Rugby Union in Scotland - Other Leagues

Other Leagues

Scotland is also home to the oldest organised rugby union league in the world, the Border League, which was formed in 1901. The Border League does not take part in the pyramid structure of the National League, but all its clubs participate in it (and thus the Border League is now effectively a supplementary competition). Two small 'independent' leagues remain outside the system, the Highland Alliance League and the Grampian Alliance League but they have only four clubs between them (the remaining membership being 2nd XVs of clubs in the League Championship) and are not likely to remain in existence for much longer.

Aside from the schools, the other 'traditional powerhouse' of rugby in Scotland was the universities, and to this day the Scottish universities have their own league system independent of the BUCS system which covers the rest of Great Britain. However, the BUCS Scottish Conference comprises divisions of four or five teams, and therefore not many fixtures each season, so unofficial Saturday University Leagues are organised (somewhat informally) between the universities. As well as havin their own leagues the universities often compete in the SRU league structure and cup competitions to a high standard, most notably in 2007/08 Aberdeen University became the first university side to make the SHE SRU finals day winning the Plate competition. The significance of the universities to the history of the SRU is evident when it is noted that four of the oldest 17 SRU affiliated clubs are university teams.

Due to the social and amateur nature of the game, most clubs try to run as many teams as possible so that all their players get games on most weekends, and therefore a large system of what are effectively reserve leagues operate. Known as 2nd XV, 3rd XV, 4th XV etc. depending on the quality of the players making up each team, their competitive activities were formally all supervised by The Scottish 2nd XV League - however in recent years disputes and breakaways have led to the formation of independent 2nd XV leagues in the Scottish Borders and in and around Edinburgh.

See University Leagues in Scotland and 2nd XV Leagues in Scotland for details.