Junior football, what is the future?

[archieb]

23 minutes ago, Nikos K said:

Aye right very good!!  95% don't want to lose their Ayrshire derbies and go back to the District leagues.

I've seen some SJFA propaganda in my time but this beats them all  , how many clubs replied about 20? 

I have NO information on the number or percentage of replies it's based on but presumably it's an East+West figure (I don't think the North Region clubs were asked).

 

[GLESGABOY]

3 minutes ago, archieb said:

I have NO information on the number or percentage of replies it's based on but presumably it's an East+West figure (I don't think the North Region clubs were asked).

 

And yet you have a figure of 95% with zero substance to it referring to "a first indication of a likely result".......

[archieb]

6 minutes ago, GLESGABOY said:

And yet you have a figure of 95% with zero substance to it referring to "a first indication of a likely result".......

Make of it what you will, I'm sure we'll get an official figure in due course.

[GLESGABOY]

1 minute ago, archieb said:

Make of it what you will, I'm sure we'll get an official figure in due course.

If they issue an official figure then the appropriate level of detail in terms of the number of responses they received etc would need to be published as well before it could be viewed objectively

[Burnie_man]

1 hour ago, archieb said:

First indication of the likely result of the SJFA's recent pyramid consultation is that 95% of clubs replying are in favour of joining the pyramid!

Interesting, given there's two options for being in favour (ie same level as LL or same level as EoS/SoS) will be interesting to see the breakdown.   The former (same level as LL) just wont float with the SFA.

[froggie]

8 hours ago, Duraglit shareholder said:

Try summer football and if it doesnt work revert back,nothing ventured nothing gained.Get BBC Alba involved,maybe showing a top fixture weekly,think of the recent Rob Roy v Linlithgow match being shown live,a great advert for junior football.Just maybe a change like this would bring more investment and spark interest in the junior game.

As a matter of interest, do any of those who think summer football is the answer have a solution to how a team like, for example, Saltcoats might get a team out in the SUMMER?

[Pete77]

6 hours ago, parkcircus said:

Am I right in thinking that some teams had games off in the first 3/4 months of the season, summer football won't fix poor pitches.

Summer football is a non-starter for near the majority. A big chunk of players and committees will be working men with family who have to fit their holidays in around the schools summer break. The only way it would work would be start a week earlier or play up to end of June. 

[cmontheloknow]

There seems to be a few major stumbling blocks for summer football.

I don't move my lawn between October and March because the grass doesn't grow. Pitches need work on them and need to be re-seeded. A full-time team can buy in a new surface - I would imagine that's beyond the bank balance of most councils and Junior clubs beyond seeing to the goalmouths. Parks being played on through the summer will not be able to recover. Councils love to shut their parks too...

The 'predictable wet weather' season doesn't exist here - games can be off at any time - there have been August wipeouts in the past. Without floodlights, any rearranged games cannot be played midweek in March and mid September onwards, which leaves mid April to late August as the window for them.

Clubs will be faced with fielding weakened teams in school holidays - currently it only affects the very start of the season and there are usually a host of trialists to pad line-ups out for the waste of time Sectional etc, not sure how much more of an impact it has in East league games. In a summer season, those missing players would be missing key games midway through the season - perhaps a big Junior Cup tie - or do we bar big cup ties from the holiday season...?!

We're looking for 30 league matchdays in East and West for next season. A season starting 1st saturday in March has 35 saturdays until the end of October. But what about cup ties? You're probably wanting to have the Junior Cup at weekends, so lets take 6 of those. Immediately, without postponements you're needing midweek dates to fit the fixtures in and that's without any other knock out cups considered.

If the season is shortened from the present June-??? (I guess when fixtures stop, wages stop, where possible) to March-Nov, are player contracts also altered so as to reduce requirements to pay them?

Edited March 5, 2018 by cmontheloknow

[LongTimeLurker]

10 hours ago, cmontheloknow said:

There seems to be a few major stumbling blocks for summer football...

...but they still seem to be able to manage to do it in Norway, Sweden, Finland and closer to home the RoI. There are even parts of Scotland where a summer season is the norm at amateur level. The biggest stumbling block is the upheaval involved with making a change that radical. The format is every bit as feasible as the current one used to be when refs were more reluctant to call games off and games could still be played with puddles on the pitch or with up to an inch or so of snow.

[db11]

11 hours ago, cmontheloknow said:

There seems to be a few major stumbling blocks for summer football.

I don't move my lawn between October and March because the grass doesn't grow. Pitches need work on them and need to be re-seeded. A full-time team can buy in a new surface - I would imagine that's beyond the bank balance of most councils and Junior clubs beyond seeing to the goalmouths. Parks being played on through the summer will not be able to recover. Councils love to shut their parks too...

The 'predictable wet weather' season doesn't exist here - games can be off at any time - there have been August wipeouts in the past. Without floodlights, any rearranged games cannot be played midweek in March and mid September onwards, which leaves mid April to late August as the window for them.

Clubs will be faced with fielding weakened teams in school holidays - currently it only affects the very start of the season and there are usually a host of trialists to pad line-ups out for the waste of time Sectional etc, not sure how much more of an impact it has in East league games. In a summer season, those missing players would be missing key games midway through the season - perhaps a big Junior Cup tie - or do we bar big cup ties from the holiday season...?!

We're looking for 30 league matchdays in East and West for next season. A season starting 1st saturday in March has 35 saturdays until the end of October. But what about cup ties? You're probably wanting to have the Junior Cup at weekends, so lets take 6 of those. Immediately, without postponements you're needing midweek dates to fit the fixtures in and that's without any other knock out cups considered.

If the season is shortened from the present June-??? (I guess when fixtures stop, wages stop, where possible) to March-Nov, are player contracts also altered so as to reduce requirements to pay them?

Playing  football every week on grass that isn't growing isn't  a great help for the pitch.

There are 4 months of the year where it is possible to make use of light nights for midweek fixtures and we don't play in 2 of them.

Make use of teams with floodlights- Bonnyrigg late last season had a fixture pile up, were still to play Penicuik, Broxburn and Kelty away from home, these games could have been played midweek under lights from feb- mid april. The former 2 were played midweek april- may.

Bonnyrigg finished last season on 10th june. Preseason started the 1st July. Players got 3 weeks off. Reality is players are taking holidays throughout the season and teams have to cope with that. I would think most people take more than just a summer holiday now as well.

A season starting  1st march and finishing end of October would have 35 Saturdays and 18 potential midweeks-   Last season Bonnyrigg played  15 midweek games

I would agree that summer football is not ideal. The existing set up of playing near 11 months of the year needs looking at. Any options need consideration. 

[cmontheloknow]

21 minutes ago, LongTimeLurker said:

...but they still seem to be able to manage to do it in Norway, Sweden, Finland and closer to home the RoI. There are even parts of Scotland where a summer season is the norm at amateur level. The biggest stumbling block is the upheaval involved with making a change that radical. The format is every bit as feasible as the current one used to be when refs were more reluctant to call games off and games could still be played with puddles on the pitch or with up to an inch or so of snow.

Volume of games is an issue though - the summer leagues in Scotland do not play with anything like the intensity of the fixture lists in our league. I don't claim to know how the Scandinavians deal with the issues I outlined but they are issues we would face here.

I found this document from the FAI about how to maintain a decent pitch without having a close season to do so:

https://www.fai.ie/sites/default/files/atoms/files/Natural_Turf.pdf

Badly maintained council pitches will not function within the summer football model, going by what that document says. Damage needs to be repaired within 12 hours of the game, it suggests on p23.

Edited March 6, 2018 by cmontheloknow

[cmontheloknow]

2 minutes ago, db11 said:

Playing  football every week on grass that isn't growing isn't  a great help for the pitch.

There are 4 months of the year where it is possible to make use of light nights for midweek fixtures and we don't play in 2 of them.

Make use of teams with floodlights- Bonnyrigg late last season had a fixture pile up, were still to play Penicuik, Broxburn and Kelty away from home, these games could have been played midweek under lights from feb- mid april. The former 2 were played midweek april- may.

Bonnyrigg finished last season on 10th june. Preseason started the 1st July. Players got 3 weeks off. Reality is players are taking holidays throughout the season and teams have to cope with that. I would think most people take more than just a summer holiday now as well.

A season starting  1st march and finishing end of October would have 35 Saturdays and 18 potential midweeks-   Last season Bonnyrigg played  15 midweek games

I would agree that summer football is not ideal. The existing set up of playing near 11 months of the year needs looking at. Any options need consideration. 

Making use of floodlights is fine but not everyone has them therefore it cannot be used by all as a solution. I agree that playing on surfaces when grass doesn't grow is not ideal, but there'd be no grass on them at all if they weren't closed for remedial work in the summer. The Junior season's length is a joke, I don't disagree. However it is extended because of the present executive's unwillingness to acknowledge the elephant in the room - a national cup competition that takes priority over league games and can lead to weeks of postponements because it is scheduled to run some large rounds in months notorious for bad weather (Nov-Feb). IF the Junior Cup was removed from that window, there would be a reduction in postponements as just like giving teams a game with floodlights, home fixtures can be avoided for teams with bogs for parks. There are ways to fix the present without reinventing the future.

[Hillonearth]

The best organised summer league close to Glasgow is the welfare level Forth and Endrick League which runs from April to September, and is generally a decentish standard with a few grounds and average attendances not too far off the lowest end of Junior level (even match programmes at Balfron Rovers!)

There are only 12 teams in in it along with a few cups, but even then they often struggle with unseasonable weather postponements to finish the season, with a good few league games played as double headers with cup games to get them out of the way.

ETA: And don't start me with the midges in some of those places.

Edited March 6, 2018 by Hillonearth

[Jason King]

...and its moving to Friday night fixtures from this season.

[tell_me_more]

15 hours ago, Nikos K said:

Aye right very good!!  95% don't want to lose their Ayrshire derbies and go back to the District leagues.

I've seen some SJFA propaganda in my time but this beats them all  , how many clubs replied about 20? 

Think you will find most of them have voted proposal in at Level 6 causing minimum disruption to league set ups, opportunity to get licensed, entry into BIG cup for those that do, retain junior cup and all the other riches that lie at the end of the pyramid pathway.
Still be a bit of an anomaly being on the same level as the SOS.
Will the same happen in the EAst? What about the EOS will it be swallowed up by the East Junior set up pointless having two in same area?

Will Clydebank be going nowhere as they will already have achieved their dream of being back senior football when "the juniors" evolve into the pyramid?

 

 

[Kilbowie Benches]

40 minutes ago, tell_me_more said:

Think you will find most of them have voted proposal in at Level 6 causing minimum disruption to league set ups, opportunity to get licensed, entry into BIG cup for those that do, retain junior cup and all the other riches that lie at the end of the pyramid pathway.
Still be a bit of an anomaly being on the same level as the SOS.
Will the same happen in the EAst? What about the EOS will it be swallowed up by the East Junior set up pointless having two in same area?

Will Clydebank be going nowhere as they will already have achieved their dream of being back senior football when "the juniors" evolve into the pyramid?

 

 

Good luck with getting the EoSL agreeing to being at the same level as the East Juniors.

FYI the poll we had was to join Senior football as well.

A lot of our members are unhappy with the way things are run in Junior football and want to move to a better organised set up,its not all about money.

[Ross.]

14 minutes ago, Kilbowie Benches said:

A lot of our members are unhappy with the way things are run in Junior football and want to move to a better organised set up,its not all about money.

Big part of it for me is being able to book flights home knowing if and when there will be a game for me to attend. I got lucky last year with the Cup Final, and even then it only went ahead when I was home because the organisers completely fucked up with the first few attempts at getting it played.

[Jambo'ness]

2 hours ago, Ross. said:

Big part of it for me is being able to book flights home knowing if and when there will be a game for me to attend. I got lucky last year with the Cup Final, and even then it only went ahead when I was home because the organisers completely fucked up with the first few attempts at getting it played.

Know what you mean there.  I have missed the last three league games against the wee rose due to being booked for holidays. 

Before anyone gets smart, we did win two.  I wasn't deliberately missing them.

[Goalie Hamish]

Good luck with getting the EoSL agreeing to being at the same level as the East Juniors.

 

Well I doubt they can veto it if the plan is agreeable to the SFA and Lowland League.

 

 

[Robert James]

2 hours ago, Goalie Hamish said:

 

Well I doubt they can veto it if the plan is agreeable to the SFA and Lowland League.

 

 

The EoSL would like to return to 2 divisions, and if the number of East Junior clubs applying to join in 2018/19, is 3 or more, it is not inconceivable that some of the weaker senior EoSL clubs (which have no immediate intention or possibility of obtaining a licence, and are getting beaten by large scores) might choose to be placed in the EoSL second tier. This scenario would open up the possibility that of some of the junior applicants(if they wished) could be slotted into the EoSL's top division for next season. 

However it seems unlikely that more than 3 junior clubs will apply now for next season, as there have been very few credible rumours ('leaks') to date., and the EoSL deadline for applications is only a few weeks away.  Unless of course the SFA steps in, using the SJFA results as an incentive for acting now  ! 

I think I must have had a few drams too many.........