BARROW Raiders chairman Steve Neale says changes to the league structures will make life tougher for the club.

However, he says it is up to the Cumbrians to rise to the challenges that they will face.

Rugby League chiefs confirmed a change in the structure of the Championship and League One, ahead of the start of the new second-tier season today.

Raiders start their Championship campaign away to Widnes Vikings on Sunday (DCBL Stadium 3pm kick-off).

And ahead of the game, chairman Steve Neale spoke to The Mail about the coming changes.

He said: “The eventual aim is to make three divisions of 12 – Super League, Championship and League One.

“One or two clubs were against it, and there’s a few teams keen to keep 14 teams in the Championship because that is how it is at the minute, and it works.

“But League One is a bit of a mess to be honest with only nine teams left in it.

“So we really need to make sure that we look after League One.

“We had 14 teams in the Championship last season and it worked quite well, so it wasn’t really broken, but to be honest I’m not too upset about the changes.

“I think at present we start the season a bit too earlier and with a couple of games less we may be able to change that.

“Eventually it is going to be a battle for us to stay in the 12 teams that stay in the Championship, so from that point of view it is going to be tougher for us.

“But it’s our job to be one of those 12 teams. If you look at last season we finished fourth bottom so it would have been cutting it close.

“I’m a favour of a pyramid system as it gives ambitious lower league clubs a chance, and I think it works well in football.

“I’m not too devastated by these changes. Yes it makes thing tougher but we have to be good enough to deal with that.”

 The changes aim to see all three leagues set up with 12 teams by the 2026 campaign, and mean only one club will be automatically promoted from League One at the end of this season.

The Championships bottom two clubs will still be releagted, while the third-bottom team will face a one-off tie against the winners of the League One play-offs to complete the make-up of the 2025 season.

The 2025 season will see the introduction of a Super Eights-style competition between the lower-ranked Championship clubs and the leading League One teams.

And the addition of a new club - potentially as early as next year – should complete the levelling-up process for the start of the 2026 season.