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Well that's a few questions answered regarding the playoffs. Shire finish on the bottom and will face the winners of the playoff between Edinburgh City from the Lowland League or Cove Rangers who look favourites for the Highland League.

 

If that is the case fancy Cove to win this match. Then the question is if that is the case can they beat the Shire ?

 

Imo I believe they can but imo it will be a lot more difficult than it looks, think the Shire will prove tougher opposition than most people will realise.

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Cove and Formartine both won comfortably today - Brora were playing the Highland League Cup Final - meaning Cove have 85pts (but the far weaker GD), Brora have 82pts with only a single game left, and Formartine have 79pts. Cove accordingly only need 1pt from their last 2 games to win.

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The bottom team shoud really be going down automatically - I suppose that may come in time.

 

I agree with you their, just as in England where the bottom 2 are automatically relegated in League 2 to the Conference.

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when our turn comes (as an amateur team with players on season-long contracts, it's inevitable that we will have the occasional fallow year) the Lowland League teams will licking their lips in anticipation of playing at Hampden, whereas with no disrespect to Shirey if they do go down, the likes of Dalbeattie Star won't be exactly salivating at the prospect of their big day out at Ochilview (or wherever they end up) - the main problem for any team who go down will be in attracting decent players for the following season, and I would be surprised if many came back up at the first time of asking.

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The parachute payments (+cc and lc entry cash) should certainly help if clubs want to make a push in the first year, a 2nd attempt would be more difficult but it's what happens if club isn't promoted by the time the payments stop which will be most interesting.

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I know all the "they've finished bottom because that's where they deserve to be" and "what they contribute" arguments that'll be thrown about however I have nothing but sympathy for Shire fans who have to just sit and wait. There are players earning tuppence ha'penny a week and will move on in the summer with their time at East Stirlingshire being little more than a footnote in an unremarkable career and these are the people who the fans have to count on to pull it out of the bag. What a position to be in.

While we had some young guys with poor attitudes last season we did have a core of senior players that I could put my faith, that I hoped would see us through over two legs. If the Sire slip out of the league I hope it's with blood and thunder and not quietly by the back door.

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The parachute payments (+cc and lc entry cash) should certainly help if clubs want to make a push in the first year, a 2nd attempt would be more difficult but it's what happens if club isn't promoted by the time the payments stop which will be most interesting.

 

How much are the parachute payments worth, because given the choice of an extra £30 a week for one season with a relegated club in a lowland league in front of small crowds at (mostly) inferior grounds, or playing in the higher league with more chance of catching the eye of bigger clubs, which option should the better players choose?

 

And before you answer both those questions, here's another. Would Dundee United and Aberdeen have taken a chance on Barry Douglas, Andy Robertson, Aidan Connolly, Blair Spittall or Lawrence Shankland if they'd been shining in the Lowland League? I just think that most relegated clubs clear the decks and start again, and meantime the better Lowland and Highlighland League clubs have accumulated some decent players in their squads.

 

Until someone actually drops through the trapdoor we'll never know, but my gut feel is that if it was the likes of Shire or Montrose then the apathy greeted by their absence would be deafening.

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Y1: £40,000

 

Y2: £20,000

 

£40k would be a huge addition to a small club's playing budget (an extra £1k a week would cover some decent win bonuses), but the problem is that most would be swallowed up by the loss of other matchday income, and I'd doubt that much of it would find its way to the players

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How much are the parachute payments worth, because given the choice of an extra £30 a week for one season with a relegated club in a lowland league in front of small crowds at (mostly) inferior grounds, or playing in the higher league with more chance of catching the eye of bigger clubs, which option should the better players choose?

And before you answer both those questions, here's another. Would Dundee United and Aberdeen have taken a chance on Barry Douglas, Andy Robertson, Aidan Connolly, Blair Spittall or Lawrence Shankland if they'd been shining in the Lowland League? I just think that most relegated clubs clear the decks and start again, and meantime the better Lowland and Highlighland League clubs have accumulated some decent players in their squads.

Until someone actually drops through the trapdoor we'll never know, but my gut feel is that if it was the likes of Shire or Montrose then the apathy greeted by their absence would be deafening.

I'm not going to disagree here, relegation will have (and should have) consequences in your ability to attract players, but having access 40k+ that your opponents don't is a big help.
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£40k would be a huge addition to a small club's playing budget (an extra £1k a week would cover some decent win bonuses), but the problem is that most would be swallowed up by the loss of other matchday income, and I'd doubt that much of it would find its way to the players

In the case of the Shire going down, the fact remains that if they continue to play at Ochilview then a good deal of this money would be taken up with the rent their. Remember the Shire are only tenants their. It could be the case for long term survival of the Shire they would have to move elsewhere within their price bracket if they did not come up again to League 2 fairly quickly.

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In England the top tier of non league, called the National League (used to be the Conference) is indeed a national league. In Scotland our top tier non leagues are regionalised. As I see it there are only so many who want promotion to the SPFL and quite a few who don't both from the HL and the LL. Why not therefore have a national top tier non league comprised of teams that want promotion with automatic promotion rather than the play-offs which are awful for the 10th place SPFL club and not exactly great for the top HL and LL cubs who have to play another 4 games with the second leg against the 10th SPFL club away - think I'm right there.

I know you could argue the crowds in a national non league would be very small - but they are anyway in L1 and L2 of the SPFL - what's the difference? For those HL and LL clubs who are not fussed about promotion they could have an option of being in the pyramid system or not.

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Sadly looking at Shire today you feel the great SPFL pyramid may have its first victim.35 years watching football at this level and have seen Shire many many times and you wonder what the future will bring then I wish them well

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In England the top tier of non league, called the National League (used to be the Conference) is indeed a national league. In Scotland our top tier non leagues are regionalised. As I see it there are only so many who want promotion to the SPFL and quite a few who don't both from the HL and the LL. Why not therefore have a national top tier non league comprised of teams that want promotion with automatic promotion rather than the play-offs which are awful for the 10th place SPFL club and not exactly great for the top HL and LL cubs who have to play another 4 games with the second leg against the 10th SPFL club away - think I'm right there.

I know you could argue the crowds in a national non league would be very small - but they are anyway in L1 and L2 of the SPFL - what's the difference? For those HL and LL clubs who are not fussed about promotion they could have an option of being in the pyramid system or not.

Surely the LL v HL playoff identifies the team that represent the national 'non-league' champion? Therefore, there's no need for a non regionalised set up, although I'd tweak it to create a more even spread of the clubs.

As such, the bottom team from league 2 should drop out without a play off. As I've mentioned previously, it's possible for a team to stumble through the league without picking up a win then sign some loanees in March in time for the playoffs. Don't even need to win a game to win the playoffs either, brora won the tie v edinburgh city after two draws.

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It's madness to suggest clubs who aspire to play in SPFL2 (how do you define that aspiration btw?) should have to make their own level nationwide.

 

You could apply the same 'test' to every point at which leagues sub-divide. By extension your entire pyramid would have to be nationwide. In which case it isn't a pyramid.

 

 

Anyway, that's not the factor preventing automatic relegation.

 

They could automatically relegate 'Club 42' and replace them with the winner of HL v LL playoff.

 

That's the model which applies a step down, between LL and EOSL & SOSL - 1 relegation slot.

 

When SFL used to call for a "nationwide conference" I don't think they ever suggested automatic relegation either.

 

We have the current system because it's the least they could get away with - 0.5 of a relegation slot. Hopefully it will increase in time, as happened in England, ideally to say 1.5 relegation slots (mirroring levels above). If anything clubs going down may speed that... while the system makes it hard to be relegated, by definition that makes it hard to get promoted if you have gone down.

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I'm not going to disagree here, relegation will have (and should have) consequences in your ability to attract players, but having access 40k+ that your opponents don't is a big help.

 

It was reported earlier in this thread that the parachute wasn't paid out until the end of next season. If that's so I would assume it's to deny an unfair advantage to the club coming down.

 

Sadly looking at Shire today you feel the great SPFL pyramid may have its first victim.35 years watching football at this level and have seen Shire many many times and you wonder what the future will bring then I wish them well

Was thinking the same today that these two old clubs might never meet again. Shire fans continue to show remarkable fortitude and resilience. Unfortunately for them, the current player group on today's display have no passion for the fight and seem more interested in bickering with each other rather than preserving their club's existence.

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Sadly looking at Shire today you feel the great SPFL pyramid may have its first victim.35 years watching football at this level and have seen Shire many many times and you wonder what the future will bring then I wish them well

 

It will be interesting to see how much of a crowd the playoff game draws for the Shire and whether their latent one game a decade sort of following is anything like as big as that Montrose attracted last season. A few hundred neutrals might drift in out of curiosity but I seriosly doubt there will be a large passionate home support backing them on in this one given the last of their traditional core following from before they got dumped into C Division post-WWII and missed out on the post-war attendance boom died off in the 70s and 80s.

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