Sedgley Tigers clinched promotion from National Two North and the championship title with an emphatic 80-14 home triumph against Sheffield Tigers on Saturday.

It was a 23rd win from 25 league games and sees them promoted to National One.

It has been a commanding season for the Park Lane outfit and after sealing their first promotion in nearly 20 years, Sedgley Park’s head coach and director of rugby development, Scott Barrow, was delighted.

He said: “All the hard work through the season gave us this chance to get promoted at home.

“The lads got tuned in straight away and scored very early on and kept pushing at them, which was pleasing. We defended really well in the second half and were down to 13 men at one point and we didn’t relent.

“The objective was to get promoted. We had a 19-game unbeaten run from the start of the season.

“We dropped a couple of bonus points but some of the performances were fantastic.

“If we’d have gone up last season it would have probably been a season too early. Last year we dropped points around us but this year we’ve taken points off all the big teams.

“Against Fylde, we won and drew, we beat Rotherham home and away, also beat Hull Ionians home and away, so we learnt a lot from last year.

“I’m just ecstatic we’ve managed to do it this year.”

Tigers captain and veteran of 17 Whitefield campaigns, Matt Riley, added after the game: “We just missed out last year, we’ve lost play-offs in the past, top four numerous times, sometimes you think is it ever going to be, is it going to always escape us.

“But we started in the summer with clear objectives, where we needed to improve.

“We got off to a good start and the boys have been outstanding, not just the 20 who played today, the whole squad has delivered to bring us this promotion.”