British American Football League

This article has multiple issues. Please help improve it or discuss these issues on the talk page. (Learn how and when to remove these messages) The topic of this article may not meet Wikipedia's notability guidelines for companies and organizations. Please help to demonstrate the notability of the topic by citing reliable secondary sources that are independent of the topic and provide significant coverage of it beyond a mere trivial mention. If notability cannot be shown, the article is likely to be merged, redirected, or deleted. Find sources: "British American Football League" – news · newspapers · books · scholar · JSTOR (September 2014) (Learn how and when to remove this message) This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. Find sources: "British American Football League" – news · newspapers · books · scholar · JSTOR (September 2014) (Learn how and when to remove this message) The neutrality of this article is disputed. Relevant discussion may be found on the talk page. Please do not remove this message until conditions to do so are met. (September 2014) (Learn how and when to remove this message) (Learn how and when to remove this message)

British American Football League

Sport	American football
Founded	1987
Ceased	2010
No. of teams	50 (across three divisions)
Country	United Kingdom
Last champion(s)	London Blitz

The British American Football League (BAFL) was the United Kingdom's primary American football league from 1998 until 2010. It was formerly known as the British Senior League (BSL) until 2005.^[1] BAFL was the trading name for Gridiron Football League Ltd incorporated as a Company limited by guarantee. Registration number: 2353839. The company went into administration on 1 April 2010, and the company ceased to trade as from this date.^[2]

The League had 3 divisions: Premier, 1 and 2, each with a playoff series and championship game to determine a winner. The Championship participants were promoted to the divisions above and the lowest-ranking teams in each division are relegated. Only clubs from England, Scotland and Wales played; clubs in Northern Ireland competed against Republic of Ireland clubs in an all-Ireland Irish American Football League.

Teams competed annually to reach the championship game (BritBowl) and win the Boston Trophy. The game was traditionally hosted at Sheffield's Don Valley Stadium, however the venue for the finals was switched in 2008 because of a schedule conflict with Rotherham United FC, the stadium's temporary tenants,^[3] with the match instead being played at the Keepmoat Stadium in Doncaster.^[4]

Tensions grew between the directors of BAFL and those of the British American Football Association, the governing body throughout 2009 and at the beginning of 2010, BAFL formally, but unconstitutionally, withdrew from BAFA. This led to uproar from the teams within BAFL, ultimately signalling the end for BAFL as an entity. The league ceased operations on 1 April 2010. The league was replaced by the BAFA Community Leagues for the 2010 season. This organisation, run under the umbrella of the governing body, rebranded in 2011 to become the BAFA National Leagues.