Sky will have to sell Sky Sports 1 and 2 for up to 23% less than the current wholesale price, according to the ruling by the broadcasting regulator.

Sky has exclusive rights to the Guinness Premiership, and RFU chief executive Francis Baron said: "The RFU is incredibly disappointed that its concerns, and those of all other affected sports rights holders, have not been taken into account by Ofcom whose consultation process was inadequate and flawed."

He added: "Ofcom set out to review pay TV but in doing so have ended up interfering in the sports rights market where they have no competence nor experience and their intervention will remove competition from the sports rights market.

"Ofcom's proposed approach effectively confiscates our rights and donates them to organisations who have consistently declined to invest in sports rights despite having balance sheets that dwarf Sky's."

Baron said Ofcom's ruling acted as a disincentive for broadcasters to bid for rights in the future.

He continued: "The result for all sports right holders is uniformly negative with the resulting reduction in rights values likely to force all of us to cut our grassroots investments and compromising our ability to deliver against the government's participation targets.

"We will review this very seriously indeed to decide what our actions may be. Clearly we will be taking appropriate legal advice on this matter."