Fans overwhelmingly favour bigger spl

[Gribz 743]

With regards a winter break, I lean towards an empty February where there are no scheduled fixtures. However, if the weather is ok, any postponed games from previous months can be played during the break. That covers quite a few scenarios of bad weather over the winter.

 

Starting earlier is a must, not only to fit in the break but to get our teams up and running before the European qualifiers start. Non-OF Scottish teams have been terrible in Europe for a long time and the OF have often suffered from playing CL qualifiers as their first games of the season.

 

Play-offs have generated end of season interest and revenue in England for years, we've really been missing a trick for a long time there. A trip to Hampden could really stimulate fans of the lesser clubs, especially if you make it cheap for kids - 20,000 spectators at an average of �£15 a ticket brings in a gross �£300k which could be an excellent windfall for the teams in the final.

 

Two up and down seems obvious and is only not there to provide middling clubs in the SPL with a bit of a comfort zone - which supposedly brings less conservative football and more chance of developing youngsters. To see that we'd need a bigger league.

 

Having feeder teams with free movement between them would certainly help with youth development as the reserve league is a dead duck.

 

The trouble with getting rid of playing four times is that it decreases interest - would you rather swap two OF games for a couple with Partick Thistle? And a couple of Hearts games with Dundee? I think a 14 team league with a split after playing everyone home and away would be best. Split for a top 6 and bottom 8, meaning the better teams play 36 games leaving more room for European ties, and the lesser teams have 40 games to balance some of the revenue. It keeps the interest of the split but gets rid of the anomalies and unfairness.

 

Pretty much agree with all this bar the final part about the split. Teams in top half should still play same amount as bottom half as the 2 games less would be played at the end of the season where there is no likelyhood of European football. I would prefer just playing everyone twice in a 16 team set up but a split to get an extra OF game would still be good.

 

Also RE the play offs, the only problem with this is seeing Hampden half empty for a play off with Dunfermline v Dundee makes it look like a poor match plus sounds poor on TV. Switch this type of fixture to Easter Road where you wold get a packed 20,000 would create an atmosphere give a better game.

[pete 2,499]

The one thing that I will say is that there was no debate or at least i filled it in without debating it. Since I have read other peoples ideas on it I may have voted different. I think i have now changed my mind and support going back to a 10 or sticking with the 12. Financially I now believe it is the only way to go.

The only thing that i will never change my mind on is getting rid of that stupid irritating split. Serves absolutely no purpose and gives advantages to some teams.

[johnnyk 158]

The one thing that I will say is that there was no debate or at least i filled it in without debating it. Since I have read other peoples ideas on it I may have voted different. I think i have now changed my mind and support going back to a 10 or sticking with the 12. Financially I now believe it is the only way to go.

The only thing that i will never change my mind on is getting rid of that stupid irritating split. Serves absolutely no purpose and gives advantages to some teams.

 

I am also changing my mind and don't think a bigger league would work finacially or improve the standard of our football any. I also hate the split and hopefully they can get rid of this once they all agree.......

[rbr 1,247]

Both of those are main objectives for the proposal of 2 x 10 if you're to believe the nonsense spouted by Doncaster. Another main objective is supposedly to inject more money into the second tier (SPL 2 or whatever they call it) so that the standard of the clubs and football on offer can be improved. I listened to the BBC's Scotfoot podcast from a couple of nights ago where Doncaster is on taking questions for the full 30 mins and a lot of the things he said are total nonsense, especially what he says regarding the amount of money clubs would lose from moving to bigger league of say 16. He just pulls figures out of thin air. Another thing that was evident and quite shocking IMO is that clubs outside the SPL haven't been consulted on the restructuring proposals AT ALL. You had the Dunfermline gaffer coming on the show disgusted that they hadn't been consulted, totally against the plans and asking Doncaster for a meeting to discuss it. Unbelievable.

 

 

Sorry but that's absolute dross , all those figures have been costed by the SPL , and now we are getting lectured because Dunfermline aren't getting their oar in , no wonder we are screwed

[Zappa 0]

Sorry but that's absolute dross , all those figures have been costed by the SPL

 

Well the figures that Doncaster was talking about on the program I listened to sounded as if they had been simply trotted out after some primary 7 arithmatic without addressing the potential options properly. You can't just say that clubs would lose X percentage of their ST and gate receipts as a result of increasing the size of the league when obviously a reduction in the number of home SPL fixtures in a season would need to be offset somehow with xtra cup games or derby matches. Where there is a will there is always a way, but there is no will to properly discuss all of the options since the Henry McLeish report. It's now full steam ahead with the 2 x 10 proposal and all other options are just being poo-poo'd as impossible. Meanwhile guys like Doncaster leading the SPL's charge for this change haven't even spoken to the non-SPL clubs about it. He's on BBC radio on Tuesday night saying in response to the accusation of ignoring fans that he's spoken to some Trusts and got meetings lined up with more Trusts, but the Dunfermline manager has to come on the phone to the show to ask Doncaster for a meeting?? They're getting people round tables at Hampden to discuss these things and there's a meeting in 10 days time to vote for this prooposal one way or another and it turns out that clubs like Dunfermline haven't even been consulted?? The Dunfermline gaffer was saying on the phone that the only things they'd heard about any of it was from the TV & press. It's a total disgrace. A shambles.

[rbr 1,247]

Soory Zappa but why should anyone from Dunfermline gat a meeting , what about Ross County , Dundee etc etc they already have a representative from the SFL who was at the meetings and who had a mandate to talk on their behalf , like I said it's the tail wagging the dog .

 

If and it's a big if we had clubs from the 1st division , solvent and able to step up to make a 16 or 18 team league at present I would probably go for it , but we dont , we have to get the 1st/spl2 sorted first before we further weaken the top division.

 

No one has still explained where the money we would lose ,would be recuoped from , what the long term effect on our main sponsorships would be and all this on the same day that Walter is yet again bemoaning the fact we have no money , beware what you wish for.......

[BrahimHemdani 1]

 

1. Not necessarilly. The survey was promoted in the national media as well as online forums and club websites and respondents were asked to invite others to participate.

 

2. On the face of it a fair point. All I can add is that I am advised that the large sample size "would be regarded as robust, and with a relatively low margin of error". At least one can be fairly sure that the sample are football fans/supporters whereas if you went out into the street and asked the same question you might have greater difficulty in establishing who was a genuine fan (whatever your definition).

 

Oh and by the way, the SPL have acknowledged the survey results are valid and echoed the results of their own survey in January 2009, which not surprisingly they have never puiblished!

 

I have obtained this further response from Red Circle Communications, hopefully this answers all your concerns.

 

 

 

The only thing I would add is that the fact that the majority (68%) were not members of a Trust provides a large, robust sample of 3,268 non Trust members. This allowed us to effectively factor out Trust members and simply look at the views of 'ordinary' fans. When we ran a statistical analysis of Trust members and non-Trust members there was no significant difference in response other than the statistic highlighted in the presentation - Trust members were not suprisingly more likely to support greater fan representation in football clubs.

 

I think the main point to make is the sample of around 5,000 provides the ability to explore all of the key sub-groups (trust/non trust, age, SPL/SFL) on a stand alone basis. And the size of these sub samples (thousands rather than hundreds - and in most cases significantly larger than a sample used by polling companys to determine voting intention across the whole of the UK) means we can be confident that the results of any sub-analysis is robust. This is further reinforced by the fact that on the key measures - opposition to a 10 team SPL and not feeling consulted - there is a similar pattern amongst all sub groups with very little deviation so we can be extremely confident on these key measures.

 

On the attendance issue as I said in order to keep the survey short to encourage response we did not measure whether people attended or how often they attended. And we also sought views from non-senior supporters. That throws up definition of what constitutes a fan but I'd argue that anyone who takes time to complete the survey has some level of interest in Scottish football and can be reasonably defined as a fan. And actually the size and robustness of the sub samples means that as in the weighting issue this becomes much less relevant than in surveys with much smaller samples.

 

I think overall it's also worth noting that the findings are reinforced by the balance of opinion from other sources whether anecdotal or other polling e.g. Scotsman Poll running at the moment actually shows a very similar distribution of support for leagues of 10,12,14,16 and 18

Edited January 7, 2011 by BrahimHemdani
Minor typo

[Zappa 0]

Soory Zappa but why should anyone from Dunfermline gat a meeting , what about Ross County , Dundee etc etc they already have a representative from the SFL who was at the meetings and who had a mandate to talk on their behalf , like I said it's the tail wagging the dog

 

I'm not saying that Dunfermline should get preferential treatment: I'm saying that clubs like them haven't been properly consulted if their chairman John Yorkston is going on BBC radio saying he'd like a meeting with the SPL chief exec because they haven't been involved in any discussions. When we're talking about the restructuring of Scottish football for the benifit of the game as a whole in Scotland and for the benefit of ALL 42 clubs and their futures (as Doncaster would like to have us believe), then personally I think that at least our 1st Division clubs should be involved in the discussions to a greater extent than having David Longmuir supposedly talking on their behalf.

 

If and it's a big if we had clubs from the 1st division , solvent and able to step up to make a 16 or 18 team league at present I would probably go for it , but we dont , we have to get the 1st/spl2 sorted first before we further weaken the top division.

 

So the answer is to chuck 2 clubs down into the 1st Division from the SPL along with their current percentage of SPL TV money and split that TV revenue up amongst the whole 1st Division as well as chuck 2 clubs out of the current 1st Division? Sounds to me like 4 of the 22 clubs would be getting financially shafted with this proposed change.

 

No one has still explained where the money we would lose ,would be recuoped from , what the long term effect on our main sponsorships would be

 

And likewise, nobody has explained why there would be increased revenue for the top flight if we go back to a 10 team league. Doncaster has said he 'believes' a 10-team top league would generate increased revenue from television broadcast deals saying things like - "We've certainly had the indication that the plan on the table is more attractive to TV than the status-quo". What 'indication'? Are we supposed to just take his word for it or have the SPL actually had an official 'indication' from broadcasters that it would be more attractive to TV in the sense that it could increase our TV revenue? I can't see Sky or ESPN saying 'oh yeah, we'll give you more money if you go with that proposal', so personally I think Doncaster is probably talking out of his rear end.

[rbr 1,247]

Zappa , we will agree to disagree , however this restructuring should be about benefiting our top flight and POSSIBLY the 1st division , after that I dont really care , they can all go to regional divisions or join junior leagues , the tail has to stop wagging the dog , it applies right through our game , where chairman of wee regional clubs are sittinfg on disciplinary committee's and making decisions that effect every club , the SFA need go as well , just another waste of space , one body over ruling all of our game

[BrahimHemdani 1]

Croatia is an interesting case. The Croatian national team have had great success in qualifying for the World Cup and UEFA Euros. Smaller country with a smaller, but slightly denser population than ours with a 16 team league. Bronze medal in a World Cup and reached the quarter finals in the Euros twice. Currently ranked 10th in the FIFA World Rankings as well. Doesn't really count for anything, but it's interesting nonetheless.

 

Dinamo Zagreb are the most successful club. "Dinamo's biggest rivals are Hajduk Split, and the matches between the two teams are referred to as "Eternal derby". Former major rivalries used to include Serbian clubs Red Star Belgrade and Partizan. Despite playing in the same division as Dinamo, and being from same city, NK Zagreb are not considered major rivals by the fans." (WIKIPEDIA)

 

I find it hard to belive that the Croatian Clubs get more money from TV than Scottish Clubs. Dinamo have 2 Argentinians and 3 Brazilians on their playing staff but although they beat Villarreal at home they failed to qualify for the knockout stages of the Europa League and apparently have not played in Europe after Christmas for 40 years. Hadjuk Split managed only one win in the Europa League at home against Anderlecht and finished bottom of their group. Both Dinamo and Hadjuk are way down the coefficent rankings. Hadjuk once reached the quarter finals of the CL in 1995 losing 3-0 to Ajax. As a country Croatia were 27th in the UEFA coefficients last season compared to Scotland's 16th. Not sure what conclusions to draw from that except that a 16 team league in a small country doesn't necessarilly guarantee success in Europe!

Edited January 15, 2011 by BrahimHemdani
typo