 1969!

In recent times the club has developed a dedicated team of volunteers who have put in place structures and standards that have allowed the club to further evolve. They now run a host of very successful junior teams which will hopefully guarantee one of the most famous clubs in rugby league for years to come.

In 2005 the decision was taken apply to play in the RL Conference Premier Division from season 2006. Following the demise of Manchester Knights 2 weeks into the 2005 season, Celtic were invited to take over their fixtures for that season and with only 5 days notice raised a team to play in Cumbria. They completed the season and then were successfully in applying to join NL3 from 2006.

They have had mixed fortunes playing wise since 2006, in their first season they finished 5th and in 2007 they achieved their highest place to-date with a very good 4th place in 2007. Last season was disappointing for them as they could only manage 9th spot. Celtic are now showing encouraging signs of recovery under coach Paul Heaton. Due to their continuing growth as a club they are developing Crow Nest Park.

East Lancashire Lions
East Lancashire Lions have a short history with forming in 2003 asBolton Le Moors Rugby league club, with the intention of trying to develop rugby league in Bolton  which is in the North of Manchester.

Their home ground in their early years was Bolton Rugby Union and their first season was a hit as they won the plate final at Wilderspool, Warrington against Torfen from South Wales. This success attracted more players, but the success on the field was not forthcoming as they had mediocre seasons. In 2006 Bolton Le Moors changed their name to East Lancashire Lions RLC as they changed area and started to play out of Darwen.

Once again the incentive was to develop rugby league in Darwen and Blackburn and as like the first season of Bolton le Moors, the first season of East Lancashire was a huge success with them winning the Northern group shield and progressing to play in the national final in Coventry where they were soundly beaten by a strong South London side, but still an outstanding achievement on reaching the final that year.

Since 2006 the Lions times have been a bit lean with finishing bottom of the National conference but still trying to develop rugby league. In 2009 the Lions were hoping for a better season on the field but todate they have had only one win against Dewsbury Celtic, but performances have certainly improved.

Gateshead Storm
Storm entered the Summer Conference in 2003 with high hopes and the side progressed to the play-offs, going one leg further than local rivals Newcastle Knights who had finished higher than them in the league. The success of the first year was recognised by the RFL with the honour of being awarded the totalRL.com 'Club of the Year 2003'. The start of the 2004 campaign saw the Gateshead side progress to the final of the RLC Challenge Cup, where they narrowly lost out to the more experienced London Skolars, 34-38. Skolars later went on to join the games professional ranks.

That was the start of a hectic few weeks in early 2004 that were to shape the future development of the North East’s most ambitious amateur club. When previous grand finalists Teesside Steelers withdrew from National League 3 with barely two weeks to go until the first game, the club received an 11th hour plea for help from the Rugby Football League and were invited to take the Steelers place in the game’s top amateur competition.

Gateshead had only a few days to mull over the offer. The challenge was immense, not only in the lack of preparation time but also, the move represented a major step up in class to a national competition and after only one year in the lower leagues. After some hastily arranged meetings the decision was taken to accept the invitation. The players benefited from the better standard of play, and were able to match the best the league had to offer - even if only for 20 minute periods - and on occasion impressed their more experienced opponents with their fast and inventive style of rugby. Off the field, the backroom staff were able to exploit the move up to NL3 by commanding excellent press coverage, resulting in a healthy increase in the number of fans attending games - all of whom are keen to be involved with a progressive and forward looking club.

Progress on the field has been steady, the young side gaining an increasing number of victories year on year with primarily the same core of players. More importantly, the side continues to develop during a period that has seen 8 bigger, more established clubs withdraw from the National League. The lack of a suitable venue for home games in Gateshead has meant a rather nomadic existence for the club, playing at Novocastrians RFC, Winlaton RFC and Rockliffe RFC. 2008 saw Storm relocate to their new home which as part of a partnership with Team Northumbria (of Northumbria University) will see them take advantage of their Bullocksteads Sports Ground for both Training and Home matches.

Along with the relocation, this season has seen a change of Personnel within the club with Rob Jones stepping down as Head Coach to take up a role as Chairman. The new Head Coach, John Coutts has played for a number of clubs including York and Gateshead Thunder, in the professional ranks.

Huddersfield Underbank Rangers
Based in Holmfirth, official records show that the club was established in 1884 and will celebrate 125 years in existence in 2009. During the early 1900s Underbank unearthed a rare local talent in Rugby League legend Harold Wagstaff (1891-1939). Wagstaff, affectionately known as the Prince of Centres, signed professional for Huddersfield when he was 15 years old for five gold sovereigns, at the age of 18 played in a test match at Fartown where England beat the Australians. "Waggy" went on to captain England in a further 4 test series. Three quarters of a century later when the Rugby League’s Hall of Fame was established, Harold’s name was the first on the Roll of Honour.

Rangers struggled in the late 1980s and early 1990s, as the establishment of the rival Newsome club took its toll. However, the club achieved a remarkable two-year revival at the end of the 1992/93 season, culminating in winning the Holliday Cup and gaining promotion to the Pennine Premier Division. The cup and promotion double was previously achieved in 1981/82, when Neil Fox was Player/Coach. Neil later received an MBE for his services to Rugby League and joined Harold Wagstaff in the Rugby League Hall of Fame. During the 1980s and 1990s, Rangers fed the professional game with many players including Paul Dixon the Great Britain International, the current Huddersfield Giants player Eorl Crabtree and the recently retired Darren Turner.

Season 1999-2000 witnessed the Rangers finish in their highest ever position (second) in the Pennine League Premier division. The following season, 2000-2001, again saw Rangers riding high in the Premier Division and proudly sat on top the table at Christmas. However, the club suffered badly with the foot and mouth crisis, the ground was closed and the nomadic Rangers were lucky to complete the season in such trying circumstances winning only one of their last nine matches. The next couple of seasons witnessed the Rangers struggle and they couldn’t maintain their Pennine Premier League status. They currently field teams in Divisions 3 and 7 of the Pennine League. The club also has a thriving junior section and proudly boasts five junior and youth teams in 2009.

Huddersfield Underbank is a proud club with a long history in the game. The club is also ambitious and innovative, and enthusiastically embraced the concept of summer rugby league and the expansion of the sport offered by the new National League 3 structure. 2003 witnessed the club play in the inaugural NL3 competition and finish a very creditable sixth out of the ten competing teams. Seasons 2004 to 2006 saw the team miss out on the play-offs, but they improved greatly in the 2007 Co-operative RLC National competition to finish fifth and reach the play-offs once before losing in the second round at Warrington Wizards. The team again finished fifth in 2008 exiting the competition in the first round of the play-offs after an exciting extra defeat at Featherstone Lions.

2009 will see the club enter the competition again, this time looking to improve their on-field performance even further and hopefully win the competition in their 125th anniversary year.

Nottingham Outlaws RLFC
Nottingham Outlaws RLFC were founded in 1998 when a number of players from the Nottingham Crusaders Yorkshire League outfit decided to explore the possibility of playing in the emerging summer conference. The newly-founded Nottingham club took the name "Outlaws" in deference to the follows of local legend Robin Hood and the Outlaws logo has now become one of the best-known names in amateur rugby league circles.
The club play in a white shirt with a blue/green chevron. The club colours are also those of the local Nottingham Trent University, perhaps not surprising since the club have long had a close relationship with the University. Indeed the four key founder members of the club were all ex-Trent students and even today the club has a generous sprinkling of Trent current and ex-students either playing for the club or helping on the coaching/committee side of things.

In its early years the club were based in Wilford village at Nottingham Moderns RUFC with a pitch situated within 50 metres of the banks of the River Trent. The club spent most of the last 10 years playing in the regional conference divisions, performing creditably against their midlands rivals. These included a series of titanic battles against archrivals Coventry Bears, as both teams strived for the title of best club in the Midlands. Whilst the Outlaws were always there or thereabouts, winning the East Midlands Regional and Midlands Premier titles on numerous occasions, the major silverware always evaded them and the best that they could muster in this period was a quarter-final defeat in the 2006 Harry Jepson play-offs against Bolton-Le-Moors. All this was about to change in 2008!

In the clubs 10th anniversary season a number of factors came together that would ultimately propel the club from midlands also-rans to Harry Jepson Trophy winners. The first piece of the jigsaw was to re-locate the club from its spiritual home at Moderns RUFC to The Bay, training ground of Nottingham RUFC and a magnificent setting for their growing junior section. Add to this the recruitment of Leeds Akkies coach Martin Crick as Head Coach and a host of new signings from the powerful Loughborough University Rugby League team and the jigsaw was complete! With a new-look team brimming with pace and power, The Outlaws swept all before them in 2008, taking the Midlands Premier Crown from Coventry in a stunning 44-0 annihilation of the holders before beating Carlisle in the semi-final and then West London Sharks in a gripping final to win the Harry Jepson Trophy for the first time in the clubs history. Having swept all before them at regional level in 2008 the club decided that the way forward was to apply for RLCN membership in 2009 and the club were delighted when they received approval earlier this year.

Looking ahead, the step-up will be a tough one for the Outlaws, but with no fewer than 7 teams across the age groups (and not to mention a thriving womens section) the Outlaws look well set to meet the challenge of higher-grade rugby league for many years to come!