1. The full title of the competition shall (unless amended at an Annual General Meeting of the member clubs) be the “BL OFFICE CENTRE ESSEX MERIT TABLE COMPETITION”. Clubs are expected to honour their sponsorship obligations by referring to the competition by its full title.
2. All matches in the competition shall be played under the Laws of the Rugby Football Union and shall comply with the byelaws, resolutions and regulations of the RFU.
3. The management of the competition shall be vested in a committee, elected annually by the member clubs. Officers to be elected as follows: -
(i) Chairman
(ii) Secretary
(iii) Treasurer
(iv) Team Secretary
Each club in membership should nominate one representative, irrespective of the number of sides that club has in the competition.
In addition there shall be the following honorary posts: -
(i) President - normally the sponsor
(ii) Vice-Presidents (Elected by the AGM in respect of outstanding service to the competition)
4. Only clubs affiliated to the Essex County Rugby Football Union shall be eligible to enter the competition. Only bona-fide playing members of participating clubs may play in competition matches. Where a player changes clubs, he may not represent his new club in the competition until 30 days after he last played for a club in a competition match.
5. Any club applying to enter the competition may only join at the beginning of a season. Application must be made in writing to the Secretary on or before the 30th April for the following season. If accepted any club or team new to the competition shall be placed in the lowest division, although the committee shall be empowered to place teams in a higher division. Clubs may enter as many teams as they wish, but the senior team of the club shall always be the team in the highest division.
6. The number of teams in each division shall be limited to ten (10), save that the committee shall be empowered to adjust the numbers of the highest division and the two lowest divisions if numbers should warrant it. The number of teams in a division should not be less than five (5).
7. In the event of new teams joining or teams resigning the committee shall be empowered to adjust the numbers of promotions and relegations to restore the division’s balance.
Where possible, two teams from each division shall be promoted and relegated. No club shall have two teams in the same division. If any club team qualifies to be promoted into a division where there is already a team from that club, such promotion shall not be made and the next highest team may be promoted instead. The original winners however shall be entitled to receive such prize as is awarded for winning the division. If any team qualifies for relegation into a division where there is already a team from the same club then the lower team shall also be relegated into the next lower division and the team otherwise due for relegation shall remain. If a team pulls out of the league for what ever reason then they shall be automatically be relegated two divisions upon re-entering. The same clubs lower teams shall also be relegated if circumstances dictate that upon re-entering a lower side is in that division.
8. If a club resigns from the competition before it completes all its fixtures for the current season, then all its matches shall be considered void and all points scored and conceded shall be cancelled.
9. All competing clubs shall pay an annual subscription - fixed annually at an AGM - to cover the costs of the competition. All subscriptions are payable by the 1st of September.
10. Bona fide players from teams in the competition shall be eligible for selection for the competition’s representative side, which shall play celebration games against affiliated clubs and, as early as possible in the season, a Championship Match against the previous seasons Division One champions at the ground of the champions.
11. The positions of teams in a division shall be established by awarding as follows; three points for a home win, one point for a home draw and zero points for a home loss. Four points will be awarded for an away win, two points for an away draw and one point for an away defeat. A point will be deducted for a side crying off (see rule 16).
[All tables and results can be viewed on the Essex web pages - www.essexrugby.com - hover the mouse over the merit table link on the merit table option from the option list on the left hand side of the page. All tables are updated weekly, currently on Monday mornings].
In the event of equality of competition points, positions will be determined on the basis of match points scored. A team with a larger difference between match points scored and match points conceded shall be placed higher than a team with a smaller points difference. If the points difference should be the same then the team scoring the most points will be placed higher.
12. Each team must play both home and away against every other team in it’s division. The Chairman and Secretary will determine the dates of each game and report back to each fixture secretary at the AGM. Competition games may be played as double headers, e.g. where teams are due to meet in a game in another competition that game may also be counted as the competition fixture.
13. Both teams are responsible for informing the Secretary and Chairman of the results of competition matches by noon of the Monday following the match, by whatever means. Failure to do so and the result may be deemed a nil-nil defeat for both sides.
14. The number of substitutes shall be limited to five unless by prior arrangement agreed by the two captains and communicated to the referee before the game.
Where one side is unable to field a full side from their own players, the lending of players from the opposition towards evening up the sides is encouraged and expected within the ethos of the competition. Where a team is short, or unable to field a full front row, they should contact and work with their opponents to ensure that the game goes ahead if at all possible.
There are no circumstances where a team is required to forfeit the game before it is played. The lending of players, uncontested scrums and/or short-sided games are all permissible and the result as recorded by the referee shall stand.
15. Where a competition match is not played or is abandoned before no-side (i.e. less than 60 minutes) where neither club is at fault (e.g. adverse weather, unfit pitch, serious injury to a player who can’t be moved), it should be re-arranged and the new date notified to the Secretary by both clubs within seven (7) days of the date of the original fixture. Clubs must take all reasonable steps to agree a date for fixture to take place. Failure to do so may result in a 0 – 0 defeat recorded against both sides. Where only one side is unwilling to agree a date for the fixture to take place, the match score may be taken as 15-0 and the points awarded to the team not responsible for the failure to agree a new date.
16. Where a competition match is cancelled by one team (a cry-off), this must be notified to the Secretary and Chairman by noon of the Monday following the match date, by whatever means. The match score shall be taken as 15-0 and the points will be awarded to the team not responsible for the fixture cancellation. Where a side cancels a fixture the offending side will be deducted 1 point. Where the team responsible for the fixture cancellation was due to be the away side, the fixtures will be reversed i.e. if a side did not travel to an away fixture, the cancelled fixture will be deemed to have been their home game and the return fixture will be away.
17. The referee shall be of the normal standard provided for the home team’s games. Where an appointed referee fails to arrive or to complete the match, or if no referee is appointed, the home side must supply a person (whether a qualified referee or not) to officiate. Others may officiate with the agreement of both captains. Each team shall provide a touch judge.
18. Having nominated a team the club shall ensure that such team shall consist of players who would normally be expected to play for that team. If, in the opinion of the committee, any club fields an un-representative team in a competition match, the points in that match may be awarded to the opposition or other sanctions applied. Any club failing to play any higher team game(s) on a given Saturday must advise their opponents of this fact as soon as this is known – before the game if possible – but by end of Sunday at the latest.
Any team feeling they have played against a team ‘stacked’ with higher team players can “appeal” in writing (email), initially to the BL Secretary, by midnight on the Monday following the game (at the latest). This will trigger the Secretary to contact the other club, simply requesting information on which players represented them in the match, such information to be provided to the Secretary by midnight on the Friday following the game, and to include details of players’ usual teams and brief explanation as to why any ‘higher’ players were used in the ‘lower’ team. Failure to respond may be deemed as an admission of having played outside the spirit of the competition and may lead to the BL officers altering or reversing the result of the match.
Any information provided will be passed to the ‘appealing’ club who then has 7 days to decide whether or not to accept the explanation or to continue the appeal, which would be heard at the next main BL meeting. Any request to continue must be in writing to the Secretary and state why the information provided by the other side was deemed unacceptable or not in the spirit of the game.
Any decision to uphold the appeal may lead to the BL officers altering or reversing the result of the match, or instructing the match to be re-played. Where matches are to be re-played, clubs may agree to the scheduled return fixture being counted as a ‘double header’ where no other suitable dates can be agreed.
19. At the end of the season a cup competition shall take place with a main cup and a plate cup held for each division. The top half of each division will play for the main cup whilst the bottom half of each division will play for the plate. Where there are more than 8 teams in any division, the team(s) having cried-off the most during the season (i.e. failed to fulfill their Merit Table fixtures) should miss out on the cup/plate competitions. Where teams are tied on this basis, the team(s) with the lower league placing(s) at the end of the season will miss out.
20. In the event of any dispute, the decision of the committee is final.
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