The Brechin City Thread

[Guest mr_malcolm]

It's hilarious that anyone ever fell for that. One trip to Central Park, Cliftonhill or even Station Park would show you what the minimum requirements were like.
I'm sure one of the 'toilet blocks' at Station Park is still just a brick wall in a square shape with a opening for an entrance.

Pished in worse places tbf

[LongTimeLurker]

17 minutes ago, Hedgecutter said:

Brechin and Montrose to inevitably end up miffed as to why they're still in the HL, only to find that the SFA look at your proposal and accidentally draw it at the South Esk, saying "what's the difference?".

Have seen it claimed that it was meant to be at the North Esk at one point during the negotiations. You had the chance to speak up vociferously when it was first being voted on but for whatever reason appear to have been complacent that it wouldn't apply to you. It was always going to be difficult to get the SFA, SPFL, HL and LL to all sign off on a change to the Club 42 rules after the fact and ultimately Ken Ferguson did not have the clout to make that happen probably because the full-time clubs that dominate in SPFL board terms quite simply don't care one way or the other what happens at the foot of League Two.

Edited May 24, 2021 by LongTimeLurker

[Gordon EF]

20 minutes ago, Brummo said:

This: Supporters of the Pyramid are keen to bring about change in the Scottish game. Agreed.

However when it comes to the boundary line dividing the country between LL and HL, suddenly it is as immutable as the Laws of the Medes and Persians, irrespective of how bad this rule is. 

If you are so keen to bring about much needed changes in Scottish football, why are you so glaringly inconsistent on this?

No Angus club thinks it is the right decision. It is unanimously agreed by anyone who knows the game in this area that the line should be drawn at the North Esk not the Tay. 

The decision to make the Tay the boundary needs looking at again for this reason.

Not really that hard to understand, is it?

There's no doubt that Angus is effectively the 'loser' under the current boundaries and I'm sure folk in Angus do think the boundary should be moved North. But they're hardly unbiased. Does anyone outside of Angus really think the boundary should be the North Esk? Angus isn't so much the problem but Dundee and Tayside. Including them in the southern half of the pyramid unbalances it to a ridiculous degree. It's already extremely unbalanced as it is.

The HL and LL are supposed to be equals. Having such lopsided parallel regional leagues will have consequences for bringing in automatic promotion.

The ship has almost certainly sailed but we really should have looked at adopting the old junior regions, West, North and East (Angus down to the Borders) and had 3 regional leagues at tier 5.

[Nowhereman]

55 minutes ago, TheScarf said:

I'm trying to think of the reasons why Brechin City would ever be in the LL?  Given they're about 30 miles from Aberdeen.  They're the same latitude as Fort William ffs. Brechin is hardly the outlier in the HL.  Half the clubs are about an hour away from them.

Hardly. There's two

[Brummo]

On 24/05/2021 at 19:45, drs said:

Its not a bad rule.

The boundary should be looked at, agreed, and moved further south to ensure there is a more equitable split of clubs in the 2 feeders and under them. 

So Angus clubs are to bear the consequences of the Highland Clearances*? The north of Scotland is much less densely populated than either central or southern Scotland. Until that changes or enough people south of the Tay give up football for e-sports, there is always going to to be this disparity between the LL and HL.

*The Highland Clearances probably have had little impact overall on the present day population of the Highlands. Things like better job opportunities elsewhere and lack of affordable housing have been far greater factors, so apologies for any offence caused.

Edited May 25, 2021 by Brummo

[effeffsee_the2nd]

2 minutes ago, Brummo said:

So Angus clubs are to bear the consequences of the Highland Clearances? The north of Scotland is much less densely populated than either central or southern Scotland. Until that changes or enough people south of the Tay give up football for e-sports, there is always going to to be this disparity between the LL and HL.

Yes, because your in the north

[TheScarf]

2 minutes ago, Nowhereman said:

Hardly. There's two

On the dual carriageway from Brechin north and beyond Aberdeen?  That's surprising.

[Tutankhamen]

Dundee is never in the Highlands

[HenryHill]

3 minutes ago, Brummo said:

So Angus clubs are to bear the consequences of the Highland Clearances? 

My favourite line so far from the mass of nonsense on this thread.

[LongTimeLurker]

Just now, Tutankhamen said:

Dundee is never in the Highlands

Was in the Grampian TV area though. There are reasonable arguments both way on this.

[GordonS]

23 minutes ago, lionel wickson said:

Berwick also made the League Cup semi final against Rangers in 1963.

Wiki says the attendance was 16,000.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1963–64_Rangers_F.C._season

[Tutankhamen]

1 minute ago, LongTimeLurker said:

Was in the Grampian TV area though. There are reasonable arguments both way on this.

Any idea where the SoSFL line in the sand is in relation to the WoSFL?

Or is it a case of nobody gives a f**k?

[Gordon EF]

1 minute ago, GordonS said:

Wiki says the attendance was 16,000.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1963–64_Rangers_F.C._season

East Fife played in front of 93,000 at Hampden in a Scottish Cup Final (more than could fit in any stadium in Europe today bar the Camp Nou) . It doesn't really mean much today.

[Hedgecutter]

47 minutes ago, effeffsee_the2nd said:

 it's been drawn as it is to prevent the north - south strength divide from becoming even more lopsided than it already is,  the further north you move it the more isolated the northern teams become . someone had to lose out , that's how it goes.   Scotlands population is not distributed equally.  A team 30 miles from Aberdeen should not be travelling to Dumfries and Galloway to play in a regional competition anyway

As things stand, Any Brechin-based supporters travelling to all the away games will travel fewer miles to get to grounds in the HL than they would in the LL, and that's with one more team to play in the HL (1743, n=17 vs 1783, n=16).  Clearly extremely marginal.  In all likelihood, it all comes down to this preference to tap into a larger pool of players, which those without red-tinted specs can see as being an unfair advantage over others in the region.  If there was a bigger pool to the  north then they'd be crying for the HL.

To play Devil's advocate though, although you bring up the D&G example, it takes ~1.5 hrs longer to drive to Wick from Brechin than a trip from Brechin to Dalbeattie.  It's also marginally quicker to drive from Brechin to Berwick than it is from Brechin to Inverness.   Also, as the crow flies, Glebe Park to Harlaw Park (closest HL ground to Brechin) is only 250 metres  shorter than Glebe Park to New Bayview (not LL, I know, but it's the nearest senior club in that catchment). 

Basically, it's very borderline, but in our heart of hearts we know that HL is the right place for it really given the substantial imbalance in north v south senior team numbers already.

44 minutes ago, Gordon EF said:

I'm sure one of the 'toilet blocks' at Station Park is still just a brick wall in a square shape with a opening for an entrance.

The Cemetery End toilets at Glebe Park were nothing but a leaf-filled concrete trough running into an open drain.  That said, we recently upgraded it to a steel urinal which now runs down into the same leaf-filled trough running into a drain.    The Trinity Road Stand toilets are considerably more civilised though (in that it has plumbing).

Edited May 24, 2021 by Hedgecutter

[FairWeatherFan]

4 minutes ago, Tutankhamen said:

Any idea where the SoSFL line in the sand is in relation to the WoSFL?

Or is it a case of nobody gives a f**k?

They don't have a boundary. The WoSFL & EoSFL negotiated one between themselves and that's it.

As seen by the SoSFL getting zero applicants for another season they have a 'natural' boundary in that most clubs are clearly put off. With all the changes since 2018 they haven't had a proper club join since 2017 when Bonnyton Thistle joined.

[GordonS]

5 minutes ago, Gordon EF said:

East Fife played in front of 93,000 at Hampden in a Scottish Cup Final (more than could fit in any stadium in Europe today bar the Camp Nou) . It doesn't really mean much today.

It does if we're talking about the "great histories" clubs have in the context of whether we should be sad they're not in the SPFL, as the person to whom I was replying had said. I'm not denigrating Brechin in a any way, yes they're a cracking club with a great history - my point is that you can say the same about loads of non-league sides too, it's just that he doesn't know about them yet.

[Tutankhamen]

5 minutes ago, FairWeatherFan said:

They don't have a boundary. The WoSFL & EoSFL negotiated one between themselves and that's it.

As seen by the SoSFL getting zero applicants for another season they have a 'natural' boundary in that most clubs are clearly put off. With all the changes since 2018 they haven't had a proper club join since 2017 when Bonnyton Thistle joined.

Answer B then, nobody gives a f**k.

[GordonS]

53 minutes ago, Brummo said:

It is unanimously agreed by anyone who knows the game in this area that the line should be drawn at the North Esk not the Tay. 

 

10 minutes ago, Hedgecutter said:

Basically, it's very border line, but in our heart of hearts we know that HL is the right place for it really given the substantial imbalance in north v south senior team numbers already.

"Unanimously."

[TheScarf]

25 minutes ago, Tutankhamen said:

Dundee is never in the Highlands

It's not in the Lowlands either.

[LongTimeLurker]

20 minutes ago, Tutankhamen said:

Any idea where the SoSFL line in the sand is in relation to the WoSFL?

Or is it a case of nobody gives a f**k?

Probably the latter with the boundary of D & G a rough guide everywhere except Kirkconnel.