Five Bold Predictions That Could Define The Premiership Title Race

Here are five bold predictions for the Premiership Rugby run in, from Saracens’ surge to Bath’s title defense and whether the top 6 is already set.

Jan 3, 2026 by Briar Napier

Five Bold Predictions That Could Define The Premiership Title Race

England’s top-flight rugby competition is red-hot, and with a title race that could see some dramatic shifts over the next few months, something has to give.

The 10-team league is always one of the most unpredictable and helter-skelter club rugby competitions in the world, and that has remained true through eight rounds of play and with the second half of the season on the horizon.

You can follow the rest of the campaign in the United States exclusively on FloRugby, and in preparation for what’s to come, we have some hot takes to dish out.

Here’s our list of five bold predictions to monitor during the latter half of the Premiership Rugby season:

The Top Six Teams Won’t Change

To be clear, we’re not saying that the order of the top 6 won’t change, but a clear hierarchy of the contenders and pretenders across the Premiership has been established.

The gap between the first-place Northampton Saints and sixth-place Saracens (seven points) is narrower than the gap between Saracens and the seventh-place Sale Sharks (eight points), with eighth-place Harlequins eight more points behind the Sharks.

That’s all to say that, unless something drastic happens, we’re not expecting a club below Saracens to suddenly rise up and challenge for the playoffs anytime soon.

As for the order in which the six teams will finish at the end of the regular season, that’s anyone’s guess.

Merely a couple of results here and there could dramatically swing the playoff race in any direction, and with the current top three teams - the Saints, Exeter Chiefs and Bath - separated by just two points, each weekend down the stretch will prove crucial for seeding and knockout-round positioning.

It’s a vastly different landscape so far than the 20242025 campaign, when Bath captured first place by 11 points, and could make for one of the Premiership’s best fights to the finish in quite some time.

Saracens Will Host A Playoff Match

The boldest call we have for the season’s second half? Saracens will surge up the ladder over the next few months and secure a top-2 regular-season finish, as coach Joe Shaw’s side has been rather unlucky to not take more points off of some stiff competition.

Of Saracens’ four defeats thus far in the Premiership campaign, three of them have come against clubs currently in the top 3, and two (against the Chiefs and Bath) were losses of seven points or fewer.

The trick will be managing squad depth and fitness levels over what will be a jam-packed next few months between European and PREM Rugby Cup play, while simultaneously making the Premiership a priority, but Saracens’ next four league matches — which includes The Showdown match against the Saints in what should be an intense affair at Tottenham Hotspur Stadium in Round 12 — will be crucial in determining the remaining trajectory of their Premiership season.

It helps that the six-time Premiership champions are full of talent, too, especially when it comes to breakout winger Noah Caluori and his joint league-high eight tries, including five on an electric Premiership debut in October against the Sharks.

Newcastle Red Bulls Will Win A Match

The team formerly known as the Newcastle Falcons has had a tumultuous few years, to say the least.

Finishing last in the Premiership for three straight seasons, Newcastle has been saved from the drop on each occasion due to a pandemic-era moratorium on relegations (in 2022-2023) and two-time reigning Champ Rugby winners Ealing Trailfinders being ruled ineligible for promotion both times due to their ground being under the minimum capacity required to play in the Premiership.

Energy drink giant Red Bull, well known for dipping its toes into ownership in other sports (soccer, auto racing, etc.), did so in English rugby in August when it took over the Falcons and promptly renamed the team after its flagship product.

So, have results turned around? Not quite yet.

The Red Bulls are the league’s worst team by far at the end of 2025, failing to win any of their eight matches domestically, while managing just one bonus point with an abysmal minus-219 scoring differential.

That being said, Newcastle’s new owners have spent big to bring in some sizable reinforcements for next season, such as New Zealand star Hoskins Sotutu and Argentina lock Franco Molina, meaning that brighter days should be ahead for the club.

It may not save the current Red Bulls from another last-place finish, but the increased optimism around the dressing room may motivate the current squad to snatch a pesky victory in the season’s second half.

Exeter Chiefs Will Turn Back The Clock

If you were a fan of Premiership Rugby in the mid-to-late 2010s, you know that many classics and big matches involved the Exeter Chiefs.

From 2015-2016 to 2020-2021, the Chiefs finished first or second at the end of the regular season in all six seasons during that stretch and made the playoff final on every occasion, winning it all twice in 2016-2017 and 2019-2020.

In the four years since, the Chiefs have been on a downward stretch, never finishing higher than seventh place or making the playoffs.

This season, however, Exeter looks right on track to not just make the playoffs again, but be in contention for a trip down memory lane and some silverware to come with it.

Featuring the best scoring differential (plus-105) in the competition at the new year, while being backed by the league’s best defense (138 points, 18 tries allowed), coach Rob Baxter — a former Exeter player and dressing room leader since 2009, making him one of the names most synonymous with a club in English rugby — has the Chiefs clicking again after a dismal 2024-2025 campaign in which they suffered six straight defeats to start the season and eventually finished ninth.

Watch out for the Chiefs down the stretch.

Bath Will Go Back-To-Back

This is a golden era for Bath Rugby, and we’re calling that there will be little hangover after the club’s famous treble-winning season in 2024-2025.

Nearly relegated from the English top flight for the first time in their history four years ago and saved only by a relegation moratorium, South African coach and former Munster boss Johann van Graan has been a miracle worker since arriving in 2022, leading the club to its first Premiership title since 1995-1996 last season on top of a PREM Rugby Cup and EPCR Challenge Cup.

Bath once again is in the thick of the title race going into 2026, sitting in third and two points back of the table-topping Saints with plenty of important showdowns still to go in the season’s second half.

Bath’s 41 tries scored are a joint-league best, and Henry Arundell — a shrewd offseason pickup at the back from French outfit Racing 92, after originally starring in the Premiership with former league mainstay London Irish — is leading the charge with six tries thus far in his return to English rugby.

Van Graan knows how to get the best of his players when it matters most, meaning that it shouldn’t be a surprise to see Bath become a tough out when playoff rugby arrives. And in our opinion, we don’t think it will be knocked out on its way to a second straight Premiership title.

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