Scottish Football Discussion Thread 2010/11

[Chaka Demus]

But with greater competitivity would come greater excitement and bigger crowds. Besides, it opens up the whole argument of where Rangers/Celtic go? I can't see X thousand fans travelling to watch Rangers play Basingstoke Town and Midcup Town. Plenty would go watch their local teams instead. I'd LOVE to see the Old Firm punted to the very bottom of the English football pyramid. Would the OF survive that?

 

 

But what's the incentive of moving out of the SPL with gurenteed European revenue each year to the bottom of the English League? If it was going to happen (And for the record, I don't think it will) The Old Firm would have to go straight into the Premiership, or at the very least the Championship and even at that I think both the OF would reject a deal of that sort.

 

If 2,000 people are paying to see St Mirren vs Hamilton just now, then why would any more go see it without the OF in the picture? The SPL chairmen are fighting furiously just now to stop the SPL being revamped to a 16/18 team league where you play each team twice. Purley because they get a massive payday when the OF come to their grounds because of the big away support. If the OF weren't in the picture do you honestly think the likes of Kilmarnock, Dundee Utd or even the Edinburgh clubs would consistantly bring upwards of 4-5,000 supporters for each away game ? If, for talking sakes Hibs were at the top of the table and had to beat St Mirren away to win the league then I've no doubt they'd easily find supporters to go to New Love Street. But would they do it on a Wednesday night in the middle of a freezing cold winter? No, is the answer there.

[TAFKAC]

If Hibs were top of the league? Probably. For the record, and the OF bringing a big crowd theory, Livingston's biggest ever attendance? Celtic? No. Rangers? No. Hibs? Yes.

 

As I say, it's a pointless argument because neither can prove our side of it. Glad to see you don't think the OF will move. Hopefully, that's something we can all agree on.

[Reznor]

Can't believe people actually think that everything would fall into place without the Old Firm, fans would return to fill stadiums and the whole game would thrive. You could be pedantic and argue that Scottish football would survive in the literal sense, but what you'd have is something on a par with the leagues in Ireland or Wales.

[sgmilne]

I think that's crap to be perfectly honest.

 

If the Old Firm weren't in the SPL and instead were Championship or mid-table Premiership sides, you'd find first of all that they'd lose a lot of their glory hunting supporters who live in places like Motherwell.

 

If Aberden won the league then the vast majority of football-supporting Aberdonians would be Aberdeen fans.

e

People forget that the other teams in the SPL are pretty much supporting teams in a competition they can't win. If they *could* win then logic would dictate that more people would attend.

 

The Old Firm aren't bringing in that much more money to SPL sides (certainly not the ones on the East Coast anyway) by being here since the TV deal is pretty poor and teams are beginning to live within their means and not rely upon TV money. The days of home fans filling up the ground to see the Old Firm are long since gone.

 

No, not every team would be bigger, but you could be sure that some teams would be and full time football would survive in the top flight.

 

The lazy arguement (ironically enough in the post directly above) is that if the Old Firm left then the Scottish league would be akin to the Welsh or Irish leagues.

 

Well the highest average attendance in Wales is Rhyl with 503 (an average attendance similar to Scottish Junior Superleague side Pollock who average at 510)

And in Ireland the highest attendance is Shamrock Rovers with 4500 (similar to Inverness CT when they were in Division 1) and the average Irish Premier Division side has an attendance of 1000 (similar to Airdrie Utd or Stirling Albion).

 

If anything, the attendances of most SPL sides will rise.

 

So I'm sorry, that arguement is just a load of crap.

[David]

I think that's crap to be perfectly honest.

 

If the Old Firm weren't in the SPL and instead were Championship or mid-table Premiership sides, you'd find first of all that they'd lose a lot of their glory hunting supporters who live in places like Motherwell.

If Aberden won the league then the vast majority of football-supporting Aberdonians would be Aberdeen fans.

e

People forget that the other teams in the SPL are pretty much supporting teams in a competition they can't win. If they *could* win then logic would dictate that more people would attend.

The Old Firm aren't bringing in that much more money to SPL sides (certainly not the ones on the East Coast anyway) by being here since the TV deal is pretty poor and teams are beginning to live within their means and not rely upon TV money. The days of home fans filling up the ground to see the Old Firm are long since gone.

 

No, not every team would be bigger, but you could be sure that some teams would be and full time football would survive in the top flight.

 

The lazy arguement (ironically enough in the post directly above) is that if the Old Firm left then the Scottish league would be akin to the Welsh or Irish leagues.

 

Well the highest average attendance in Wales is Rhyl with 503 (an average attendance similar to Scottish Junior Superleague side Pollock who average at 510)

And in Ireland the highest attendance is Shamrock Rovers with 4500 (similar to Inverness CT when they were in Division 1) and the average Irish Premier Division side has an attendance of 1000 (similar to Airdrie Utd or Stirling Albion).

 

If anything, the attendances of most SPL sides will rise.

 

So I'm sorry, that arguement is just a load of crap.

A good post there, and the parts in bold I strongly agree with.

[unfitfinlay]

I think that's crap to be perfectly honest.

 

If the Old Firm weren't in the SPL and instead were Championship or mid-table Premiership sides, you'd find first of all that they'd lose a lot of their glory hunting supporters who live in places like Motherwell.

 

If Aberden won the league then the vast majority of football-supporting Aberdonians would be Aberdeen fans.

e

People forget that the other teams in the SPL are pretty much supporting teams in a competition they can't win. If they *could* win then logic would dictate that more people would attend.

 

The Old Firm aren't bringing in that much more money to SPL sides (certainly not the ones on the East Coast anyway) by being here since the TV deal is pretty poor and teams are beginning to live within their means and not rely upon TV money. The days of home fans filling up the ground to see the Old Firm are long since gone.

 

No, not every team would be bigger, but you could be sure that some teams would be and full time football would survive in the top flight.

 

The lazy arguement (ironically enough in the post directly above) is that if the Old Firm left then the Scottish league would be akin to the Welsh or Irish leagues.

 

Well the highest average attendance in Wales is Rhyl with 503 (an average attendance similar to Scottish Junior Superleague side Pollock who average at 510)

And in Ireland the highest attendance is Shamrock Rovers with 4500 (similar to Inverness CT when they were in Division 1) and the average Irish Premier Division side has an attendance of 1000 (similar to Airdrie Utd or Stirling Albion).

 

If anything, the attendances of most SPL sides will rise.

 

So I'm sorry, that arguement is just a load of crap.

 

I disagree.

 

Without the Old Firm, the SPL would struggle to get even a decent TV deal and without the money that brings in, they'd struggle to retain even the players that are in the SPL at present. Attendence might increase in the short term but without the TV exposure, attendences would gradually fall as generations of kids grow up wanting to see "real football" like they see Sky Sports.

 

You're right that the Old Firm would probably lose a lot of glory hunters from their fan base but they wouldn't lose them to other Scottish sides. They would and are losing those types of fan to teams like Man United, Chelsea and even the likes of Real Madrid and Barcelona.

[sgmilne]

Nah, even if they don't get a 'decent' TV deal, they will still get a TV deal - BBC Scotland for example.

 

So they'd still get the exposure without question.

 

Yes, there would be a bit less money, but clubs are moving away from offering players big money these days anyway and are trying to rely more on youth.

[Chaka Demus]

Rangers were on the brink of beind sold this evening for 36M to a Mr Craig Whyte. The main investor from a group a people. Rumours going about that he is a front for the Dave King Group.

 

All in tomorrows papers.

 

Here's to a new era.

[Reznor]

I think that's crap to be perfectly honest.

 

If the Old Firm weren't in the SPL and instead were Championship or mid-table Premiership sides, you'd find first of all that they'd lose a lot of their glory hunting supporters who live in places like Motherwell.

 

If Aberden won the league then the vast majority of football-supporting Aberdonians would be Aberdeen fans.

e

People forget that the other teams in the SPL are pretty much supporting teams in a competition they can't win. If they *could* win then logic would dictate that more people would attend.

 

The Old Firm aren't bringing in that much more money to SPL sides (certainly not the ones on the East Coast anyway) by being here since the TV deal is pretty poor and teams are beginning to live within their means and not rely upon TV money. The days of home fans filling up the ground to see the Old Firm are long since gone.

 

No, not every team would be bigger, but you could be sure that some teams would be and full time football would survive in the top flight.

 

The lazy arguement (ironically enough in the post directly above) is that if the Old Firm left then the Scottish league would be akin to the Welsh or Irish leagues.

 

Well the highest average attendance in Wales is Rhyl with 503 (an average attendance similar to Scottish Junior Superleague side Pollock who average at 510)

And in Ireland the highest attendance is Shamrock Rovers with 4500 (similar to Inverness CT when they were in Division 1) and the average Irish Premier Division side has an attendance of 1000 (similar to Airdrie Utd or Stirling Albion).

 

If anything, the attendances of most SPL sides will rise.

 

So I'm sorry, that arguement is just a load of crap.

I think you're living outwith the real world there.

 

In general, very few fans are out & out glory hunters in terms of which team they'll latch onto. Celtic fans will be Celtic fans till they die, as will Rangers fans and those of every other team. The 'gloryhunting' thing is more apt for talking about how active they are as supporters. Sure when times are barren at their club, they'll stay away from games, watch it on the TV, listen to radio, stop buying merchandise, lose a bit of interest, focus more on a premiership team etc. What they won't do is completely change the team they identify with to go and pay

[David]

In general, very few fans are out & out glory hunters in terms of which team they'll latch onto. Celtic fans will be Celtic fans till they die, as will Rangers fans and those of every other team.

Yeah, but once those "Old Firm fans until they die" actually do get old and die, or move on in life, there will be a younger generation who will grow up seeing the likes of Hearts, Hibs, Motherwell and Aberdeen challenge for league titles, win league and Scottish cups and play in the memorable European ties that come along with all of that.

 

For example, Motherwell experienced the biggest growth in fans during and after the Scottish cup run of 1991 and the decent league finishes that followed.

 

Games against the likes of Borussia Dortmund are still fresh in my memory, and those types of games created new fans of a younger generation, a fair percentage of which have remained.

 

Imagine if Motherwell were actually able to keep progressing at that time? Imagine if the league title wasn't a pipedream?

 

That generation won't know Rangers & Celtic in the same way as we do now, as both clubs will undoubtedly have changed.

 

For example, both will make the usual noises about stamping out bigotry and the like, but if they find their appeal in one of the biggest leagues in the world being affected by a percentage of their fans moronic behaviour you can bet that they'll get all kinds of serious about it.

 

And actually, the 'crap' argument wasn't all about attendances, it's about quality overall. If the Wales/Ireland comparison wasn't to your liking, then you could substitute it for say... Sweden/Norway and the point remains.

Well, Sweden and Norway are closer to being the same size as Scotland, and i'd take a Scottish league minus the Old Firm that was as successful as theirs any day of the week.

 

Norweigan and Swedish teams are seen in the Champions League, and have been known to do well.

 

The only thing that gives the SPL any kind of prestige and which puts the league into the top 15 or so in Europe is the Old Firm.

And the main reason the Old Firm attract the attention they do is because of the backwards religious shite we see throughout Scottish society.

 

It's starting to dwindle away as time passes and our country becomes more multicultural and modern, but both of those clubs represent the last bastion of such a society.

 

See, the rest of Europe can have a positive view of Celtic & Rangers (well, not so much Rangers) because they see them every now & then for a big European tie. We have to put up with their tribalistic, neanderthal behaviour every weekend.

 

The English FA wouldn't put up with that shit every week, and Rangers and Celtic would have to seriously look at changing their ways or they would get dumped.

 

Without them, you might bump the gates up by a thousand or so in the short term as the stayaways come out of the closet, but once the novelty wears off and they realise they're watching the same shite which drove them away in the first place, they'll disappear again and it will have had little meaningful effect. If you really want to add another 5,000 or so to your weekly gates you'd need to start with halving the prices, and even in the event that it worked (which would be by no means a certainty) you're still not bringing in that much more money, therefore you aren't going to significantly improve the one thing that would make a difference - the quality of your teams.

Think about it this way, if the OF were to fuck off at the end of the season, we would have a season where any of four or five teams could realistically become league champions.

 

If Hearts, for example, were to win the title for the first two seasons you honestly think that there wouldn't be players that would look at them, and the chance to play European football, that wouldn't have looked at them when they were guaranteed to win fuck all?

 

That means the quality of player would increase.

 

In addition, i'm not going to pretend i'm all clued up about the distribution of money in Scottish football, but i would have a hard time believing that losing the Old Firm would make as negligable a difference as you imply. 4/5,000 tickets for every home game, your share of the

[sgmilne]

I'd be quite happy for Scotland to be a league of a similar standard to Sweden and Norway. That's a realistic aim.

 

As for the quality of the product on display, that's just buying into this belief that Scottish games aren't exciting and games from other leagues are. Some people think every Premiership side is hugely exciting - it's not. Just like the SPL there will be terrible games on each and every week with the occasional exciting match. United v Killie last week was superb. Two teams attacking each other non-stop. That's what fans pay to see - an exciting game of football.

 

Actually, on that, I did a bit of research a few years ago for my job and the results were that people go to the football for a few reasons, and obviously 'to be entertained' is up there, but the most significant response was 'To see my team win'. That's why Hibs got their biggest attendances of the modern era in Division 1.

 

It's not 'shite' that drives people away from football, it's paying excessive admittance fees to see a product that is broken - and it's broken because only two teams can win. People want to see their team have something to play for. If a team is in relegation trouble it bumps up attendances because the games take on a meaning.

 

It's the same with every club. In the 1980s before Murray and Souness, Rangers were getting attendances in the 10,000s. Last season, Celtic's attendances went through the floor to the extent where they actually attempted to cover up the numbers. Why were the attendances bad? Because these teams were not doing well and the fair weather element couldn't be bothered.

 

Now if you take that to its core level - the point where someone chooses what team they will support at school - kids will have a choice. They could support the teams from a different city who are stuck around the same level as Bolton Wanderers, or they could go along to see their local side who have a chance of winning the SPL.

 

And going back to the point about the quality of player - it may have escaped your attention but there are practically no teams buying players from abroad anymore. It's either picking up young foreign players who are looking to use the SPL as a stepping stone, older guys winding down their careers, or Scots.

 

Just because Rangers and Celtic aren't here, it doesn't mean the youth systems wont work. We'll still have Scottish players coming through, which worked for us back in the 1960s-1980s.

 

And yes, the small sides will still remain small. Every side has its limit of how big a fan base it can attract, but full time football can exist among the bigger sides and that is all that the SPL needs to survive. And it would survive at a level that suits the size of Scotland (i.e. similar to Scandinavian leagues). No non-Old Firm fan would have a problem with that.

[martyngnr]

Yeah, but once those "Old Firm fans until they die" actually do get old and die, or move on in life, there will be a younger generation who will grow up seeing the likes of Hearts, Hibs, Motherwell and Aberdeen challenge for league titles, win league and Scottish cups and play in the memorable European ties that come along with all of that.

 

For example, Motherwell experienced the biggest growth in fans during and after the Scottish cup run of 1991 and the decent league finishes that followed.

 

Games against the likes of Borussia Dortmund are still fresh in my memory, and those types of games created new fans of a younger generation, a fair percentage of which have remained.

 

 

Absolutely. When Aberdeen had their European run a few seasons ago we managed to attract +20,000 crowds to the 4-0 crushing of Copenhagen and draw with Bayern Munich.

Nobody can honestly suggest that if European nights like this were the rule rather than the exception that crowds would come flooding back. When you factor in the greater possibility of domestic honours too it makes perfect sense.

 

The English FA wouldn't put up with that shit every week, and Rangers and Celtic would have to seriously look at changing their ways or they would get dumped.

Indeed, it would take one week of "Oooh Ahh Up The -Ra" or "Fuck Bobby Sands = He's deid" and the English FA would get them sorted out.

[bAzTNM Fan]

Rangers were on the brink of beind sold this evening for 36M to a Mr Craig Whyte. The main investor from a group a people. Rumours going about that he is a front for the Dave King Group.

 

All in tomorrows papers.

 

Here's to a new era.

 

 

 

 

Heard it all before. I notice your edit: I saw the post when you originally put it up saying that Rangers had already been bought - how could you possibly think, at any point, that after all the moonbeams and palava over the years that it was a done deal?

[Chaka Demus]

Wow, somebody cares an awful lot about who's going to take over their greatest rivals.

 

Could be worse, we could have a chairman who sent hundreds of soldiers to their deaths in a false war.

[bAzTNM Fan]

Wow, somebody cares an awful lot about who's going to take over their greatest rivals.

 

Could be worse, we could have a chairman who sent hundreds of soldiers to their deaths in a false war.

 

A-fucking-men. One of the few times we'll agree on anything Old Firm related.