Scottish Rugby is pleased to announce today the club season structure for 2008/2009.

The season structure was approved by the Scottish Rugby Board following a number of positive meetings of the Scottish Rugby Council and the Scottish Rugby Championship Committee which included extensive consultation with clubs and stakeholders by the elected club representatives.

Scottish Rugby President, Jim Stevenson welcomed the new fixtures stating:

"I am delighted to see that the new season structure has been agreed so promptly following our healthy debate at the AGM.

I would like to thank all the Scottish Rugby staff and volunteers who have contributed to pulling together what is a very busy season structure.

I am sure that the season ahead will be extremely exciting and I look forward to watching as many of the games as I can."

As a result of the number of cup and league fixtures, certain amendments have been made to the previous season structure and these include:

- League and Cup Fixtures have been scheduled throughout the season to give greater continuity to the programme
- Fixtures on the days of international matches, whether League or Cup, can not kick-off later than two and a half hours before International match kick-off time;
- Premier Division clubs that qualify for latter stages of Cup in April, but are involved in Sevens tournaments on Saturdays, will play fixtures on Friday evening or Sunday by 'gentlemen's agreement .
- Cup Finals will be scheduled on Sunday 10 May to avoid clashes with various club sevens tournaments on the previous day.

A revised fixture list has been issued to all clubs. There is no change to the order of fixtures but some dates in the second half of the season have been altered in order to accommodate the new structure.

This article was posted on 13-Jul-2008, 19:10 by Hugh Barrow.