YORK Wasps have been given a six-day deadline to save the club.

At an emergency meeting yesterday between Wasps officials and the Rugby Football League, the club officially handed in their resignation from the league.

However, the RFL have agreed to give the Wasps until Tuesday (March 26) to find a new owner or put in place finances to secure the club's future.

The meeting was hastily arranged after the Wasps' directors sensationally said the club had folded as of Tuesday night.

All fixtures were cancelled, and as such, the Northern Ford Premiership outfit would have played their last match after more than a century's involvement as a professional rugby league club.

RFL spokesman John Huxley said: "During a meeting at Red Hall (RFL headquarters), the directors of York Rugby League Football Club informed the RFL that the club had ceased trading and as a consequence the Wasps were resigning as members of the RFL.

"The directors have told the RFL that there was a possibility that the club could be sold to new owners or refinanced to enable the club to meet its existing and future debts, and as a consequence fulfil the club's fixture list."

The news of Wasps' imminent closure comes out of the blue, just a week after York City Football Club were saved from extinction and six months after Wasps announced a sponsorship deal with the New York Economic Development Council, which apparently gave the rugby club a rosy future.

But the deal, brokered by sports advertising company World Rugby League, has not worked out.

Wasps vice-chairman Russell Greenfield said: "We were promised sponsorship money that would have seen us get through this season and some way through next season, but we've only received so much money, nowhere near what we were promised," he claimed.

Ryedale MP John Greenway, who has the Huntington Stadium within his constituency, said: "It's very sad news, but not entirely surprising. It's symptomatic of what is going on at the lower end of professional sport."

Updated: 10:30 Thursday, March 21, 2002