Dunfermline Jag

I think Rosyth just ran out of options. They can't get the Rec back because it's still wanted for some kind of development and, in any event, all the former club buildings have been removed and the pitch ruined. They can't make Fleet Grounds EOS compliant (an option they had seriously looked at and was do-able) because Fife Council are building a new school at the site which will have its own Astro etc and they won't agree to money being invested in what would be competition. They can't share the former Civil Service club with Dunfermline Athletic because The Pars, having originally been open to such an arrangement changed their mind and don't want them there. They can't use Pitreavie (which I didn't think was EOS compliant but the club chairman is on record saying it had been approved by the league) because the financial goalposts were moved so far at the last minute that it was simply unaffordable. I don't think any one person or organisation is solely to blame, although Fife Council started the whole saga by terminating the club lease for a development which still hasn't happened and then put obstacles in the way of the Fleet Grounds option. However, every other party in the saga has just seen the club as a burden and despite all of the elected Councillors being supportive, ultimately all the other parties were prepared to sacrifice the club to protect their own interests.

Syngenta had priority over Queens park as their agreement with Stenhousemuir pre-dated the agreement with Queens Park. If there was a fixture clash QP had to pay Syngenta and their opposition to move Syngenta's fixture - usually to the Friday.

I see your point but I disagree. This will go the way these these things always seem to go:- We recognise football has a problem with the character of some of its players. We identify Goodwillie as representing that problem. We hound him out of the game. We all feel that our righteous indignation has been satisfied and go away knowing that football is in a better state. Other players get to fly on under the radar and football continues to have the same problem.

David Goodwillie is no better or worse than many guys playing football in the Scottish pyramid. There are players with actual convictions - sex, drugs and domestic abuse among them - taking the field each week with nary a word spoken and no thought given to their victims or those who might have to come into contact with them, let alone Councils and others acting outraged at their presence on Council facilities. Lets not pretend that this is all out of principle. NLC, who threatened to terminate their lease with Clyde when he re-signed for them, said nothing during his first spell. The Clyde Women's team who resigned en masse had joined the club when he was there, some of them when he was captain. I also wonder how many folk on here, outraged at Goodwillie, mourned the passing of Adam Strachan never having spoken out against him continuing to play football, despite his "troubled past" which involved repeated convictions for domestic abuse and drug dealing. Football is full of bad people. It is often some of the worst that can kick a ball and are lauded for it, their particular sins being overlooked when expedient. Surely the same standards should be applied to all, or to none?

I find Rosyth's position very confusing. They know what the EOS requires and the need for a compliant ground was being talked about with Fife Council years ago. Surely they wouldn't have agreed to the current plans without checking with the league? However, the new ground doesn't appear to comply with the requirements so have the league signed off on it? The problem with established clubs (and Rosyth are an established club albeit only recently in to the EOS league) is what you do if this is the best they can get, through no fault of their own, particularly if did have a compliant ground until they were forced out. There is no Junior league to go to, there is just the pyramid. Are you really going to force them to fold if they don't meet all of the ground requirements?

Ballast bank wasn't properly enclosed and the dressing rooms were a distance from the pitch but in those respects it was no worse than Peebles Rovers and that doesn't seem to bother anyone too much. The Swifts' plan was to improve Ballast Bank but the Council, for the sake of a couple of days per year - Inverkeithing Highland Games and and an annual car rally - wouldn't let them do what they needed to do, so they moved. There is no doubt that dalgety Bay is a better venue for pyramid football.

I believe that there will be toilets and a catering outlet within the enclosed area around the pitch. No stand or enclosure that I am aware of but I was told that there will be room for one if the club want to do it.

15 to 20 minute walk. The new ground isn't in Rosyth but its about as close as you could get and not really any further from the centre of Rosyth than the Fleet Grounds.

Anyone who has caused a club to fold, unnecessarily, mid-season with all the costs and inconvenience that results in, should not be allowed anywhere near any other club in the league.

No. The problem is the junior clubs who stuck their heads in the sand for several years, joined the pyramid late and now don't like the consequences of that.

I have had a look at the Rosyth plans on the Fife Council website. I hope there is more to it than shown, or that they already have EoS approval, because on the face of it the new set up is no better than the Fleet Grounds or, for that matter, Letham who were, of course, refused entry.

I have been avoiding my Cowdenbeath supporting colleague today as I was at the game and I'm afraid he'll ask me what I thought of it. I knew there would be a dip in standard but I was shocked at how much. If that is anywhere near Cowden's starting eleven for the season be very, very afraid. The first half was pretty poor all round but Lochore were definitely the better team in the second with the best chances and a good shout for a 2nd penalty. There was virtually no cohesion about the Cowdenbeath team and they badly need a few experienced players to provide a backbone and some guidance on the park to the youngsters. The more the game went on the more convinced I became that there will be some big defeats - double figures, I reckon - from the better teams in the League. That's two draws against East of Scotland opposition, both playing their first friendly this season, and that is about their level at the moment.

Swifts have been in it since they joined the EoS. However, Rosyth have announced that they will have an U20's team next season.

There is no mess. Every club is in the position it would have been in if Covid hadn't prevented the formation of Premier, First and Second divisions when originally planned. Two, maybe three, of the Conference X clubs will be promoted. Sure, it isn't ideal that the entirety of the new Third division will be from West Lothian but it is not the the League's fault that the dinosaurs survived longer in West Lothian than anywhere else. There has been no animosity shown by the EoS towards these former junior clubs. That cannot always be said to have been true the other way. Despite that, no club has been punished and no club has been disadvantaged. That is the very opposite of the EoS getting it wrong.

A bit of deflection from the Lowland League here, I think. This has been talked about for months but yesterday was the first time I had seen anyone say it was still subject to SFA approval. If players and clubs have made plans based on being led to believe that this was a done deal, they weren't being misled by the SFA. In the meantime, all of the players born in 2002 have just seen up to 500 potential competitors, for promotion to their first teams next year, disappear! Its an ill wind that blows nobody any good.