NIFL Premiership

NIFL Premiership
Country	Northern Ireland
Confederation	UEFA
Founded	2008 (as IFA Premiership)
Number of teams	12
Relegation to	NIFL Championship
Level on pyramid	1
Domestic cup(s)	Irish Cup NIFL Charity Shield
UEFA cup(s)	UEFA Champions League UEFA Europa League Setanta Sports Cup
Current champions	Larne (2nd Premiership title; 2nd Irish title overall) (2023–24)
Most successful club	Linfield (56 titles)
TV	BBC NI (12 live games per season and 50 live games plus highlights via BBC iPlayer) Eleven Sports, OneFootball (Outside the UK) Bwin.Party Sky Sports (5 Premiership games per season and the League Cup final)
Website	Official website
2023–24

The Northern Ireland Football League Premiership, known as the Sports Direct Premiership for sponsorship purposes, is a professional association football league which operates as the highest division of the Northern Ireland Football League – the national league in Northern Ireland. It was formerly called the IFA Premiership until 2013, with previous competition formats called the Irish Premier League, Irish Football League Premier Division, and before that simply the Irish Football League. Still known in popular parlance simply as the Irish League, the Premiership was established in 2008 under the auspices of the Irish Football Association before the Northern Ireland Football League was created for the start of the 2013–14 season. At the end of the season, the champion club is presented with the Gibson Cup.

Larne are Irish League champions for the first time in their 134 year history, following a 2-0 win over Crusaders in April 2023. In winning the league, Larne became the first team from outside of Belfast to win the league since Portadown in 2002.

Origin

The current Premiership format was introduced for the 2008–09 season after the League system for Northern Ireland was re-organised. The top flight was reduced in size from 16 to 12 clubs, included on the basis not only of their performance in the 2007–08 season, but in the previous two seasons, and other off-the-field criteria. Each applicant club was assessed by an independent panel and awarded points against the following criteria:

• Sporting (maximum 450 points) – based on league placings, Irish Cup, League Cup and European performances in 2005–06, 2006–07 and 2007–08; with points also awarded for running youth teams, women's teams and community development programmes
• Finance (maximum 200 points) – based on solvency, debt management and cash-flow projection
• Infrastructure (maximum 150 points) – based on stadium capacity, changing provisions, sanitary facilities, field of play, floodlighting, existence and standard of control room, first aid room, drug testing room and media facilities
• Personnel (maximum 100 points) – based on qualification and experience of staff
• Business planning (maximum 50 points)
• Attendances (maximum 50 points)

Portadown were the highest-profile casualty of the new system, suffering relegation to the newly formed IFA Championship as a result of submitting their application for inclusion in the Premiership 29 minutes past the deadline for consideration. The Premiership remained under IFA control for five seasons until the creation of the Northern Ireland Football League in 2013, when it became the NIFL Premiership.

2021–22 membership

Club	Stadium	Location	Capacity	Finishing position in 2020–21
Ballymena United	Ballymena Showgrounds	Ballymena	3,600	08 !8th
Carrick Rangers	Loughshore Hotel Arena	Carrickfergus	6,000	11 !11th
Cliftonville	Solitude	Belfast	3,200	05 !5th
Coleraine	The Showgrounds	Coleraine	2,496	02 !2nd
Crusaders	Seaview	Belfast	3,383	06 !6th
Dungannon Swifts	Stangmore Park	Dungannon	5,000	12 !12th
Glenavon	Mourneview Park	Lurgan	4,160	07 !7th
Glentoran	The Oval	Belfast	6,050	03 !3rd
Larne	Inver Park	Larne	3,250	04 !4th
Linfield	Windsor Park	Belfast	18,614	01 !1st (champions)
Portadown	Shamrock Park	Portadown	2,770	09 !9th
Warrenpoint Town	Milltown	Warrenpoint	1,450	10 !10th

Champions

No.	Season	Champion
1	2008–09	Glentoran
2	2009–10	Linfield
3	2010–11	Linfield
4	2011–12	Linfield
5	2012–13	Cliftonville
6	2013–14	Cliftonville
7	2014–15	Crusaders
8	2015–16	Crusaders
9	2016–17	Linfield
10	2017–18	Crusaders
11	2018–19	Linfield
12	2019–20	Linfield
13	2020–21	Linfield
14	2021–22	Linfield
15	2022–23	Larne

External links

• Northern Ireland Football League website
• NI Football Daily Website
• Irish Football Club Project
• Irish FA Website
• Irish League Forums
• BBC Irish Football
• nifootball.co.uk
• rsssf.com: Northern Ireland - Champions

Football in Northern Ireland

League competitions The IFA Cup competitions NIFL Premiership Northern Ireland (B) Irish Cup NIFL Championship (U-21) (U-20) (U-19) Irish League Cup Intermediate League (U-18) (U-17) (U-16) County Antrim Shield Ballymena & Provincial List of clubs Mid-Ulster Cup Northern Amateur Football League List of stadiums Mid-Ulster Football League (by capacity) List of competitions