The English Football League played its first season in the years of 1892-93. It was originally known as the First Division however recently in 2004 it was renamed the Football League Championship. The two teams that, at the end of the season, are at the top of the table are promoted to the English Premiership, and a third team who wins a play-off between the 3rd and the 6th placed teams is also promoted. This is any team's dream, as the money and prestige of teams and players playing in the Premiership are far greater. This makes the Championship a very difficult league to get out of as it is very money motivated competition which makes the teams battle all the harder. Recently the question was asked in the media of how much the average player earns in the English championship and they estimated it was £200,000 a year.In the English premiership the wages do vary but there is a huge difference compared to the championship. The difference in salaries between the two divisions are huge. In addition, the bottom placed three teams are relegated to League 1, which was formerly known as the Second division. If there is a huge difference between wages in the Premiership and the Championship and League 1. Championship teams are just as terrified of dropping into League 1 and lower leagues as they are hungry to gain promotion into the Premiership, which makes this English league even more of the footballing battlefield.

See below a list of winners from the last five years. The first is the winner the second is the runner up and the 3^rd is the playoff winner of this great English league. In each season below are the teams that are promoted to the division above.

Season 2004-2005   Sunderland             Wigan Athletic            West Ham United

Season 2005-2006   Reading                  Sheffield United          Watford

Season 2006-2007   Sunderland              Birmingham City         Derby County

Season 2007-2008   West Brom Albion    Stoke City                   Hull City

Season 2008-2009   Wolverhampton        Birmingham City         Burnley

Season 2009-2010   Newcastle                West Brom Albion        Blackpool

Season 2010-2011   QPR                        Norwich City               Swansea City 

This season it is looking very likely that one of Newcastle, Nottingham Forrest or West Bromwich Albion will win this English League and be promoted. Newcastle were relegated last season which no one would have predicted as at the beginning of the season as they had never been relegated before and usually finishing in the top half of the Premiership table. This season there is quite a battle at the top, and every week championship results can show the top teams making mistakes. There are other teams such as Cardiff who have at this point in the season the top scorers, Whittingham and Chopra. This is sure to help their overall goal of being promoted. You also have the likes of Swansea that are putting up a good fight for promotion, so the Championship similar to the premier league is real battle at the top of the two divisions.

In the list of teams shown earlier that have been promoted over the past 5 years a lot of them have floated in and out of the premiership. However there are some major success stories like Birmingham who have been in and out of the championship but this season have had great success being on a 14 match undefeated run which doesn’t happen very often in football, especially by a team that has only just been promoted. On the other hand, Reading, who used to be in the Premiership but now are struggling and their championship results have been poor and are now possibly looking at being relegated into the third tier of English football. If you look at the twenty teams in the championship, the majority of them have at one point been in the top division, which means that they have tasted its fruit such as the wages, publicity in the public eye etc. Players are looked up to by the youth of today and obviously the players in the top division are idolised more than players in the Championship. It is almost a guarantee that every football player in the country who plays some kind of competitive football must dream to be a top division player. For every team in the English league it will be the overall goal to be promoted to the Premiership, or more importantly, not to get relegated.

This article was written by Ian Ryan on the 12^th of February 2010 who is the webmaster at www.footballbettingtips.co.uk. The purpose of the article is to educate you, the public about the championship and how it works. Learning about football and everything around it is vital when betting on such a complex sport.