"Scotland Has Too Many Clubs" - Ann Budge

[1320Lichtie]

Malta is only slightly bigger than Clackmannanshire with less than a tenth of Scotland's population, so that isn't a sensible parallel. Not sure why people see having twenty fewer clubs in the national divisions as meaning clubs would no longer exist. Most of Scotland's 950 or so Saturday afternoon teams already play outside the SPFL. Bo'ness United vs Alloa makes more sense than Stranraer vs Alloa from a logistical standpoint when part-time players are involved and you would still get a decent sized crowd along to watch it. Regional divisions at the top part-time level would not be the end of the world for the clubs involved.

Why when nobody wants it? Berwick/Annan/Stranraer/Peterhead/Elgin/ICT/County are the only clubs that are really outwith the central area anyway and they're all spread out across the 4 divisions. Vast majority of Arbroaths away games are currently

Under half an hour - Forfar, Montrose

Hour'ish - Cowdenbeath

1 hour - 1 and a half hours - Edinburgh City, Clyde, Stirling

2 - 3 hours - Elgin, Annan and Berwick

It's hardly that far. Scotland's a small country. 6 long trips a season, big fucking deal.

[LongTimeLurker]

1 hour ago, Gordon EF said:

Regionalising the bottom 2 leagues would result in a 'North' League of Peterhead, Elgin, Arbroath, Montrose, Forfar, Brechin, East Fife, Cowdenbeath and Stirling, which would result in far more travelling for the 3 'southern' clubs in that group.

 

 

Suspect what she has in mind would be something similar to Austria's 10-10-[16/16/16] format, so there would be no need to do things that way. The Highland League, and east and west junior superleagues provide the obvious template for a similar regionalisation in a Scottish context, and the twenty demoted SPFL clubs could easily combine with 28 or so from the existing regional setups to facilitate that sort of league structure, if Scottish football ever got serious about having a pyramid. Set things up that way and you have 48 clubs only two promotions away from the big time rather than having 10 and that means many more local communities with a team that people might take an interest in rather than gravitating towards the Old Firm.

[Gordon EF]

15 minutes ago, LongTimeLurker said:

 

Suspect what she has in mind would be something similar to Austria's 10-10-[16/16/16] format, so there would be no need to do things that way. The Highland League, and east and west junior superleagues provide the obvious template for a similar regionalisation in a Scottish context, and the twenty demoted SPFL clubs could easily combine with 28 or so from the existing regional setups to facilitate that sort of league structure, if Scottish football ever got serious about having a pyramid. Set things up that way and you have 48 clubs only two promotions away from the big time rather than having 10 and that means many more local communities with a team that people might take an interest in rather than gravitating towards the Old Firm.

That kind of split probably makes more sense although I still think only having 20/22 clubs playing at a 'national' level is far too small. There's no reason why there shouldn't be at least one predominantly part-time national league.

Edited August 7, 2016 by Gordon EF

[Mattmc]

Why not go the other way and have less full time teams? Countries like Ireland have far less full time clubs than we do, but seem to compete better at international level. Granted they don't have many internationalists from their own league but, these players must of been part of some kind of system in their own country before moving on.

Is it more about filling peoples pockets?

If Stranraer were playing Sunday league I'd still support them but playing merged with another team things may be a bit different.

[Gordon EF]

The idea that tinkering with the league set up will improve the standard of player Scotland produces at the top end is ludicrous.

Andy Robertson is the last Scotland player to 'emerge' from the lower leagues afaik. Is anyone seriously suggesting we'd be producing more players like that if QP were playing in a regionalised league against Albion Rovers, and Cumbernauld Colts, rather than in a national league against Albion Rovers and Arbroath?

Edited August 7, 2016 by Gordon EF

[parsforlife]

Any proposal put forward to 'help the national team' should be ignored. Bottom on the list of priorities.

[1320Lichtie]

The idea that tinkering with the league set up will improve the standard of player Scotland produces at the top end is ludicrous.

Andy Robertson is the last Scotland player to 'emerge' from the lower leagues afaik. Is anyone seriously suggesting we'd be producing more players like that if QP were playing in a regionalised league against Albion Rovers, and Cumbernauld Colts, rather than in a national league against Albion Rovers and Arbroath?

This. Utter nonsense. The set up has f**k all to do with the standard of player. If they're good enough for Scotland they'll be away playing Full Time anyway in no time.

[1320Lichtie]

Any proposal put forward to 'help the national team' should be ignored. Bottom on the list of priorities.

This as well

I love Scotland but you only get a handful of games a season and club football is what fans really care about.

[Tulloch Gorum]

I don't really see the attraction of regional leagues at all.  Part of the fun of following a team is that you get to go all over the country, go to places you might not otherwise see etc.  

[BFTD]

9 minutes ago, Gordon EF said:

The idea that tinkering with the league set up will improve the standard of player Scotland produces at the top end is ludicrous.

Andy Robertson is the last Scotland player to 'emerge' from the lower leagues afaik. Is anyone seriously suggesting we'd be producing more players like that if QP were playing in a regionalised league against Albion Rovers, and Cumbernauld Colts, rather than in a national league against Albion Rovers and Arbroath?

I think the idea's supposed to be that it'll help the bigger clubs produce better players, with youth development at clubs like Queen's Park being considered irrelevant. Sixteen grand a season was the last estimate I remember seeing touted as the sum that would help the full time clubs achieve this aim, once the part-timers aren't part of the SPFL any more.

[LongTimeLurker]

9 minutes ago, Gordon EF said:

.. Is anyone seriously suggesting we'd be producing more players like that if QP were playing in a regionalised league against Albion Rovers, and Cumbernauld Colts, rather than in a national league against Albion Rovers and Arbroath?

Not as far as I am aware. What the top clubs wanted to do when the SPL-SFL merger negotiations started up was to have their U-20 teams playing against lower division part-time clubs on a regular basis and regionalisation was very much on the agenda in that context. The full-time clubs would probably prefer to keep players in house more of the time rather than loaning them out to other clubs. This year's Challenge Cup might be the thin end of the wedge on that given the U-20 teams seemed to hold their own quite well against that level of opposition.

[Gordon EF]

1 minute ago, BigFatTabbyDave said:

I think the idea's supposed to be that it'll help the bigger clubs produce better players, with youth development at clubs like Queen's Park being considered irrelevant. Sixteen grand a season was the last estimate I remember seeing touted as the sum that would help the full time clubs achieve this aim, once the part-timers aren't part of the SPFL any more.

I suppose that may well be the plan but it's ridiculous as well, to be fair. No country which has dramatically increased it's standard of player in recent years has done it by syphoning of resources from smaller clubs to bigger clubs. If Falkirk or Hamilton think all they need to produce the next Kenny Dalgleish is £16k a year, then we really are fucked.

[paranoid android]

Heard this on the radio earlier - didn't agree with it, and I never have.

[Gordon EF]

3 minutes ago, LongTimeLurker said:

Not as far as I am aware. What the top clubs wanted to do when the SPL-SFL merger negotiations started up was to have their U-20 teams playing against lower division part-time clubs on a regular basis and regionalisation was very much on the agenda in that context. The full-time clubs would probably prefer to keep players in house more of the time rather than loaning them out to other clubs. This year's Challenge Cup might be the thin end of the wedge on that given the U-20 teams seemed to hold their own quite well against that level of opposition.

Well the comments about Ireland etc being able to produce better players whilst having a regionalised structure suggests some folk are being reeled in by that.

Budge's comments and others like them may well be an effort to introduce colt teams by the back door. Can't speak for everyone but the minute East Fife are punted to some regionalised league to play against Hearts and Hibs u-20s, I'm done with Scottish football. I doubt i'll be the only one.

[1320Lichtie]

Not as far as I am aware. What the top clubs wanted to do when the SPL-SFL merger negotiations started up was to have their U-20 teams playing against lower division part-time clubs on a regular basis and regionalisation was very much on the agenda in that context. The full-time clubs would probably prefer to keep players in house more of the time rather than loaning them out to other clubs. This year's Challenge Cup might be the thin end of the wedge on that given the U-20 teams seemed to hold their own quite well against that level of opposition.

If there's an 18/19/20 year old that can't get into a first team squad up here then they're not going to be troubling the international stage at any point anyway.

[The Grass Is Greener.]

Will the 20 teams be invited back when the Auld Firm f**k aff to England? 

[1320Lichtie]

Well the comments about Ireland etc being able to produce better players whilst having a regionalised structure suggests some folk are being reeled in by that.

Budge's comments and others like them may well be an effort to introduce colt teams by the back door. Can't speak for everyone but the minute East Fife are punted to some regionalised league to play against Hearts and Hibs u-20s, I'm done with Scottish football. I doubt i'll be the only one.

I'll join you. Would never happen though. This has been spoken about for as long as I can remember. Clubs would never vote it through.

If we weren't such fucking bottlers as a country we wouldn't even have to entertain this chat. Funny how clubs like ours seem to be getting the blame. Joke.

[BFTD]

Just now, Gordon EF said:

I suppose that may well be the plan but it's ridiculous as well, to be fair. No country which has dramatically increased it's standard of player in recent years has done it by syphoning of resources from smaller clubs to bigger clubs. If Falkirk or Hamilton think all they need to produce the next Kenny Dalgleish is £16k a year, then we really are fucked.

Yes; yes it is.

If you were of a paranoid bent, you might well come to the conclusion that this whole SPFL thing has been a plan to marginalise the wee clubs and gradually replace them with extended squads for the big clubs, as per L4L's last post. If so, you'd hope the boards at clubs like Falkirk and Hamilton would be smart enough to realise they'd be next on the chopping block, but well...

[Cream Cheese]

I agree with her actually. There are too many teams deemed "professional" in Scotland. They should start by ridding us of all the cheating b*****ds, such as Hearts for example. Incurring millions upon millions of debt, then refusing to repay back those that you owe, despite somehow finding the money to prevent you from going bust. They're the unacceptable face of Capitalism.

[54_and_counting]

wonder if she thinks that by binning 22 clubs or greatly reducing what competitions they play in (effectively binning them anyway) that their fans will simply pop along to the nearest club and follow them

not a fucking chance, shes probably right in that given our population and therefore % of population that will follow football clubs, we have too many, however they are here, have been for years and years and will be here so long as there are fans to follow them and these fans deserve way more respect, the national game never struggled in the mid 20th century onwards with this amount of clubs, so whats changed now