Blogging on the move right now but want to pass comment on one part of the statement by Aberdeen chairman, Stewart Milne. As he confirmed his club would place the fifth and decisive vote against Sevco being allowed access to the SPL next season he said:
“Reorganisation of the game is a priority and is something we have been actively involved in for a long time, but it is not something that should be rushed through just to deal specifically with one club.
“As we have indicated there are a number of other areas that we feel need to be addressed openly in the coming period if Scottish football fans are to feel that their views have been properly taken into account.”
Those well-paid executives who work for us and on Friday met to discuss a way to reorganise the league structure in the next couple of weeks should pay heed. As Mr Milne suggests, we are the game, not you.
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If Green is as broke as we think and his consortium finished then is it too much of a leap of faith that his only concern will be getting as much money as he can for the assets he bought? Property development has to be his best option, no?
Tom McLaughlin:
Tom McLaughlin:
I have not a clue as to what is going to happen. It appears from what O.G. is posting that Sevco could be in serious trouble. There are others prepared to buy Sevco off his hands. Now what they would do with it, I don’t profess to have a crystal ball or a degree in newco physics, but I sure as hell know there are a lot of huns who don’t want to see their club die (sic) (that is a French Sic, remember those?) and a lot of masons in office who are of a like mind. Now if all the Grand Masters soldiers can’t put together a football team (or buy one) then it must be getting cold in hell.
If you want to say there will be no huns in football next season, under any guise, then feel free, that is your prerogative, I have no problem with that, but, if I me, why oh why oh why Tom McLaughlin do you have such problems with what I post. It is almost like you are stalking my posts. Was it not you that was championing free speech on here just the other day? Well I am exercising my right to free thinking and saying, I don’t THINK this is over yet, but I won’t be betting my house on it. If that is not in accord with what you think well bingo! Don’t go getting upset if I have an alternative view to yours and I happen to THINK they could afford to buy Annan Athletic, the problem for them is, are Annan Athletic for sale?
In a country that when you plead Guilty you are found Not Guilty, in a country where you send bombs to kill and you are found to have no charge to answer because you were an inept bomb maker… then be charged with conspiracy to assault, then when it comes to the huns, as far as I am concerned anything is possible.
Anything!
I see the huns are giving Alex Thomson a hard time because he linked to the animation of the Greig statue showing Greig walking away, unaware that the statue is some kind of memorial to the Ibrox disaster.
He might want to point out that those 66 fans died as a direct result of the negligence of the club, who fought tooth and nail to avoid paying compensation to the bereaved families.
weeminger at 11:07 said:
“And this is where Jim Spence differs from the others …
I’ve always liked listening to Jim Spence, he sounds like he loves football, it’s not just his payroll.”
I agree with that: he also comes across as having a natural humility about his views. As well as having a sharp enough mind to see through much of the agenda-driven dross spouted by several of his BBC peers.
If you’ll pardon the pun, he’s also a more rounded character than folk like Jabba: having always had other interests beyond football, and work experience beyond the fetid offices of the MSM. That, together with a genuine passion for his hometown team …
FF
johann
The role of Skippy was handled by three kangaroos: Jo-Jo, Stumpy and Wildy, together with a few others, handling less demanding tasks.
Skippy CSC
FF thinks he is better than he actually is. Bring back the Holy Goalie!!
FRASER Forster looks set to report back for pre-season training with Newcastle United when they return from their summer holidays next week.
But boss Alan Pardew admits the goalkeeper is still set to quit the Sports Direct Arena in his search for first-team football.
Forster has spent the last two seasons on loan at Celtic, where he has played almost 70 times, including helping the Old Firm giants to the Scottish Premier League title.
Hoops boss Neil Lennon has been keen on bringing the 24-year-old to Parkhead on a permanent deal, with Newcastle and Celtic having already agreed a £2m fee for his services, but so far Forster has failed to put pen to paper on the move.
He is believed to be holding out to see whether an English club come in for him, but while Southampton are reportedly interested in his services, there has been no other concrete bids.
“At the moment he is coming back to us,” admitted Magpies manager Pardew.
“He will be with us until he finds a club and we find a fee that works for us.”
Forster was shipped out on loan by Pardew last summer after the Newcastle boss evaluated his goalkeeping options during pre-season.
Pardew made Dutch star Tim Krul his No1, and with veteran Steve Harper adding back-up, he felt he could allow Forster to join Celtic for the season.
Krul’s fantastic form – he kept 15 clean sheets last season – and the signing of Rob Elliott from Charlton as further back-up alongside Harper means that Forster is seen as surplus to requirements, despite shining in Scotland.
“It’s one area that we are well stocked in,” admitted Pardew
Phil MacGiollaBhain @Pmacgiollabhain
Have any of you gambling types opened a book on whether or not Charlie and the boys have enough in the bank to pay Sevco 5088 payroll?
ASonOfDan
And the source?
TBB
Any thoughts on my wee hours point that the construct put forward by McLeish had to be based on their being a competitive Rangers and it looks like no Rangers at all, something McL could not have envisaged, the SFA need to revisit and reshape the construct rather than try to reshape reality by attempting to shoehorn the McL construct into it?
In classic Clyde 1 SSB fashion, a couple of comments on points raised and then onto the main point.
1. The timescales for Sevco to submit accounts, apply to the SFA, register players, apply to the SFL, have fixtures re-arranged (e.g. to avoid Celtic v SPL team and Sevco v SFL3 team in Glasgow on the same day), etc. are unlikely. Ergo, no Sevco in any league next year.
2. Barcabhoy – agree, particularly that Jim Spence and the team at STV have taken advantage of the lapses by others to establish themselves as the mainstream authorities on the situation.
Main point: A lot has been made of the troubled times for Scottish football, the financial constraints that most clubs operate under and the risks being taken by some of the smaller teams in the SPL in rejecting Sevco’s application. However, in world terms, we live in one of the wealthiest countries on the planet. We live in a country where football is the most popular sport and one of our most popular pastimes. We live in a country world-famous for its footballing exploits, from leading the development of the game with our English counterparts through our club side successes and the contribution Scots have made to the game as managers. So yes times may be tough, but take a leap of faith. If we can’t make a go of professional football in this country, with or without “a Rangers”, then heaven help us.
How funny would it be if each SFL club came out with statements saying no to newco each day.
DeniaBhoy, 11:16
Well…
kitalba said:
why oh why oh why Tom McLaughlin do you have such problems with what I post. It is almost like you are stalking my posts.
kitalba –
I haven’t a clue where that is coming from and what motivates it. All I did was respond to your comment with one of my own. I can assure you I did so in the spirit of debate and not confrontation. You suggested Sevco could buy an SFL club. I replied that they couldn’t afford to. I wasn’t attacking you or your point of view.
I was engaging in debate kitalba. Nothing more.
hen1rik on 26 June, 2012 at 11:28 said:
They will do, the huns have offended everybody and now it’s payback time, what goes around comes around!!
Ain’t that right Alistair…
Tbb
Apologies for lack of punctiation, touch screen mobiles not good for proof reading.
bournesouprecipe
Sunderland Echo.
new article posted.
How Transparent was the Raith Rover’s Statement for you Alistair? por cierto
For the avoidance of all doubt, watch this. From a LEGAL point of view http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N01qCH8502Q&sns=tw RFC is dead.
Kit and Tom
I don’t want you two fallin’ out again!
Ye’d better meet up for that pint soon!
God bless you both.
Philbhoy –
I haven’t fallen out with anybody.
Does anyone know what the position is with our sponsors and joint agreement with Old Newco? Is it null and void,are we free to look elsewhere?
****Breaking News****
”Teams from Powerleague Hamilton have completed voting on the entry of Newco into the Sunday morning 10am league.
10 votes for NO v 0 yes votes.
Is believed newco have now approched the BBs league to seek entry to their league.
More news as and when we get it.”
Tom:
Where did the Why! Oh! Why, Oh! Why, come from? Awe some poster used it on here before, I thought it was hilarious and was just indulging a wee bit of plagiarism.
Rather dramatic don’t you think?
In the spirit of debate, I don’t know what Sevco can and cannot afford, I don’t state unknowns as fact. That would be fallacious of me.
Now you say Sevco can’t afford to buy a team with an annual turnover of what circa 300K?
From The Tannar Ba’
Today I’d like to return to a multipart series of articles I wrote while at Avoiding the Drop which focused on some of the financial problems facing football leagues across the world- especially those in smaller countries. This week’s events at Rangers F.C., coming on the heels of less publicized problems at Heart of Midlothian F.C., and Dundee F.C., have, I think, only served to reinforce what I had to say when this series was published a little over two years ago.
The intervening months and years have also seen the presentation and adoption of the McLeish Report- a comprehensive study of many of the same issues prepared by Henry McLeish, former Scottish First Minister and, just as importantly, former midfielder for East Fife F.C.. While much of what McLeish recommended and had accepted by the club’s of the Scottish Premier League is being implemented, its effects have yet to be felt in any significant manner. Links to the McLeish Report as well as a summary of what it will mean for the Scottish game are included at the end of this post.
I hope that by the end of the series it will become clear that many of these financial problems are the result of a century and a half old organizational model that simply cannot cope with the realities of the modern football and the modern finances. Having highlighted the ways in which this model has increasingly come up short when faced with the unique problems presented by the sporting and financial landscape of the twenty-first century, I will offer a number of possible solutions which may help to ensure the future stability of the game, both on and off the pitch. As always, I look forward to your comments, questions, and criticisms.
Scottish Football: An Example and a Re-imagining
World football is in crisis.
The drive for success on the pitch and notoriety off of it has caused club after club, in league after league, in country after country to engage in business practices that would make even Wall Street’s shadiest bottom-feeders and Ponzi-schemers blush. Many of these practices might be justified if they were the “means to an end,” but that is the problem- there is no “end.” There is nothing inherently wrong with selling a player, securing the most lucrative sponsorship deals, building new stadia, or trying to expand into new markets if these actions have the end result of keeping a club’s balance sheet in the proverbial “black.” One might even be willing to accept these and other financial maneuverings if they at least kept a club from falling further into debt- if they “held the line,” so to speak. Unfortunately, the reality is that the vast majority of clubs are not achieving either of these ends. Rather, they are looking to bring in every possible dollar, pound, or Euro simply to slow down the pace at which their debt increases and to keep the club in business for another season. Even before the recent economic crash, this “system” wasn’t working. (Ask any club owned by an Icelander or an Icelandic consortium what happened when the system stopped working?) Thus far, the richest of the rich clubs have been able to limp along, maintaining success on the field, even while their debts continue to pile up off of it. This, despite the clubs making every effort to raise revenue through foreign tours, churning out new kits for every possible occasion (anniversaries, European competitions, “third” kits, “alternate” kits, etc.), selling naming rights for their stadia (new or old), seeking new ownership, and on and on and on. In short, the measure of success for most clubs- big or small- is no longer profit, prosperity, stability or on-field achievement. Success is now continued existence- “getting by.” A sport where “getting by” becomes acceptable can only be headed for disaster. The sporting landscape is littered with the corpses of franchises and leagues that offer ample proof of this. Worse yet, leagues are, in my opinion, greatly diminished by clubs that are able to “get by” year after year without any hope of improvement on or off the field. Even when they manage to remain financially afloat, nobody wants to watch- much less pay to watch- the footballing equivalent of the Los Angeles Clippers or the Washington Nationals. My apologies to the dozens of people who still support Portsmouth or those who supported Gretna.
What I am proposing is a solution that may work for one country and that may offer some ideas that could be used in others. I’ve chosen as my case study the footballing nation about which I know the most- but certainly not everything- Scotland. Despite its decline in the last generation at both the club and international level, Scotland remains one of the quintessential “footballing nations.” If you want to know how mad Scots are for their “fitba” you need only look at the city of Dundee. Dundee has a population of 150,000 people- it’s the same size as Springfield, MA if that helps you- and has two senior clubs and seven junior clubs. Dundee F.C. and Dundee United F.C. have spent most of their histories in the top two tiers of Scottish football and, as you may know, are located on opposite sides of the same street- at least until I hatched my plan…
Introduction
Football as we know it has existed in Scotland since at least July of 1867 when Queen’s Park F.C. were founded in Glasgow. In the 145 years since the founding of club football in Scotland scores of clubs have come, gone, merged, risen in status, fallen in status, and generally undergone all manner of transmogrification. There is nothing even remotely unique about this situation- it has been much the same in every other country where football is played. What is different about Scotland is that, in footballing terms, it is a “hot house”- change, for better or worse, tends to happen here first. Scotland is a nation of just over five million people that has a premier league of 12 clubs, a league of 30 clubs (in three divisions) and three “senior” non-league regional leagues (the Highland League, the East of Scotland League, and the South of Scotland League) totaling 55 clubs, and three “junior” non-league regional leagues (West, East, and North) totaling 158 clubs. (For purposes of this discussion we’ll set aside the Scottish Amateur Football Association and the 50 regional associations and 35,000 players it oversees.) Those numbers add up to 255 professional or semi-professional clubs, or 1 club for every 21,569 citizens. If this were the case in the United States, there would be 13,909 professional and semi-professional clubs. The point being, that there are too many clubs in Scotland for all of them to remain well-supported and, more importantly for our purposes, too many to remain financially viable in the best of times- and these are not the best of times.
That wasn’t easy for me to write: one of the greatest things about football in Scotland- maybe the greatest thing- is that it is so local and so personal. Below the SPL, almost every Scottish club is a “community club.” One of the reasons I love Ross County F.C. so much is that it is a “people’s club.” Dingwall, County’s home, is a town of 5,000 people, with a First Division club with a stadium that holds 6,300 people. One reason that this works is that County are the northernmost fully-professional club in Scotland (and therefore, in the United Kingdom) and as such they make it their business- literally- to cater to fans not just in the Highlands, but also in the Shetland and Orkney Islands as well as the Outer Hebrides. This “catering” includes everything from conducting youth clinics to playing preseason matches against “select” clubs drawn together from the local amateur leagues in these areas. In addition to the goodwill these actions generate for the club, it also allows County to have a very strong youth program (not just for a smaller club, but for any club in Scotland) and to produce the players who form the core of the senior club- a necessity for any club with limited resources. County’s youth players are also required to participate in job training classes run by the club in the event that they never make the senior side and need to have jobs skills other than football. To lose a single club like this would be a tragedy, but to lose dozens of them would be a catastrophe- and that is a catastrophe that looms large if Scottish football as a whole is not reorganized radically and immediately. It is a catastrophe that, while it cannot be prevented, can be mitigated. After covering a few more of the relevant and ugly truths below, I would like to outline a plan that I think could do just that. In a nutshell, what I am suggesting for Scottish football- and for any nation with similar problems- is that sacrifice now can bring strength and stability later.
Before we begin in earnest, however, it is worth noting that the financial problems that are detailed below, while “ordinary” in their kind, are normally not this prevalent or this severe. As mentioned above, all of these things happen in all leagues, in all countries, all the time. They do not all usually happen in one country, in all of its leagues, and over such a short period of time as has been the case in Scotland in the last decade or so. I am not talking about the financial hurdles clubs face on a year-to-year basis (relegation, a bad run of form leading to reduced attendance, the loss of a kit sponsor, etc.), but rather, problems that most clubs only face once or twice in a century, being faced multiple times in a decade or less, and in some cases, by the same clubs. This is the “hot house” scenario I alluded to earlier: because Scotland has so many clubs competing for so few people and so little money, the “cracks” begin to show there first- and worst. Let us first look at the finances of Scottish football clubs over the last decade or so, starting with those that should be the most stable and most profitable of the clubs- those in the Scottish Premier League.
Since the SPL was founded in 1998 six clubs have entered administration, or, as we call it here in the States, bankruptcy. The club’s that have entered administration since this article’s initial publication are in red:
2002: Motherwell F.C.
2003: Dundee F.C.
2004: Livingston F.C.
2008: Gretna F.C.
2011: Rangers F.C.
It is important to note that these are only the clubs where official action had to be taken, that is, where an outside party (governmental or non-governmental) had to step in and “administer” the club in order to put its finances back in order . During the last decade there were also financial problems- other than administration- that affected clubs in the SPL- let’s add those in the hope of getting a better look at the “big picture.” Again, the new additions are in red:
2002: Motherwell F.C.: Administration.
2003: Dundee F.C.: Administration
2003: Dundee F.C.: Declared financially insolvent by Pricewaterhouse Coopers.
2003: Dunfermline Athletic F.C.: Declared financially insolvent by Pricewaterhouse Coopers.
2003: Heart of Midlothian F.C.: Declared financially insolvent by Pricewaterhouse Coopers.
2003: Hibernian F.C.: Declared financially insolvent by Pricewaterhouse Coopers.
2003: Livingston F.C.: Declared financially insolvent by Pricewaterhouse Coopers.
2004: Livingston F.C.: Administration.
2004: Rangers F.C.: The club attempts to lower its debt with a “rights issue,” where those already owning a stake in the club are offered additional shares in order to raise revenue. This can be thought of as an Initial Private Offering.
2004: Dunfermline Athletic F.C.: The club is forced to cut the wages of several top players to avoid entering administration.
2008: Gretna F.C.: Their loss of revenue following the death of their sole benefactor, Brooks Mileson, sends them into administration and they are subsequently dropped from the SPL to the East of Scotland League where they reformed as “Gretna F.C. 2008.”
2009: Livingston F.C.: The club enters administration for a second time and is relegated to the Scottish Football League’s Third Division after a lengthy appeals process.
2009: Rangers F.C.: The club is threatened with receivership by Lloyd’s of London over their outstanding debts.
2011: Heart of Midlothian F.C.: The club is twice faced with “winding up orders” by HMRC before making last minute payments. The club is late with player paychecks for numerous months to the point where the club’s continued existence is brought into question.
2012: Rangers F.C.: Administration
These totals are frightening. Eight clubs (several on multiple occasions) of the eighteen clubs that have been in the SPL since 2002 have been in severe financial trouble during that period, including five SPL clubs being declared insolvent in a single year, and this in a twelve club league. Now let’s look beyond the SPL, for logic dictates that if the “richest clubs” in the country’s “richest league” are struggling to remain viable, the picture can only be worse in the lower leagues- and it is. Again, the additions are in red.
2002: Motherwell F.C.: Administration.
2002: Airdrieonians F.C.: The club collapses under its debt and goes out of existence.*
2002: Clydebank F.C.: The club fails to build a new stadium, ground-sharing causes support and revenue to decline.*
2003: Dundee F.C.: Administration
2003: Dundee F.C.: Declared financially insolvent by Pricewaterhouse Coopers.
2003: Dunfermline Athletic F.C.: Declared financially insolvent by Pricewaterhouse Coopers.
2003: Heart of Midlothian F.C.: Declared financially insolvent by Pricewaterhouse Coopers.
2003: Hibernian F.C.: Declared financially insolvent by Pricewaterhouse Coopers.
2003: Livingston F.C.: Declared financially insolvent by Pricewaterhouse Coopers.
2004: Livingston F.C.: Administration.
2004: Rangers F.C.: The club attempts to lower its debt with a “rights issue,” where those already owning a stake in the club are offered additional shares in order to raise revenue. This can be thought of as an Initial Private Offering.
2004: Dunfermline Athletic F.C.: The club is forced to cut the wages of several top players to avoid entering administration.
2008: Gretna F.C.: Their loss of revenue following the death of their sole benefactor, Brooks Mileson, sends them into administration and they are subsequently dropped from the SPL to the East of Scotland League where they reformed as “Gretna F.C. 2008.”
2009: Livingston F.C.: The club enters administration for a second time and is relegated to the Scottish Football League’s Third Division after a lengthy appeals process.
2009: Clyde F.C.: The club terminates all first club contracts to avoid going into administration.
2009: Stirling Albion F.C.: The club is on the brink of administration for the second time in the calendar year and could be “wound up” as soon as this Saturday, despite being in first place in the Scottish Football League’s Second Division.
2010: Dundee F.C.: Administration
2011: Heart of Midlothian F.C.: The club is twice faced with “winding up orders” by HMRC before making last minute payments. The club is late with player paychecks for numerous months to the point where the club’s continued existence is brought into question.
2012: Rangers F.C.: Administration
*the remnants of these two clubs were eventually cobbled together into a new club called “Airdrie United F.C.” They currently play in the SFL’s Second Division and offer a hint as to the source of future stability in Scottish football- mergers.
The most worrisome thing about the financial problems detailed above is that they are so diverse. Were there only one factor which caused all of the clubs to have financial difficulties- say, overspending on players- a solution would be easy enough to discover. Clubs are spending too much on players? Fine, the league could limit the percentage of a club’s revenue or budget that could be spent on player salaries or implement another form of “salary cap” as some American sports leagues use- case closed. The case, unfortunately, is not so straight forward. The factors that have led so many clubs to ruin- or at least the brink of it- are varied: Livingston and Clyde rented their stadiums and, frankly, signed bad leases, so when their revenues declined their rents, in essence, skyrocketed and they had no way to pay them. Clydebank abandoned their old stadium before their new one was built, their financial backers pulled out, and they then shared grounds with other clubs for six years before succumbing to the twin blows of declining support and revenue- unavoidable given that they didn’t have any home matches for six years! The entire SPL has been the victim of two bad deals regarding their television rights, one of their own making (SkySports) and one not (Setanta). Dunfermline, one of several “yo-yo” clubs between the SFL First Division and the SPL were, at one point, spending 95+% of their annual turnover on player salaries. Livingston still exist, but only because the SFL chose not to kick them out of the league this summer after they went into administration for the second time in five years, instead choosing to demote them two divisions. Gretna chose to hitch its wagon to the fortune and ego of English millionaire Brooks Mileson, and when he and his money went away (terminal illness caused him to withdraw his financial support of the club), they dropped from the SPL to the East of Scotland League in the blink of an eye. And these are only the clubs where we can confirm problems. Recently Heart of Midlothian has descended into financial folly and it is also clear that belts have been tightened to the extreme at both Aberdeen and Motherwell. With so many clubs in trouble (and thus far we have not touched upon the lower divisions of the SFL where financial problems are a frequent issue even in good economic times) and for so many reasons- some self-inflicted, some not- it is clear that the finances are not the problem, but the result of other, bigger, systemic problems. Next we’ll take a look at these problems individually, but with the knowledge that none can really be disentangled from any of the others.
PART TWO
In the Part One I looked at the overall financial landscape of Scottish football and suggested that the financial problems facing the Scottish game were not only the result of poor economic decision making (overspending on players, becoming overly dependent on money from television rights, etc.), but also of an outdated organizational model which has proven unable to cope with the financial, demographic, and indeed, sporting realities of football in the 21st century. In Part Two I shall take a more detailed look at these “realities” as well as what changes might be made to address them. It is, after all, one thing to identify problems, but it is quite another thing to put forward solutions to those problems.
SCOTTISH FOOTBALL: PROBLEMS AND SOLUTIONS
Problem 1. There is not enough revenue to support the game in Scotland as it currently exists.
I detailed the reasons for this in Part One, but suffice it to say, in a country as small as Scotland- its population is roughly equal to that of metropolitan Madrid (which supports only two top flight clubs, not twelve)- and with only Rangers and Celtic having any appeal outside of the country, the money just isn’t there to support the Scottish game in a way which will ensure a viable future. Among the reasons why this is so are that television rights cannot be sold for a high enough price (the population is too small and the clubs are not marketable enough globally), there is a limited market for merchandising outside of Scotland (the exception being the market for Celtic merchandise in the Republic of Ireland and some parts of the United States), selling players to bigger leagues, while lucrative, ultimately damages the game at home, and with so many clubs competing for the discretionary income of so few people, gate receipts alone cannot support any club at any level of Scottish football- especially in the current economic climate.
Solution 1. Reduce the number of professional and semi-professional clubs in Scotland.
This would be achieved by the merging of clubs (see Part Three)- especially smaller ones in close geographic proximity- to create more, larger clubs in the newly reorganized top three tiers (referred to as leagues A,B, & C in the remainder of this series) of Scottish football. While this will be unpopular with many supporters, there are numerous benefits to having fewer “league” clubs in Scottish football. First, this could potentially create more clubs that could challenge the hegemony of the “Old Firm.” Second, more, stronger clubs, would mean a stronger league, and increased strength could result in getting more Scottish clubs into Europe by increasing the quality- top to bottom- of the SPL. These clubs would also be more likely to do well in Europe as a result of not only being inherently better as clubs, but also because they would benefit from facing better domestic competition on a match-to-match basis. Third, these clubs would have larger fan bases, which would improve their financial stability by increasing gate receipts (larger, newer stadiums would seem to be a necessity created by merging clubs) and increased marketing opportunities for things like kit deals, kit sponsorships, ad revenue, etc.. Finally, increased relegation and promotion as well as a true pyramid structure from the very top to the very bottom of Scottish football (something it lacks at the moment) would also cause the best clubs to rise to the top of the pyramid by putting pressure to succeed on the top clubs- lest they be relegated- and by providing incentive to those clubs outside of “league football” to improve and move up the pyramid.
Problem 2. There are too many administrative bodies involved in Scottish football.
Football, like so many other things in Scotland, is incredibly territorial, if not downright provincial, in its outlook. Thus it should shock nobody that there exists a “too many chefs ruining the broth” situation in the Scottish game. This glut of administrative bodies puts a financial drain on the game, muddies jurisdictional waters when problems arise, and limits the bargaining power of all entities when negotiating sponsorship deals, television contracts, etc. As an example, in 2007 the accounting firm Pannell Kerr Foster found that the SFL was three times more expensive to administer than similar leagues in England. Specifically, that there are 68 clubs in England’s Nationwide Conference, and it is run by four people- four. The SFL, which has 30 clubs, “requires” 14 people to administer it. This is money that could be saved or put to any number of better uses- youth development, increased marketing, improvement of stadia, etc.
Solution 2. Eliminate all but three governing bodies.
Scottish football is a veritable “alphabet soup” of leagues and associations but I am only going to concern myself with the three major ones (the SFA, SPL, and SFL) and take it as a “given” that the lesser ones would be absorbed into the remaining administrative bodies once the dead weight has been trimmed. There is only one governing body whose existence should not be questioned, and that is the Scottish Football Association. The association is not without its own problems (there are enough of them that it is probably worthy of its own multipart series), but it must exist just as football associations exist in all other footballing countries. Next, while I would prefer that the Scottish Premier League did not have its own administrative body, this seems unavoidable at present, and thus it must continue to exist for the time being. One would hope, however, that as the financial health of the Scottish game improves, the SPL and the SFL could be reintegrated. It was, after all, the desire for more money that created the SPL in the first place. The Scottish Football League would obviously remain as the governing and organizational administrator of “league football” in Scotland. However, under my new structural model the SFL would also oversee the “Scottish Football Conferences.” Everything else would be put under the direct control of the S.F.A.- junior football, amateur football, etc.
Problem 3. There is no true “pyramid” system in Scotland.
Due to the territorial and provincial nature of football in Scotland, promotion and relegation is not the simple process it should be. At present there is relegation and promotion between the SPL and the SFL, and within the SFL- until you reach the bottom of the league system- at present there is no automatic relegation from the Third Division (and from the SFL overall). The relegation “process” from the Third Division and “league football” overall does not even begin unless the same club finishes last in the Third Division three times in a row. At that point, the club is suspended from “full membership” in the SFL and becomes a “non-voting associate member”- but they are not relegated. The club must finish last for two more consecutive seasons, and then member clubs vote on the fate of the side in question. In short, it takes five consecutive last place finishes for a club to be put up for a relegation vote. Obviously, even at this juncture, the league could vote not to relegate the club. If, however, the club is relegated, the league then invites applications from non-league clubs wishing to replace the relegated side and join the SFL. These clubs need not be from a specific league or even be the best club in those leagues. More important to the SFL are the size of the club, the quality of its facilities, its financial health, etc. All of these are important in their own ways, but it does little to ensure that the “promoted” club will improve the overall quality of the SFL in footballing terms. The most recent club to join the league was Annan Athletic in 2008- following a 4th place finish in the East of Scotland League the previous season. Annan finished 7th (of 10) clubs in their first season in the league and currently hold one of the playoff promotion spots in the Third Division.
In addition to creating stagnation at the bottom of the SFL because relegation from the league is only a remote possibility, the lack of a true pyramid system also frustrates clubs outside of the league structure because no matter how successful they are, there is no guarantee of automatic promotion into the SFL. Additionally, it allows poor clubs at the bottom of Division Three to survive in the league as long as they do not enter administration (and even then one assumes that they could be docked points rather than dropped out of league football) or avoid finishing last often enough to have their future reviewed by the league. Many of these clubs- in the long term- might benefit from a few years out of the league to improve the quality of the club on the pitch and to get their financial houses in better order, allowing them to potentially be more competitive upon a return to the league.
Solution 3. Create a true pyramid system in Scotland.
This is how business is conducted in every sane footballing country and it works in all of them- some of which have over a dozen levels of competition. I’ll detail how many clubs should be relegated/promoted from each level below, but basically, a pyramid should be created that reaches all the way down to amateur football and that ensures automatic relegation and promotion with one exception- that a promoted club must meet stringent safety standards for its grounds and facilities, and be able to pass a financial audit by an independent agency.
These are the three biggest problems in the Scottish game at present (I’ll save the identifying and nurturing of home-grown talent for another time) and my proposed solutions to them. Here, then, are the details I’ve alluded to in just about every one of the above paragraphs. Please note that as all of these solutions are “of a piece,” there will be some overlapping between the various topics.
REORGANIZATION, REGIONALIZATION, RELEGATION, AND RESERVE clubS
League and Conference Football
REORGANIZATION
At present there are 42 professional* and semi-professional clubs spread across the four divisions (the SPL and the three SFL divisions) of league football in Scotland. My reorganization would reduce this to three divisions (here named “A,” “B,” and “C,” for the sake of simplicity) with 36 total clubs. Each league having 12 clubs which play each other “home and away” for a total of 24 matches, plus and additional eight matches against other clubs in the league on a rotating basis, for a total of 32 matches a year. This reduction in the number of clubs would not be achieved through the outright elimination of clubs or the demotion of additional clubs from the league levels, but rather, through the consolidation/merger of smaller clubs into larger, more competitive sides. More on this below.
*Queen’s Park F.C. are an exception- they are the only fully-amateur side in league football.
REGIONALIZATION
Below league football “proper,” all leagues would be regionalized. This would be practical in terms of the day-to-day operations of the leagues (lower travel expenses, for example), as well as making automatic relegation and promotion an easily organizable task. Currently the three “non-league” leagues in Scotland are the Highland League, the East of Scotland League, and the South of Scotland League. After reorganization, these three “senior regional leagues” would become the “Northern Conference” (essentially a slightly smaller version of the Highland League), the Central Conference (clubs in Scotland’s “Central Belt”), and the Southern Conference (clubs below the Central Belt and north of the English Border). Below the new senior regional conferences would be three new “junior regional conferences” (replacing the current Scottish Junior Football leagues) and Scottish amateur football, which would also be organized regionally. With all three of these non-league “tiers” organized in the same way (Northern, Central, Southern), promotion and relegation can reach the very bottom of the organized game in Scotland. The bottom two tiers would, obviously, contain “mini-tiers” within the conferences as needed.
Note: While it would appear, based on this reorganization, that the new Central Conference(s) would be by far the strongest, this is not likely to be the case. While this is where the bulk of Scotland’s population resides (70% by some estimates), it is also the area where the most professional and semi-professional clubs are based, providing ample footballing opportunities to aspiring players. Traditionally, it is actually the Highland League has been the most successful of the regional leagues. With the lack of professional and semi-professional clubs in the North, talent has naturally gravitated to the Highland League and, in fact, it has provided league football with more current clubs (Ross County, Inverness CT, Peterhead, and Elgin City) than the other two regional leagues combined- only Annan Athletic and Gretna have come out of these leagues in the recent past, and only Annan remains in the league at present.
RELEGATION
Relegation and promotion within the new pyramid would take place as follows:
-League A would see its worst club automatically relegated each year, and its second worst club potentially relegated through a “home and home” playoff with the second place club in League B.
-League B would see its champion automatically promoted to League A and its second place club enter into a playoff with the second lowest club in the League A table. The worst club in League B would be automatically relegated and the second worst club would enter a relegation playoff with the second place club in League C.
-League C would see its champion automatically promoted and its second place club in a playoff with the second worst club in League B. The three worst clubs from League C would be pitted against the champions from the Northern, Central, and Southern Senior Conferences in “home and home” playoffs. League clubs relegated to the regional leagues could be place geographically, to make up the numbers in smaller leagues, etc.- whatever would make the most sense organizationally.
-Relegation and promotion between the Senior Leagues, Junior Leagues, and Amateur leagues would be on a “two up, two down” basis within each geographical region (Northern, Central, and Southern) with one place being automatic and the other involving a playoff.
A true pyramid structure, regionalization, and proper promotion and relegation also means that any time a club is created, disbanded, or merged, it is easily replaced or accommodated. If, for example, a League C side goes into administration, it can be dropped to the appropriate regional league and then replaced with the best “non-champion” from that regional league. No more of the overly secretive “audition” process that now takes place in Scottish football. Additionally, with a real pyramid system in place, the leagues will not be thrown into chaos if a club cannot be promoted for any reason- financial, safety, ground size, etc.- as the next “eligible” club could be promoted, or in exceptional circumstances, no club would be promoted.
The number of clubs in any league (other than League A) could also be adjusted to included reserve sides for League A (or any other league, for that matter), much in the way that some continental clubs have reserve sides which play in the lower divisions. I have also added a new (as far as I know) wrinkle to the idea of a reserve club by allowing for the possibility that two (or more) clubs could field a “combined reserves” club in a lower league much as some “major league” clubs in North American sports field “minor league” clubs with a shared player pool. Not only would this help to strengthen the sides involved, it would also cut down on what seems to be an epidemic of loan spells in Scotland. It would also help to provide spaces for players to offset those spaces that might be lost due to the mergers I have proposed below. The only obvious rule here being that a reserve side can never be promoted into the league where its parent club plays. Finally, it would go a long way towards adding stability to the reserve club set-up in Scotland. At present some clubs have a reserve club every year, others only sporadically, other clubs use (abuse?) the loan system in place of having a reserve club, etc.
One final note on reorganization: Berwick Rangers F.C., which is actually based in the English town of Berwick-Upon-Tweed, would return to play in English regional football.
PART THREE
Now we come to the part of my master plan that was the most fun to undertake- but also the one likely to make the most people angry. At least initially, nobody, I repeat, NOBODY is going to be happy about this. However, I truly believe that he way to make football in Scotland more competitive domestically, more competitive in Europe, to make the National club better, and to make the game’s future more stable financially and otherwise is to have fewer, bigger (though not necessarily “big”) clubs. With these goals in mind, I present my handiwork. There were no hard and fast rules, but there was a general “rationale” that I used, so here it is:
If clubs were merged, I put them in the league of the highest club involved in the merger with the assumption that the combined club would only get better as a result of the merger.
The size of the club didn’t matter. If a small club has generally been competitive and financially stable, I saw no reason to merge them with another club or place them in a lower league.
Most of the clubs that were merged were smaller clubs in close geographic proximity to each other or that have demonstrated in recent years an inability to get their financial houses in order even when experiencing success on the pitch.
Although they were relegated from the First to Third Division as a result of going into administration, Livingston F.C. were given the benefit of the doubt and placed in League B rather than League C.
The clubs brought into the league to fill the spaces in League C created by mergers are those that have been the most successful in the current regional leagues over many decades, not just those clubs that had a good year last year or the year before.
Obviously, within a few years, the leagues would “settle,” with relegation and promotion taking care of any problematic “seeding” on my part.
The numbers following a clubs name show the current divisional placement of the merged clubs. 1 = the SPL, 2 = SFL1, 3 = SFL2, 4 = SFL 3.
As I said above, I’ve gone with simplicity in naming the leagues. They could be called “Lion,” “Thistle,” and “Saltire,” or anything else one desired.
League A
1. Aberdeen F.C.
2. Dundee City F.C. (Dundee/Dundee United) 1/2
3. Falkirk United F.C. (Falkirk/Stenhousemuir/East Stirlingshire) 1/3/4
4. Celtic F.C.
5. Rangers F.C.
6. Heart of Midlothian F.C.
7. Hibernian F.C.
8. Firth of Forth F.C. (Raith Rovers/East Fife) 2/3
9. Kilmarnock F.C.
10. Motherwell F.C.
11. Hamilton Academical F.C.
12. North Lanarkshire F.C. (Airdrie/Clyde/Albion Rovers) 2/3/4
13. St. Johnstone F.C.
14. St. Mirren F.C.
The hope here- on my part at least- is to create more clubs that can challenges the Old Firm. On paper I’m not sure that has happened immediately, but the the “second tier” of the league (Hearts, Motherwell, and Aberdeen) would certainly be stronger with “Dundee City” likely to join that group and the other merged clubs forcing the “third tier of clubs (Hibernian, Kilmarnock, etc.) to become more competitive. Realistically, I think “North Lanarkshire” and, to a lesser extent, “Firth of Forth” would be the two clubs most likely to be relegated to League B. Although, with the entrance of some stronger clubs to the league, it could be “yo-yo” clubs like Hamilton, St. Johnstone, and St. Mirren who cannot compete and drop into League B. The ability of some of these new sides to “sneak” into Europe (in any form) and the possibility of some of the non-Old Firm clubs having reserve clubs in the lower leagues (combined or otherwise) will likely lead to some clubs improving over time. It is also likely that this league- which is clearly better in terms of quality than the current SPL- might earn a better coefficient from FIFA and that could lead to more European spots being allocated to the new league, which could only benefit Scottish football domestically and internationally.
League B
1. Angus Athletic F.C. (Brechin City/Montrose) 3/4
2. Angus United F.C. (Arbroath/Forfar) 3/4
3. Ayr United F.C.
4. Celtic F.C. Reserves
5. Inverness Caledonian Thistle F.C.
6. Fife United F.C. (Dunfermline/Cowdenbeath) 2/3
7. Greenock Morton F.C.
8. Partick Thistle F.C.
9. Livingston F.C.
10. Queen of the South F.C.
11. Ross County F.C.
12. Rangers Reserves F.C.
13. Stirling United F.C. (Stirling Albion/Alloa) 3/3
14. “Combined Reserves F.C.” (players from non-Old Firm clubs in League A)
Two reserve sides in a 14 club league are probably enough, but as I said above, the “combined” club is an experiment and relegation/promotion could well see one of these reserves sides dropped out of the division anyway. Perhaps the only existing club that can make a case for being “hard done by” are Inverness Caledonian Thistle, but they’ve not proven themselves to be an SPL “fixture” for any length of time, so it would be up to them to do a job of work and get themselves promoted back into the top level of Scottish football. The addition of all of the merged clubs as well as the reserve sides from League A certainly improves the quality of this division, with “Fife United” being perhaps the strongest club and the most likely to be promoted. The two new “Angus” sides would be, initially at least, the two most likely candidates for relegation.
League C
1. Annan Athletic F.C.
2. Dumbarton F.C.
3. Elgin City F.C.
4. Queen’s Park F.C.
5. Peterhead F.C.
6. Stranraer F.C.
7. Huntly F.C.
8. Cove Rangers F.C.
9. Whitehill Welfare F.C.
10. Spartans F.C.
11. Dalbeattie Star F.C.
12. St. Cuthbert’s Wanderers F.C.
13. Deveronvale F.C.
14. Gala Fairydean F.C.
The last tier of “league football” is made up of those current Third Division clubs not merged under my plan as well as the best of the Highland League and East of Scotland League clubs over recent years. This league has been purposely engineered to have a great deal of fluidity, with up to five of its clubs changing on a yearly basis (two could go up, three could go down). This was done with four goals in mind: First, to put more clubs “in play” for as long as possible every season. With five spots potentially changing each year, and another 4-5 clubs potentially fighting to get in or out of those spots, there is a good chance that two thirds of the clubs in the league will have “something to play for” until the very end of every season. Second, to discourage the complacency that currently plagues the Third Division. No longer will a club be able to finish last for five straight years before facing the possibility of being dropped from league football. Third, with the potential for three clubs to be promoted to League C each year, it gives clubs in the regional conferences something for which to strive- both on and off the field. The ripple effect created by this new, “true,” pyramid structure, of course, will provide the same motivation for junior and amateur sides looking to grow in size and/or quality. Finally, this reorganization will balance the three regional conferences in terms of numbers and to fully integrate them into the new pyramid system.
Conference Football
Below the League level there has always been a very vigorous footballing landscape in Scotland which, for my purposes here, need only be reorganized geographically and renamed (now “Conferences” instead of “Leagues”) in order to prepare them to be fully enmeshed with “League” football above them and the “Junior Conferences” football below them.
Northern Conference
1. Buckie Thistle F.C.
2. Clachnacuddin F.C.
3. Wick Academy F.C.
4. Formartine United F.C.
5. Forres Mechanics F.C.
6. Fort William F.C.
7. Fraserburgh F.C.
8. Inverurie Loco Works F.C.
9. Keith F.C.
10. Lossiemouth F.C.
11. Nairn County F.C.
12. Rothes F.C.
13. Strathspey Thistle F.C.
14. Turriff United F.C.
15. Brora Rangers F.C.
By virtue of being made up of the Highland League clubs not drafted into the new “League C,” this is likely to be the best- at least initially- of the conferences. Perhaps the only mitigating factors would be that Fort William F.C. is generally considered to be the “worst club in Europe,” and several of the other clubs (Turiff, Strathspey, and Formartine) only joined the Highland League in the 2009-2010 season.
Central Conference
1. Civil Service Strollers F.C.
2. Edinburgh City F.C.
3. Edinburgh University A.F.C.
4. Heriot-Watt University F.C.
5. Lothian Thistle F.C.
6. Tynecastle F.C.
7. Craigroyston F.C.
8. Easthouses Lily Miners Welfare F.C.
9. Leith Athletic F.C.
10. Ormiston F.C.
11. Stirling University F.C.
12. Preston Athletic F.C.
13. Peebles F.C.
14. Crichton F.C.
15. Threave Rovers F.C.
If you have a decent grasp of Scottish geography (and really, who doesn’t?) you’ll be able to tell that this conference draws heavily on the old East of Scotland League, and more than that, is very “Edinburgh-centric.” I do not believe that either of these will be an issue as will have no impact on the league structure, and the Glasgow end of the “Central Belt” is already well-represented by the conglomeration of league clubs already centered in and around the city This will likely be the second best of the new regional conferences.
Southern Conference
1. Coldstream F.C.
2. Selkirk F.C.
3. Gretna 2008 F.C.
4. Eyemouth United F.C.
5. Hawick Royal Albert F.C.
6. Kelso United F.C.
7. Vale of Leithen F.C.
8. Abbey Vale F.C.
9. Fleet Star F.C.
10. Newton Stewart F.C.
11. Wigtown & Bladnoch F.C.
12. Creetown F.C.
13. Nithsdale Wanderers F.C.
14. Mid-Annandale F.C.
15. Heston Rovers F.C.
Most of these sides are taken from the old South of Scotland League, which was the weakest of the old regional leagues, and it is likely that this conference (based mostly in Ayshire, Dumfries & Galloway, etc.) will likely be the weakest under the new system. The towns and clubs are smaller in this area and there are fewer league clubs upon which aspiring players can set their sites. As a result, the clubs are smaller, more numerous, and draw on smaller talent pools.
NOTE: Stranraer and Annan Athletic’s both currently field reserve clubs in this league, but under my plan they would most likely be moved to a “mini-tier” within the Southern Conference or into local junior football.
Junior Football
Below the regional leagues in Scotland- those renamed as regional “conferences” under my plan- there is the uniquely Scottish institution of “junior football” (the Scottish Junior Football Association is actually four years older than the Scottish Football League). The “junior” in the name refers to the level of football as compared to the “senior” football played by SPL and SFL clubs as well as the regional leagues (conferences)- not to the age of the players involved. It is essentially and equivalent term to “non-league” football in most countries.
The current Scottish Junior football system is broken into Southern and Western Leagues (w/60-65 clubs in each) and a Northern League (w/35-40 clubs). Each of these leagues is further broken down into 3-5 mini “pyramids” for the purposes of promotion and relegation. Without going into great detail, the changes that would be made here would basically be to redraw the geographical “boundaries” of each league to arrive at a more balanced distribution of clubs (50-55 per league) and to formalize the pyramid places of these leagues as well as placement within them. After reorganization each region of junior football would be matched to one of the regional conferences (Highland, Eastern, and Southern) for the purposes of relegation and promotion.
Amateur Football
Below junior football there is amateur football- everything from pub sides to long-standing and fairly accomplished clubs that simply do not pay their players, and are therefore, “amateur.” The Scottish Amateur Football Association (SAFA) oversees fifty regional associations and the sixty-seven leagues and the tens of thousands of players involved in them. Under my plan the SAFA would be phased out, amateur football would be organized into regions (and likely sub-regions as well), and administered directly by the Scottish Football Association.
The North Caledonian Football League
This is football in Scotland, so of course there has to be a potential “spanner in the works” in terms of trying to organize the game on a consistent basis- in this case it is the North Caledonian Football League. The NCFL is an amateur league, but, inconveniently it would seem, not part of the SAFA system. Fortunately, it instead operates directly under the auspices of the Scottish Football Association- something I’m suggesting should be the case for all of amateur football in Scotland. In the past, the NCFL has been used by its clubs as a way into junior football or the Highland League and by clubs in the north as a league for its reserves clubs.
PART FOUR
Conclusions
This will not be your traditional “conclusion”- I’ve tried to sum things up as I’ve worked my way through Parts One, Two, and Three. Instead this will be the part where I touch on things that didn’t quite fit into the format of the other installments, tie up some loose ends, and of course, make some rash generalizations.
If you’ve reached this point, you’ve slogged your way through about 8000 words on the state of football in Scotland and you would be completely justified in asking, “So things are bad in Scottish football- so what?” My response is two-fold: First, things are not bad in Scotland, they are- if you’ll pardon the poor grammar- “worse.” You need only look back at the first installment to see how pervasive the financial problems are in the game. With that in mind, I stress that the problems in Scottish football are just one example of a system that is broken. If you need another example you can find one just by looking south of the border. England might be more than ten times bigger than Scotland in terms of population, but it has almost as much of a “glut” of clubs as Scotland does, and thus it shouldn’t be a surprise to see clubs having major financial problems from the top (Portsmouth), right through the middle (Southend United), and all the way to the bottom (Farnsley Celtic). If you need further proof of this you need only look at Avoiding the Drop’s They’ve Fallen and They Can’t Get Up series- almost every one of which contains the word “administration” at least once. Second, if the state of football in Scotland can be improved, the state of football can be improved in other small countries experiencing similar problems, financial, organizational, or otherwise. It’s worth looking at some of these other countries to see how their situations compare and contrast with that of Scotland.
To my mind, Scotland’s cohorts would be those in similar-sized countries (4-8 million inhabitants) whose top leagues are dominated by a small number of clubs, and who, in my opinion, have an average to better than average footballing “pedigree.” This group would include nations such as Austria, Bulgaria, Switzerland, Slovakia, Denmark, Norway, Ireland, Croatia, and Bosnia-Herzegovina. One is tempted to say that, at least on the international level, these clubs run the gamut from “spoilers” to “also rans,” but the fact is that Bulgaria has gone as far as the semi-finals in a World Cup (1994), Denmark has won the European Championship (1992), made the semi-finals of the same tournament (1984), and reached the quarter-finals in France in 1998- the same year that Croatia finished in third place. All of this was achieved despite an organizational and financial system that grew organically from the founding of football in these countries, not with an organizational or financial system that was built for the specific purposes of creating the strongest possible domestic league and, consequently, the strongest possible national club. That is the essence of my proposals for Scotland- to make its leagues and its national side as competitive as possible by creating a stable financial and structural foundation for Scottish football. I believe this same model- with adjustments for each country’s idiosyncrasies- can work and work well for many other nations in Europe and world wide.
Many of the countries I’ve mentioned above- along with Sweden, Portugal, Belgium, and the Netherlands- have been mentioned as potential members of a breakaway “Atlantic League” that has been proposed on numerous occasions in recent years for the purpose of providing better competition for the two or three strong clubs in each of these nations with the intent of better preparing them for competitions like the Champions League. Such a league would probably be more trouble than it would be worth- what would happen to clubs actually playing in Scotland and winning that league if Rangers and/or Celtic qualify for the Champions League through the Atlantic League?- and if my plan were to work, an Atlantic League, or anything similar, would be unnecessary. Even if the changes I have proposed created only two more clubs that could challenge for the SPL title and regularly qualify for European competitions, it would radically change the footballing landscape in not just Scotland, but in Europe as well. If you doubt that, ask yourself how many of Europe’s “big” leagues (England, Spain, Italy, Germany, etc.) have more than 4-6 different clubs regularly challenging for domestic titles or qualifying for European competitions?
Finally, if your attention span is long enough please read the McLeish Report. It covers much of the same ground as I have covered above- the merging the Scottish game’s three main governing bodies and league reconstruction- as well as some that I have not- the introduction of a winter break- and even the viability of summer football. That the report was approved and is being implemented by the SPL just as McLeish has written it is a triumph for him personally, for the organization which charged him with preparing it, and for the game in Scotland. The game in Scotland cannot survive- much less prosper- unless it is changed and I’m glad that at least two great minds agree about what must be done.
If it’s more than 5 lines I don’t read it
RaRaRasputin
The STV lad Grant was very good at picking up on points.
I had been banging on as I do (no laughing at the back, at my advancing years I’m proud of it) Now where was I?Oh aye club licensing and how it was a barrier.
I did so because I noticed msm made no attempt to distinguish membership of SPL and automatic membership of SFA from licencing requirements.
Even when drawn to attention msm eg Clyde and associates avoided delving.
Eventually a guy on Twitter asked STV Grant if I had a point and he contacted the SFA who confirmed it was not a given and Tweeted as such.
Within a week club licencing started to appear in msm and much wider over blogs as a hurdle for Newco, especially the 3 years accounts.
So good on STV Grant but if I can add to Barcabhoy’s point, WITHOUT msm guys like Spence,Alec T, STV Grant teaming up with the bampots then the valid points made would not have reached the minds of supporters and public at large who are greater in number than the bampot community.
So heres to the msm men of honour and here’s to the bampots for creating a new reality.
ASonOfDan at 11:21
FF thinks he is better than he actually is. Bring back the Holy Goalie!!
A bit harsh considering we have heard nothing from either party. Despite Artur Boruc’s popularity, Fraser Forster has had a better record at Celtic than Artur had and rather than supporters criticising him for not signing permanently (if indeed that turns out to be the case) we should thank him for 2 great years between the sticks and for helping us to win the league last season.
If he does move on, I wish him every success.
Mort
Andy gray:’do you want rankers in the league?’
Andy, they’re gone, bust, burnt, fininshed, no more, like ENRON, Worldcom, Woolworths, Hunter & Clarke. When will he get it through his thick bawheid?
Auld Neil Lennon heid:
If you get a moment you should read that post above from the Tannar Ba’, it echos a lot that is recommended in the McLeish Report and the guy has some good ideas of his own too.
League reconstruction should be undertaken on the premise that it benefits everyone and is progressive. It should never be considered simply to protect corruption and criminality.
I thought the cardigan was coming to their rescue tomorrow ?
‘crushed nuts?’ ‘Naw, Layringitis!’
I agree, but in a country that, by jury, can find a man who pleads guilty to a crime – not guilty – anything is possible.
pheersy on 25 June, 2012 at 17:51 said:
no laughing at the back bhoys…from “rangers together we stand”
I’ve run out of sick bags!