The long drawn-out saga of the Premier National Trophy qualifying groups finally drew to a close at Hull on Wednesday. The Vikings ended their programme with a home win over Glasgow by 51 points to 39.
Swindon and Exeter had qualified from the Southern Group weeks ago as had Workington from the Northern Group. A week ago Hull secured their place in the semi-finals with a win over Workington.
While fundamentally the competition is a good one, the qualifiers have dragged on far too long. The first problem was the switch to two qualifying groups rather than three groups used in 1999. This meant six home and six away matches had to be staged. This is probably too many for a preseason competition. There were originally supposed to have six teams in the Northern Group but Hull's late switch to the Premier League increased this to seven. The other problem was the failure to enforce the deadline for completion of group matches. They were supposed to be finished by the end of May but nearly dragged on into July.
This happened much the same last year with Edinburgh being kept waiting until well into mid season to discover if they had qualified or not. This was due to delays in completing some matches in the Southern Group. Monarchs eventually qualified for the semi-final as best runners-up. They went all the way to the final only for their injury hit team to lose out to Newport in the September final.
If the Premier National Trophy, continues next year, which it ought to, it is to be hoped that smaller qualifying groups of four teams will be used and deadlines strictly enforced.
Final Premier National Trophy results and tables are as follows:
Premier Premier National Trophy Results
Premier Premier National Trophy Tables
Hull meet the Southern Group winners Swindon in the semi-finals while Workington's reward for winning the Northern Group is a match against Exeter including a trip to the notorious County Ground.