Thinker 875 Posted February 19, 2013 Share Posted February 19, 2013 (edited) Every so often on a Scottish football forum, somebody will post a mad-dog suggestion about pan-European, UK or Atlantic leagues... So I thought I'd have a go. Obviously this is just a day-dream, but I've spent a while trying to come up with a plausible plan for getting us (and other Scottish, Northern Irish and Welsh teams) into a bigger league. Cheers to anyone who finds the time to read this and please get ripped in with your criticisms - it's very possible I've missed a glaringly obvious flaw that shoots the whole thing down. Outside that, likely responses would be: "Nah mate, it'll never happen." - You're almost certainly right, this is just for fun really - but I've tried to come up with the least objectionable idea possible. "I don't want to play in England, Rangers are Scottish." - Fair play if that's how you feel, but being stuck in a small-scale league is a massive restriction on our otherwise colossal club. "I want to ditch Scottish football and leave the rest of them to rot." - Me too, but I doubt UEFA will ever allow individual clubs to be exceptions. A Football League for the whole UK The main problems with creating a unified UK league are: It would threaten the footballing independence of the home nations. (While a lot of people may welcome a permanent “Team GB”, it would never pass a vote). Most suggestions are complicated and involve disruptive reconstruction of the English league system. (Why would clubs in such a successful set-up agree to this?) I’ve tried to come up with a suggestion which would allow clubs from the leagues of Northern Ireland, Scotland and Wales to gain promotion into the Football League (alongside teams from the Football Conference), with a minimum of disruption to the English clubs - the only change being an expansion at the lowest level to make space for an initial, fair representation of non-English teams (See below). Governance Each national football association would continue to govern its own clubs, run its own national cup competition, national side etc., but the Football League and the Premier League would expand their remit to become UK-wide bodies. This should not threaten the footballing autonomy of the home nations as it is in keeping with the numerous, cross-border leagues currently being proposed around Europe (e.g. The Balkan League, the combined Belgian\Dutch and Russian\Ukrainian Leagues). Making Space I propose that, in order to create a number of new league places for Northern Irish, Scottish and Welsh sides, League 2 be expanded into 2 parallel, non-regionalised divisions (League 2A and League 2B). This type of organisation is fairly common across European football. The existing 24 League 2 teams would be split evenly between the 2 parallel divisions (12 in each) with the new clubs making up the numbers. The benefits of this format are that: It would prevent any one division from being “swamped” with non-English clubs. It would allow all English clubs to retain their level in the league hierarchy. The top 3 flights of English football would be completely unaffected. It would create enough space for each of the home nations to be fairly represented. I suggest that Leagues 2A and 2B should each initially be of 20 teams - creating 16 new league places (an overall increase from 92 to 108). Subsequently, over several seasons, these divisions could be expanded to 2 x 22, then 2 x 24 teams. This would better allow for a measured, gradual introduction of non-English teams. Representation There are many factors that could be taken into account when deciding how many teams from each of the home nations should be granted the extra places in the expanded league (UEFA co-efficient, attendances, turnover, quality of facilities, etc.) but I think the fairest baseline would be to ensure that representation is roughly proportional to population. Once in the Football League, clubs from smaller scale set-ups would have a far greater opportunity to develop. The Football League currently consists of 90 English teams and 2 Welsh, so an absolute minimum of 9 Scottish, 3 Northern Irish, and 3 further Welsh teams should be considered (See Table 1 below). Note: At the time of writing, both Newport and Wrexham are vying for promotion from the Conference, so the minimum number of extra Welsh teams required may well change. Table1: Proportional club numbers [TABLE=width: 603] [TR] [TD] Nation [/TD] [TD] Population [/TD] [TD] % of Population [/TD] [TD] Proportionate Number of Clubs [/TD] [/TR] [TR] [TD] England [/TD] [TD] 53,013,000 [/TD] [TD] 83.90% [/TD] [TD] 90 [/TD] [/TR] [TR] [TD] Scotland [/TD] [TD] 5,295,000 [/TD] [TD] 8.38% [/TD] [TD] 9 [/TD] [/TR] [TR] [TD] Wales [/TD] [TD] 3,063,500 [/TD] [TD] 4.85% [/TD] [TD] 5 [/TD] [/TR] [TR] [TD] Northern Ireland [/TD] [TD] 1,811,000 [/TD] [TD] 2.87% [/TD] [TD] 3 [/TD] [/TR] [TR] [TD] Total [/TD] [TD] 63,182,363 [/TD] [TD] 100.00% [/TD] [TD] 107 [/TD] [/TR] [/TABLE] The single remaining place (required to make Leagues 2A and 2B up to 20 teams each) could be awarded to the winner of a 4-way play-off contested by the next best candidate from each country. As Leagues 2A and 2B are expanded (eventually to 24 club divisions) the additional league places could be awarded via similar competitive play-offs. Relegation and Promotion In the system I propose, relegation from the UK League (to the Conference and Northern Irish, Scottish and Welsh Leagues), would be via separate streams (i.e. the lowest placed Scottish team would be replaced by the Scottish League Champions, the lowest placed English team by the Conference Champions etc.). This means that the number of clubs from each nation would stay constant, and therefore guarantees each a set level of representation. Relegation could be made fairer by taking the actual league position into account and, say, making demotion automatic for a team which finishes bottom of a League 2A or 2B, but giving a team which finishes second-from-bottom (or higher) the opportunity to defend their league status through a play-off. The nations with a higher representation (England and possibly Scotland) could have 2 relegation/promotion places. Development Periodically, (perhaps every 4 seasons) the performance of each nation’s teams could be assessed and their quota of places adjusted accordingly. Also, should it be decided that having parallel divisions is too much of a departure from tradition, Leagues 2A and 2B could eventually be reshaped into 2 separate flights. Once the non-English clubs have found their level through promotion, and all the divisions are suitably mixed, the top halves of the parallel divisions could be merged back into a League Two, and the bottom halves into a new League 3. Edited February 19, 2013 by Thinker 0 Quote Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
The Real PapaBear 0 Posted February 19, 2013 Share Posted February 19, 2013 brilliant piece, Thinker - best I've read on the subject. I think you're on to something there. The only possible fly in the ointment would be that Scottish participation in European competitions might cease to happen in some seasons. For example, if Rangers finished 11th in the league and Celtic 12th, would we get a CL or UEFA cup spot for being the highest place Scottish team at the expense of English teams that finished above us? 0 Quote Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thinker 875 Posted February 19, 2013 Author Share Posted February 19, 2013 True, but I suppose that criticism would apply to any cross-border league. For example, it's not beyond the realms of possibility that Dutch teams could dominate a BeNe league if they go ahead with that. I suppose that would just be hard lines for Belgium. But (ideally) the Scottish cup would continue to carry a Europa spot - so there would be that to aim for from the word go. Beyond that, hopefully we'd get to the Premiership in 3 or 4 seasons, and the fusion of the leagues might result in a higher league co-efficient and an increased number of European qualification places. TBH though, I'd sacrifice the certainty of European competition to be in a higher quality league week in week out. I'm very jealous of Cardiff City's position. 0 Quote Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gribz 743 Posted February 20, 2013 Share Posted February 20, 2013 Will look forward to reading this a bit later. 0 Quote Link to post Share on other sites More sharing options...
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