Promotion from Championship Sham

Although I am currently living in the US, I am a Rugby fan, and have been to both Ealing and Coventry rugby clubs. Today it was announced that both will not be allowed into Premiership because their ground capacities aren't big enough.

Both have capacities of nearly 6000, which would be more than enough to allow them into football's Premier League, but below the minimum 10000 capacity the Premier Rugby demand.

When you look at the home attendances of Premership Rugby Clubs, not including home matches at big stadiums, where attendances are vastly inflated by free ticket giveaways (I have been offered free tickets to matches at Wembley, Spurs and Twickenham for clubs palying "home" matches at those stadia), many never get near the 10000. Nothing looks worse than a half empty stadium on TV.

So why do PRL insist on this? - it's a way of ensuring a closed shop for the multi millionaires who control those clubs.

Ealing, particularly, have shown they would be more than capable of being able to perform in the PRL but there is no way they would get planning permission to expand their ground, and they would never get "primacy of tenure" if they transferred hiome matches to an existing suitable stadium.

Makes you wonder if one of the reasons the Premiership Cup will no longer exist is that PRL clubs were not happy being outplayed by Ealing?

What are the benefits of having a closed shop?