Junior football, what is the future?

[Tutankhamen]

5 minutes ago, FairWeatherFan said:

North Region probably in its current format unless Rothie Rovers end up coming in seeing a slight change.

East Region splitting North and South still. 17 team North and 13 team South. The could chance their arm and try and have North, Tayside and Lothian league winners get the three Scottish Cup spots to make up for the loss of the West Premiership.

Wish them every success.

[newcastle broon]

6 hours ago, effeffsee_the2nd said:

Shetland Orkney and lewis all have rugby teams that play in mainland leagues with Orkney at one point getting promoted high enough to be playing nationaly , weather or not they'r subsidized I've nae idea.  

Subsidized by the SRU if I recall. 

[EdTheDuck]

10 hours ago, Doonhamer1969 said:

Was 133 clubs.

Now 62

Thanks.

So before the East clubs switched to the EoSL there must have been over 200 Junior clubs?

Quick quiz: With the West Juniors now moving to the seniors along with the East Juniors, how many of the current League 1 and League 2 clubs will still be in the SPFL in, say, 20 years? Not fucking many IMHO.

Also, just my opinion, but if reconstruction happens this year and Brora & Kelty get the call I predict Brora will be the last HFL club to get promotion for a long time (unless other Sugar Daddies come along). 

Further to this the Lowland League has to be split into East and West Divisions to recognise the population imbalance between the HFL region and the LL region, surely?

 

[lowenan]

1 hour ago, FairWeatherFan said:

North Region probably in its current format unless Rothie Rovers end up coming in seeing a slight change.

East Region splitting North and South still. 17 team North and 13 team South. They could chance their arm and try and have North, Tayside and Lothian league winners get the three Scottish Cup spots to make up for the loss of the West Premiership.

Had hoped we would get a North of Scotland League. 

[FairWeatherFan]

2 minutes ago, lowenan said:

Had hoped we would get a North of Scotland League. 

Doesn't look likely. This newspaper article was from Tuesday.

20 hours ago, FairWeatherFan said:

Going by yesterday's papertalk the North Juniors are still distancing themselves from the pyramid.

https://www.pressandjournal.co.uk/fp/sport/football/2142565/talk-of-north-junior-football-clubs-being-ready-for-highland-league-promotion-plan-premature/?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=facebook

Talk of north junior football clubs being ready for Highland League promotion plan ‘premature’

Any talk of the north juniors being ready to form a “tier six” below the Highland League is premature.

Highland League secretary Rod Houston had said on Thursday that proposals were in place from the start of next season, which would introduce relegation to its league and promotion from the North Caledonian League and North Region Superleague.

However Richard Easton, secretary of the North Region Junior FA, said only informal talks had taken place, before the current lockdown was imposed, and no concrete proposal is in the pipeline.

He said: “We have had very early discussions but there’s nothing in place for us at the moment. We just wanted to see what the plan was if any of our clubs wanted to progress through the pyramid.

“If some time in the future they want to take the step up, improve their facilities or maybe feel they’ve outgrown junior football, it gives them the platform to do so.

“But there’s not too many clubs in that situation just now if an agreement was to be put in place. That is a long way away.”

There may well be an appetite there at some clubs within the north junior structure, longer term, to look at progression up the leagues.

Easton added: “I think for some clubs there is, given the circumstance are right. That would be down to the individual clubs. You’ve got some clubs that are more ambitious and some clubs that are quite happy playing junior football. It’s on a case-by-case basis.

“The criteria is strict and there would be very few clubs that would meet that currently.”

 

 

[Doonhamer1969]

2 hours ago, nicotina said:

Late application has been accepted Boca Juniors.

think they must be south of the tay 

Trips to sunny Buenos Aires on a Tuesday night.....

[Doonhamer1969]

8 minutes ago, EdTheDuck said:

Thanks.

So before the East clubs switched to the EoSL there must have been over 200 Junior clubs?

Quick quiz: With the West Juniors now moving to the seniors along with the East Juniors, how many of the current League 1 and League 2 clubs will still be in the SPFL in, say, 20 years? Not fucking many IMHO.

Also, just my opinion, but if reconstruction happens this year and Brora & Kelty get the call I predict Brora will be the last HFL club to get promotion for a long time (unless other Sugar Daddies come along). 

Further to this the Lowland League has to be split into East and West Divisions to recognise the population imbalance between the HFL region and the LL region, surely?

 

There were 158 clubs at the point that the 'exodus' of 24 clubs went from the East Juniors to the EOSFL, April 2018 approx.

[cmontheloknow]

9 minutes ago, EdTheDuck said:

Thanks.

So before the East clubs switched to the EoSL there must have been over 200 Junior clubs?

Quick quiz: With the West Juniors now moving to the seniors along with the East Juniors, how many of the current League 1 and League 2 clubs will still be in the SPFL in, say, 20 years? Not fucking many IMHO.

Also, just my opinion, but if reconstruction happens this year and Brora & Kelty get the call I predict Brora will be the last HFL club to get promotion for a long time (unless other Sugar Daddies come along). 

Further to this the Lowland League has to be split into East and West Divisions to recognise the population imbalance between the HFL region and the LL region, surely?

 

Not had 200 for a long time. It was 160 or so for most of the past 20 yrs.

[Doonhamer1969]

10 minutes ago, EdTheDuck said:

Thanks.

So before the East clubs switched to the EoSL there must have been over 200 Junior clubs?

Quick quiz: With the West Juniors now moving to the seniors along with the East Juniors, how many of the current League 1 and League 2 clubs will still be in the SPFL in, say, 20 years? Not fucking many IMHO.

Also, just my opinion, but if reconstruction happens this year and Brora & Kelty get the call I predict Brora will be the last HFL club to get promotion for a long time (unless other Sugar Daddies come along). 

Further to this the Lowland League has to be split into East and West Divisions to recognise the population imbalance between the HFL region and the LL region, surely?

 

Agree re Lowland split. There should be 3, or even 4 Tier 5 leagues.

[EdTheDuck]

15 minutes ago, Doonhamer1969 said:

There were 158 clubs at the point that the 'exodus' of 24 clubs went from the East Juniors to the EOSFL, April 2018 approx.

Beg pardon, I counted development leagues or something. Thanks again

[ShrimpLok]

On 11/04/2020 at 14:17, BMan said:

It's going to fade away eventually anyway, however the SJFA have plenty of money to self fund say £25k a year "prizemoney" until that time happens, particularly if the post of Secretary becomes part-time/voluntary position saving £35k a year. It will undoubtedly find a sponsor to cover some of the prize money.

As someone else point out, the SJFA have assets of around £400-500k, the Secretary's pension will be in a pension fund and already accounted for.

The east and north do not need senior west clubs for the competition to continue for the forseeable future with the rewards at largely the current level. Why would they want senior west clubs competing and snaffling the money?

As "ShrimpLok, Saviour of the Grade" did so well at providing a pathway for the West Region to move to the WOSL I now present my 3 point plan for Tayside clubs to make themselves a few quid:

1 Propose a motion at the SJFA AGM creating a new class of "Associate Membership" of the SJFA for teams not competing in a Junior League who wish to compete in the Junior Cup.
2 Make it clear that Associate Members have no access to SJFA assets, as per any other club leaving the juniors (see East Region leavers passim).. 
3 Propose a prize money split in the Junior Cup that sees the 4 highest finishing SJFA full members rewarded with prize money each year funded from assets of the SJFA in addition to the semi final and final guarantees.

[Dev]

14 hours ago, Killiepiyo said:

Anyone else still not understand the hate towards the juniors?

Time to move on, like everyone-else don't you think?

[Dev]

6 hours ago, 8MileBU said:

Basically this ^^^
Too many fans of the Juniors take any ‘hate towards the juniors’ as attacks on their clubs when it’s anything but that.

Sadly some alleged Juniors supporters (sometimes they were just Trolls looking for a wind-up) were quite happy to show hate themselves and then complain if anyone dared to stand up to them!

Fortunately, for all genuine Juniors supporters in the West that time is gone!

[Dev]

3 hours ago, FairWeatherFan said:

Doesn't look likely. This newspaper article was from Tuesday.

 

Judging by the tone of this article and past statements from the SJFA etc, and if recent history is something to go on, then a NoS looks like a 100% certainty next season or for the following one.

Edited April 16, 2020 by Dev
.

[Cyclizine]

11 hours ago, effeffsee_the2nd said:

Shetland Orkney and lewis all have rugby teams that play in mainland leagues with Orkney at one point getting promoted high enough to be playing nationaly , weather or not they'r subsidized I've nae idea.  Shetland is a funny one tho as they don't have any direct transport links to the far north of Scotland like the other 2 do, the ferry docks in Aberdeen . So find a league for them if you can be bothered

There are fewer games and laxer player registration in club rugby. They also get travel subsidy from the SRU. Certainly, Orkney used to rely on scrounging players from the mainland when playing away.

[AsimButtHitsASix]

31 minutes ago, Cyclizine said:

There are fewer games and laxer player registration in club rugby. They also get travel subsidy from the SRU. Certainly, Orkney used to rely on scrounging players from the mainland when playing away.

I *think* the Spanish league allowed PFA teams in the lower divisions once upon a time. The basic idea was they were a team ran by the local association and any player unattached to a club could play for them and got travel expenses. So players could maintain match fitness whilst looking for a club. You see teams like this play friendlies in Scotland.

New plan: any player without a club gets allocated to Orkney for away games if required.

[AML67]

On 14/04/2020 at 08:45, cmontheloknow said:

If league takes priority, any club in both the big Scottish and the Junior Cup is going to have a headache. Say Talbot for example, playing big Scottish on the date everyone else is playing Junior Cup, they won't be (unless league is very accommodating) be able to postpone a league game the following weekend as they can do now. Perhaps the sensible option is that it is only Junior Cup if no other cup commitments. Sour milk and off honey for some perhaps!

Highly unlikely to happen in my opinion as we had a 2nd Round South Challenge Cup tie last September away to Gala that clashed with the Wedding of one of our team ( well over half the side attending all day ) that had been almost 18 months in the planning so we simply suggested that we meet on the first round date in August as we’d both received byes and that Gala have theit fixture for the earlier date rearranged , we’d given them maximum notice from the day after the draw ( around 6 weeks I believe ) ! The host Club were open to the possibility despite our obvious disadvantage if they refused however the LL point blank ( apparently) wouldn’t alter the fixture despite being only a few weeks into the campaign and surely could easily have ‘fitted’ this fixture in further down the calendar ! To say we were disappointed would be an understatement but in fairness to our hugely depleted side we only lost 2-1 to a last minute goal ! Clearly I’m suggesting no one regardless who you are should look for any favours in scheduling / rearranging matches where the LL is concerned or at least that was our experience 

[Stag Nation]

14 minutes ago, AML67 said:

Highly unlikely to happen in my opinion as we had a 2nd Round South Challenge Cup tie last September away to Gala that clashed with the Wedding of one of our team ( well over half the side attending all day ) that had been almost 18 months in the planning so we simply suggested that we meet on the first round date in August as we’d both received byes and that Gala have theit fixture for the earlier date rearranged , we’d given them maximum notice from the day after the draw ( around 6 weeks I believe ) ! The host Club were open to the possibility despite our obvious disadvantage if they refused however the LL point blank ( apparently) wouldn’t alter the fixture despite being only a few weeks into the campaign and surely could easily have ‘fitted’ this fixture in further down the calendar ! To say we were disappointed would be an understatement but in fairness to our hugely depleted side we only lost 2-1 to a last minute goal ! Clearly I’m suggesting no one regardless who you are should look for any favours in scheduling / rearranging matches where the LL is concerned or at least that was our experience 

18 months in the planning? And he hadn't noticed it was a Saturday in the football season?

[AML67]

24 minutes ago, Stag Nation said:

18 months in the planning? And he hadn't noticed it was a Saturday in the football season?

Don’t think his wife gave the proverbial flying f@<€ to be honest but we had hoped from a home tie where 2 or 3 of the lads ( my apologies ) we’re actually attending the evening reception only 20 miles away therefore being in Galashiels effectively snookered that scenario !
 

I do get what you mean though , surely she could’ve been more considerate  but the aim of the post was to highlight the potential hazards of fixture scheduling / rearranging rather than trying to decipher the thinking of the fairer sex which clearly won’t bring ‘football’ in to the equation 

Edited April 16, 2020 by AML67

[ShrimpLok]

On 13/04/2020 at 10:50, Inanimate Carbon Rod said:

Isnt Falkirk’s stadium in Grangemouth? Im sure its only a stones throw from the refinery?

 

On 13/04/2020 at 10:58, AlanCamelonfan said:

People say that because the grangemouth sign is on road to stadium at the back but the main road into the stadium is on the laurieston road but it's on the border 

 

On 13/04/2020 at 11:35, LongTimeLurker said:

FWIW Falkirk and East Stirlingshire both technically play in Grangemouth if you go by the old burgh boundaries with Camelon being the only Falkirk team in the pyramid.

 

On 13/04/2020 at 11:54, Stag Nation said:

But if you're going to be 'technical', the old boundaries are irrelevant. That's why they're called 'old'.  Did Falkirk Council really pay millions for a stadium in another town?

Grangemouth Community Council has published boundaries on Falkirk Council's website and it includes the entirety of the Falkirk Stadium with the boundary being down the A9. 
https://www.falkirk.gov.uk/maps-local/council-democracy/community-councils.aspx?prop=community_&val=Grangemouth (incl Skinflats)