It's the end of the line

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For the Scottish Premier League after (according to Sky) the 10 non old firm clubs handed in their two years notice of resignation from the SPL, to end in 2004. These teams will then form a new league where rather than the old firm having voting rights which are essentially 25% each against the other ten clubs having 5% each, they would have equal voting rights for all. The situation came to a head recently when the old firm clubbed together to veto a SPL TV deal and left an uncertain future for the ten.

This now leaves a more uncertain future for the Glasgow clubs who, at present, have nowhere to go. They have been offered the chance to join the breakaway 10 in the new league.

Now for my thoughts. The Glasgow clubs have now been given the excuse they needed to attempt to break into the EPL. IMO this would be a big mistake. At the moment we hae English clubs striving to mearly stay in the EPL and others working hard tto gain entry and, again stay in the EPL. Why then should two SCOTTISH clubs be allowed to waltz in and gain automatic entry just because of their present status. The Glasgow teams should be told that if they don't join the new league they certainly aren't joining ours. Or if they do they start at the bottom and work there way through like every other team.

-- Anonymous, April 16, 2002

Answers

A ppalling P rospect

-- Anonymous, April 16, 2002

They have already been told by UEFA that they will not be allowed to play in the EPL.

The leagues should also not want them, as soon as they say yes to them United Kingdom or Great Britain would be formed for all competitions, no more England N.Ireland Scotland and Wales. FIFA has also said this.

-- Anonymous, April 16, 2002


I never realised Glasgow had such a stranglehold on the SPL. Must be absolutely madness to offer 2 clubs that kind of power.

-- Anonymous, April 16, 2002

The voting rights aren't as described.

To pass any change you need 11 of the 12 to be in favour. At the last meeting the ten smaller clubs voted together and the Glasgow pair abstained, the 11 in favour requirement therefore failed.

If the Old Firm gang up then they can block everything which can be twisted to say they have 50% power, or if you divide this imaginary 50% in two, 25% each. The other ten then look like they have 50% too, or dividing by 10, 5% each.

In reality Dunfermline and Hibs could similarly block everything if they wished, they don't though as the 10 have very similar views on life, and this is the opposite to the 2.

The Old Firm are too strong up here, as dominant as Man U and Arsenal in England really !! Man U and Arsenal see themselves as needing European football to the detriment of League Cup and FA Cup. Old Firm see themselves as needing the next step up and the nearest opportunity is obviously England.

England does not need Rangers and Celtic at all. All Premier games are pretty full already, teams won't generate more bums on seats revenue. Sky may like it for a while as there will be more 'big' games, but would you watch Rangers for Villa anymore than you'd watch Rangers v Hearts ??

As for the Scottish sides I don't think they realise what they will lose out on. They somehow think that their remaining 10 will be more competitive and therefore entice bigger crowds. Well yes maybe, but it will never compensate for the lost Old Firm pulling power. I'd see Scottish domestic football without Rangers and Celtic descending very quickly into League of Wales, or Northern Irish levels. Not sure but I'd be surprised if anyone outside Old Firm has reaced 3rd round of European competition in ten years.

-- Anonymous, April 16, 2002


but the top 2 of the 10 will get into Europe!

-- Anonymous, April 16, 2002


Quite frankly, I couldn't give a toss about the SPL, or Celtic, or Rangers. Scotland abhorrs anything to do with England on most issues, so screw em - let them wallow in mediocrity: we don't need 'em.

-- Anonymous, April 16, 2002

Thank god for FIFA and Hadrian (Wall). Don't get me wrong, I like Scots more than most regions of England but the area should be kept seperate when it comes to football. I concede as far as the voting system, it's just the way I read it on the Sky sports web site.

I still feel that Scottish football can be better organised and has a good future if it's run right. Rangers seem to be collapsing and losing the grip they once had. They are certainly losing more games thatn they used to. Celtic are not as strong as Rangers used to be and I think that gradually all the teams will become more balanced. Not equal by any stretch but the other teams will be taking more points off the top two. If this becomes the case then the possibility is there for more 'bums on seat' as they call it. Scotland has plenty of people and can certainly support theteams it has with full stadia.

Keep the EPL for English clubs and I'll be happy. The closest I would allow is Berwick.

-- Anonymous, April 16, 2002


A scottish mate of mine keeps telling me that Geordies were just slow runners :-)

-- Anonymous, April 16, 2002

at the moment, with the Old Firm included, the Scottish champions have to do two rounds of qualifying for the CL, as opposed to one for the 4th best in England. This comes from the ranking of Scottish sides in Europe. Take Rangers and Celtic out of it and the rest would have a success rate alongside Republic of Ireland, indeed last meeting of these countries produced the first Irish win.

The new Scotland champs would probably join the CL with the Faroe Isles and Lichenstein.

-- Anonymous, April 16, 2002


Why would FIFA be against this? There is already a precedent of Berwick (England) playing in the Scottish Leagues and both Swansea and Cardiff (Wales) play in the English leagues. Anyway, we invented the bliddy game and FIFA should be subordinate to the FA surely? :-)

Naturally, the Premiership doesn't "need" Celtic and Rangers although it would be spiced up a bit by their addition. It really all depends on what the Glasgow clubs want. They are not pushed enough in their domestic competitions to become a great force in Europe but do have virtually automatic qualification for Euro competition, one way or another, season after season, which they would not have in The Premiership. So they are faced with a tough choice if they are really considering entry into The Premiership.

It will be interesting to see how this debate pans out but somehow I can't imagine Celtic and Rangers playing in the English leagues.

-- Anonymous, April 16, 2002


Rangers and Celtic dominate Scotland in the same way Arsenal and Man U do England only Leeds and Blackburn have stopped them winning all the last 12 championships.

The not pushed enough in domestic competition argument is often rolled out but doesn't really stack up. Ajax, Panathaniakas, Galatasary even Rosenberg and Porto have similar domestic dominance yet have longish European campaigns.

I'm pretty sure neither Cardiff nor Swansea can qualify for Europe while playing in England though, and although it would never happen the same is probably true with Berwick. The League of Wales sides do qualify for Europe though.

The remaining clubs are kidding themselves as to the desire of people to go and watch them. Take Hibs last season. Their big three games are the Old Firm at home, and Hearts at home. They played them pretty close together, two times last season, the attendances were ...

Celtic 14524 Rangers 14939 Hearts 12926 Celtic 9704 Rangers 8879 Hearts 8512

Now you can question how they survive with the equivalent of First Division attendances. But you then have to look at the difference between the Old Firm gates and the next biggest, nearly a 10% difference. I'd guess the new revamped SPL would suck in and add the likes of Partick and Airdrie to replace the Old Firm, not the biggest of attractions. At the low level of income they currently have from gate receipts to lose out on the Old Firm games may wipe them out.

The other effect the wee clubs are missing is the despised buying up of the better Scottish players. Rangers taking say McCann from Hearts, or Celtic taking Agathe from Hibs. Hearts getting £1m for McCann may upset the fans but it is the equaivalent probably of 6 home games receipts. If the Old Firm moved away, and stopped feeling as though they were getting a double benefit by buying up Scottish players (good players and weakened opposition) they may well stop trickling down their money. Again less income.

The ten SPL sides making the stand should learn from the Nationwide sides that just because Sky will pay for English Premiership football, with big crowds, big name players it doesn't mena they will for Dunfermline v Killy.

-- Anonymous, April 16, 2002


Howay lads. Let 'em all in. We're all from the same country. That would be the United Kingdom of Great Britian and Northern Ireland. Least that's what it says on my passport.

-- Anonymous, April 17, 2002

Nah let the bigoted twats sink without a trace...

-- Anonymous, April 17, 2002

Well done Gav, its important for us moderates to have a voice in this.

UEFA are against it, I am not sure of FIFAs stance, however they have said that they will insist on combined teams for the Olympics and World Cups if this goes ahead.

-- Anonymous, April 17, 2002


I thought that the idea was simply to leave Rangers and Celtic with either 20 derby matches or a trip back to the other Scottish clubs to be included under majority voting in their new format.

-- Anonymous, April 17, 2002


I have to second that Nick Raphael. Four teams from the UK in World Cups, Euro Champs and the Olympics is just silly. I understand that there are many football associations instead of just one, but couldn't, say, all the states in the United States have their own football associations and thereby 50+ national sides qualifying for the WC? Germany could also do that, as well as Switzerland. In the end of the day, any state could form new "national" sides out of sub- state regions or nationalities.

Smacks of cheating to me, but I stand to be corrected on this.

-- Anonymous, April 17, 2002


So what next, in a few years time will you be saying Europe should compete as a single country in the World Cup? Don`t be daft, they`re Scotland, and have been since football was invented. And as far as I`m aware the majority of Scots would prefer to retain a Scotland side (anyone want to back me up or contradict me on this?). Why should we change our national teams just so that the Old Firm can rake in more cash? Yes, they`re big fish in a small pond but them`s the breaks. It`s exactly the same as Wimbledon wanting to move to Milton Keynes - they`re supposed to be geographically based football clubs, not franchises. This isn`t America (actually for me this is Japan, but you know what I mean) and we should treasure the fact that our clubs don`t move around whenever it suits them.

-- Anonymous, April 17, 2002

By the way Mika, we don`t field 4 teams in the Olympics (just to further confuse things!)

-- Anonymous, April 17, 2002

I'm with you Al. Scotland should be seperate. It has it's own parliament, judicial system and frankly it's own identity. I'm afraid I can go one better and ask if they want us to integrate the entire commenwealth into one team.

Hary Kewell, Ryan Giggs or lil Kevin on the left?

A country is a country and should remain that way. As far as the track and field fraternity go then combining talents of the home nation's is the only way they could field any sort of team. There just isn't enough interest. I agree that IF we bothered to enter a team in the Olympics then it should be a combiined effort like the Lions is for Rugby. But then I feel that the Olympics should be kept entirely for Amateurs and don't bother to watch the Football in the Olympics.

-- Anonymous, April 17, 2002


A country is a country and should remain that way.

That raises more questions than it solves when you look at the UK! Look at the oddly named Rugby "Six nations" competition. more like 2 nations plus one nation together with a bit of another one, plus the remaining 3 bits of that other one. I suppose "6 Nations" is less complicated if somewhat misleading. :-)



-- Anonymous, April 17, 2002

Rugby actually deserves an award for playing with a united Ireland, something football needs to think about.

-- Anonymous, April 17, 2002

"A country is a country and should remain that way." - Andy

"That raises more questions than it solves when you look at the UK!"

- Aye it does Jonno. Which country is that then Andy -- the UK or Scotland?

"Scotland should be seperate. It has it's own parliament, judicial system and frankly it's own identity." - Andy

- The EU has its own parliament, judicial system and an own identity (inasmuch social objects such as Scotland or Europe can be said to have identities of their own). Europe does not have a team in the WC though. I'd like to see what kind of a team the United Nations could field? I wonder who would they play in the WC?

-- Anonymous, April 17, 2002


But Europe does have its own golf team.

-- Anonymous, April 17, 2002

Irish rugby is successful because it doesn't have so much of a clear background of sectarianism. The fans tend not to associate with certain teams with troubled history like football. I mean it occurs to me that football in Northern Ireland splits down to Celtic vs Rangers. Or increasingly Manure (like the rest of the island). The oddity of Irish nationalists and unionists cheering on a team from Ulster (which as a province contains counties either side of the border) is to be applauded.

-- Anonymous, April 17, 2002

FIFA are saying they wouldn't stand in the way of Celtic and Rangers joining the Nationwide league. Bradford's chairman thinks they'd find some way of parachuting the teams into Div 1.

Full article on Sporting Life

-- Anonymous, April 17, 2002


Are they really that short of football pitches up in Scotland?

-- Anonymous, April 17, 2002

I think that the Old Firm could undoubtedly bring more to the EPL than (say) Derby, Leicester, Southampton or (dare I say) the Mackems. But probably no more than (say) PSV, Ajax or Barcelona.

So why should they? Unless we are going to amalgamate the FA and SFA, then I don't see why they should be allowed to. You could (probably - I havent checked the atlas) make a case for a (true) nationwide league wih geographic leagues to include Darlo, (Hartle)'pool and Carlisle with the lesser Scottish teams. But tha tis a whole lot more than is being suggested here.

-- Anonymous, April 17, 2002


It's the first step in creating a super league that has no relegation or promotion...that we would be excluded from....exclusion isn't my problem though...I don't want to watch us constantly play foreign teams, I get a lot of my enjoyment from us playing ENGLISH teams, the banter with other fans whether it be match day or at work....that would go, it'd be nothing more than a glorified european cup....

Forget it, we've lost enough of our game without trying to make it more of an international thing....

-- Anonymous, April 17, 2002


there is a touch of arrogance in the Old Firm belief that they would do okay in the English League. On CL results Celtic who are miles ahead of Rangers failed after the first league games of the CL. This matches up with Leeds in England. Leeds are going to finish 6th, so it could be argued that Celtic would also be a 6th finish.

Celtic are miles ahead of Rangers so they'd probably be a 12th-16th side. (Reyna has looked as average at Sunderland as he did at Rangers).

Could argue that Rangers may struggle to get promoted to the Premiership. If it had been this year would both Rangers and Celtic finished above Man City ?

-- Anonymous, April 17, 2002


So that's that then...Keegan to finish his managerial career at Rangers...

-- Anonymous, April 17, 2002

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