Gallagher Premiership: The threat of relegation hanging over a raft of big clubs only adds to the intrigue

We should relish the enthralling prospect of what the remainder of this Premiership season holds in store

Leicester Tigers are among the teams who could still go down (Getty)

The final Premiership fixtures of 2018 take place this weekend with the most absorbing second-half to any season in the competition’s 20-year-history set to play out in the New Year.

With only eight points separating bottom club Newcastle Falcons and fourth-placed Wasps before round 11, no fewer than nine clubs will begin 2019 looking nervously over their shoulders as the dreaded finger of relegation looms over some of the greatest names in English club rugby.

“It could be you,” they will all be thinking.

It may be a matter of time before the inevitable happens and the current keyholders pull up the drawbridge and ringfence the competition in the interests of nobody but themselves. But we should relish the enthralling prospect of what the remainder of this Premiership season holds in store.

Whatever deal may be brokered in years to come will do nothing to avert the possibility any one of Wasps, Northampton Saints, Leicester Tigers, Harlequins or Bath could very well go down come the end of the current season. The RFU has said as much.

Northampton and Quins have been there before, and lived to tell the tale, but the prospect of a relegation dogfight was one none these once mighty clubs minds at the start of the season.

For Falcons, Worcester Warriors and Bristol Bears there is nothing new about entering the New Year with all the uncertainty that lying near the foot of the table brings. Their experience of battling down at the bottom could yet stand them in good stead as the business end of the season approaches.

There is a sense of Armageddon associated with relegation, although both Quins and Northampton’s players, coaching staff and fans alike seemed to relish the brief spells they spent out of the top division following their departures in 2005 and 2007 respectively.

The commercial departments may have felt very different, but for many at those two clubs the experience outside the top flight proved a breath of fresh air at the time.

Bath Rugby are one of the relegation candidates (Getty Images)

For Wasps (fourth), Bath (sixth) and Leicester (seventh) relegation would be unchartered territory but with so much to play for in the remainder of the season, none of those mainstays of the league will be taking anything for granted at this stage.

Some fascinating fixtures are set to play out.

This weekend alone sees Quins take on Wasps at the Twickenham Stoop on Saturday in a game which will see one club put distance between themselves and the rest of the relegation mire while the other will be left with their feet firmly in the collective mud.

Eleventh placed Worcester, thrashed by fellow strugglers Northampton last weekend, look set to suffer a miserable New Year as they travel to Allianz Park to face Saracens, who will surely get back to winning ways after surrendering their 22-game unbeaten run in uncharacteristically meek fashion against Exeter last weekend.

Bath against Leicester, for so many years the most engrossing fixture in English club rugby long before the league system was introduced and for many years thereafter, has never before been considered a serious relegation clash.

Exeter beat champions Saracens last week (Getty)

But whichever clubs loses at the Recreation Ground on Sunday will be facing up to the growing reality they will be enter New Year in survival mode.

There will be some unusually nervous figures in the west country this weekend.

Last year’s promoted team Bristol, who have made a decent if not spectacular fist of their first season back in the Premiership, host Newcastle at home on Sunday knowing defeat would see them overtaken by Dean Richards team near the foot table. Only Worcester would stand between them and the drop.

With third placed Gloucester seemingly clear of the relegation mess on 32 points courtesy of six wins and a draw from 10 games, and Exeter and Saracens in a league of their own with only a solitary defeat each this season, only three teams in the league can afford to breathe easily going into 2019 approaches.

Current positions suggest it will be Newcastle or Worcester who will drop. But no-one is safe. At the half way stage, there is so much intrigue to come. Long may it continue.