Shannon

There was negotiations then in 2012 for league restructure and 3 tier lesgues but was never voted through or even tried to. Any reason why? Why not ensure you got more £ in a once in a generation opportunity with one of the big clubs demoted to 4th tier. You may want more money now but it's done unfortunately and Premiership teams having Rangers back and they no longer care about league two and then again league two don't care and are genuinely running scared of teams at top of Lowland and Highland League plus new West and East of Scotland Lesgues too.

Then surely in 2012 that was the time to create a complete overhaul of TV money and more fairly distribute it all over Scotland citing Rangers being in League Two to Championship for at least 3 seasons ending up 4 seasons. If only could redistribute 15% to lower leagues then should not have agreed to that and negotiated for more £ as then league two and league one had more power than they will ever have again?

What do the League One and League Two teams do for their % though of TV money as they aren't on TV for league games?!! Not saying it's right but better than £0 that Lowland League teams and below get. Their argument is they should only get TV money for Scottish Cup and lucky to be getting anything. Not that I agree with that view. I do agree that the lower league teams should get more money but Killie, St Johnstone, St Mirren will say we need every penny we can get and we are on TV 4-6 times a season and Stenhousemuir aren't so anything they get should be a bonus.... I think the taking £25k off the champions (1 players wages for 1 week) and around £2k-£500 each off rest of Premiership teams would pay for 2 extra teams.

I am not saying we have an amazing crowd or support especially now with 8 years without a trophy just that certainly wasn't just 100-200 Meadow fans v Queens Park in 2012. We brought 5 X 50 seater buses from Irvine plus plenty on cars and trains. Was a good crowd and better than if they played Elgin or Annan etc. That's all. Our crowds are only 200-300 at home now and travelling support these days perhaps 50-100 but if we get back into Scottish Cup game and start challenging for trophies will go up significantly as big town with a few hundred or even thousands of glory hunters [emoji23]

Your next home game v Annan had 626, East Stirling 374 and Berwick Rangers 487 so yeah your home crowd around 500-600 mark and that being generous. The other 600 fans must have been neutrals...[emoji849]

The attendance was 1,147. Meadow took around 600-700 that day. A very good attendance for a Scottish Cup 2nd Round tie. We didn't think we would defeat you as hadn't been doing well in our league and you were far better team on paper and had some very good mix of ex Juniors, experienced pros up and coming youngsters like Shankland and it showed. A number of league two clubs not yourselves as you have improved with help from certain signings from Kilsyth Rangers and Largs Thistle from Juniors amongst others but Brechin, Stenhousemuir and Stirling Albion are certainly wanting to try everything for there to be no further relegation from league two for as long as possible. Kelty and Brora would finish above them three over a league season and they know it.

Still to be confirmed but likely 2nd to 6th and best placed 7th team in tier 7 so will be teams battling to finish top 6/7. Potentially also 7th to 11th tier 8 and 12th down tier 9. Or may just be 7th down in tier 8 and split into North / South or East / West. So will be a lot to play for other than just conference winners.

Conference A. I reckon Arthurlie should be the favourites to finish as league leaders but Shotts will fancy their chances too. Dark horses are Whitletts and Lesmahagow Conference B. If St Cadocs keep up their signings then should be up there and Renfrew should be favourites but with manager moving on don't know so hard to call so early on. Teams to watch Shettleston if they continue their form into next season. Gonna go for Shettleston as they will have a more settled team. Port Glasgow and Greenock top half too. Conference C This is a packed one with any of 6 or 7 teams could win it. Early thoughts are Neilston or Petershill to go up. But Kilsyth, Lanark, Drumchapel, Ardrossan and others will think anything less than a top 4 spot and tier 7 for 2021-2022 to be disappointing.

Great chance for them to be challenging for tier 6 / Premiership for first time in years and should end up tier 7 if they have a decent season and will then likely potentially a few more local games. With Ardrossan most Ayrshire teams are top tier or bottom tier not many Ayrshire teams like them that are middle (Irvine Vic's / Whitletts / Girvan but that's a trek). Likes of Troon, Largs, Kilbirnie, Meadow the bigger teams near Ardrossan haven't been in their league for many years but very even conference. Could finish anywhere from 1st to 7th.

Really interesting interview with Stenhousemuir chairman. If you did shoot him down or argue strongly against what he was saying then interview wouldn't have revealed as much and would have been 5 or 10 minutes long. It does really show the teams in league two have just as much self interest as Premiership teams in that they really don't want any more teams in their SPFL to dilute the money they get and make them more likely to find their natural level which is the Lowland League in all honesty for Stenhousemuir and Albion Rovers plus others. I had to listen again when he said that even in a 14 team league should only be 1 relegation place via a play off. I wanted to suggest to him if was 14-14-14 if he thought would be fair if only one promotion spot then from each league via play off only too? I would think he would be against that!! Also that he wanted no relegation for 2 years and cited formula one safety cars. Using same example thats for one race not for a full season of races. They keep saying teams will go out of business surely simply cutting their wage bills to suitable level example £50 a week and if end up in Lowland League then rebuild as East Stirling have done and Berwick Rangers are doing. Stenny and Albion Rovers would actually have more chance of trophies and cup finals that he talked about in the Lowland League than in SPFL and would probably find it far less stressful in a 16 team Lowland League than bottom 4 club of SPFL hoping and praying that big non league clubs that will finish above them like Brora, Kelty, Bonnyrigg, Talbot etc don't come up anytime soon.

Talk about throwing your toys out the pram for not getting 3/4 home gates against current Premiership teams, will be a more competitive conference without Talbot and Pollok thrashing likes of St Ants home & away. Make your feelings known in the calls and meetings not on Twitter if your a chairman of a football club. Bit embarrassing in my opinion. With way Scottish football goes could still be reverted back to all in conferences so why not try for that instead of making your club look daft on social media.

It was going to be tough for current West Region Premiership teams to stay tier 6 as teams in leagues below are improving eg Darvel, Blantyre, Arthurlie, Petershill, Lanark plus 2 new amateur teams have number of current and ex Juniors and Seniors in their teams. I reckon only half would have finished top 3/4 in conferences. Would have been an exciting but stressful season for a lot of West Premier teams now less pressure to spend on wages and can focus on facilities a bit more as will just want to avoid bottom 3 or 4. It's all still to be finalised though. Who knows with Scottish football.

Darvel and Blantyre Vics won't be happy at all about the decision. They both do deserve promotion in my opinion as were well ahead and Rob Roy should have been relegated as no way they were staying up and they could regroup in the conferences.

Yeah go to Scottish Professional Football League section on pie and bovril and below Highland League / Lowland League / East of Scotland League you will see West of Scotland Football League Forum. https://www.pieandbovril.com/forum/index.php?/forum/137-west-of-scotland-football-league/ Also https://wosfl.co.uk/ will be a handy website to keep a look at as will have fixtures / league tables / news etc.

Irvine Meadow are doing one to try to help towards floodlights for licensing purposes as we join senior football and new West of Scotland Football League. At over £1,100 which is quite good going for a smaller club at this difficult time. https://www.gofundme.com/f/irvine-meadow-stand-floodlights-appeal?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=p_cf+share-flow-1

If anyone says that phrase you know they are not genuinely apologising. In fact she is basically saying you are wrong. Out of all the Tories in the current cabinet in my opinion Priti Patel is by far the worse and most dangerous one about. She is a smirking wee cow and has contempt for every person daring to ask her a difficult question. As per YouTube video above she also wants capital punishment brought back and doesn't care if innocent people die. Much like her Governments handling of the Coronavirus which is being praised by most UK media outlets!!

YouTube link too I think...[emoji848]

https://open.spotify.com/episode/3tnJ13S0nfddiEQQVSCVVb?si=0EbVanf0TgK0tak82Z9oxw I think this is the link here.

It would often be a Friday night and often would get a very good crowd as 10 plus years ago was no other football really on a Friday night so had some very good semi final crowds at neutral venues.

Been reading a bit that talk of regionalising conferences. I really don't see how this would work as for example East Ayrshire (Talbot, Hurlford, Darvel) and North Ayrshire (Buffs, Meadow, Largs, Beith, Kilbirnie) are largely strongly than Lanarkshire (Lesmahagow, Lanark, Carluke)...?

For the smaller clubs like Royal Albert having conferences for a season is a great way to get some larger visiting supports and more match day income for at least a season. In a season or two they will become tier 7 / 8 team depending on the quality of their squad. They don't have to invest in their squad or facilities more than they currently are but if wanted can use any extra cash from games v for example Talbot, Meadow, Kilbirnie, Beith, Pollok, Kilwinning Rangers etc to invest in their facilities / upgrade their pitch etc.

Surely a few of these will have applied and don't know about it as they don't an active social media or just not put out a statement.

It's the number of shares. Some supporters may have 1 share, others have 50 or more depending on how many they have purchased etc. I have around 10 and that will be average for supporters with shares I reckon.

Positive things are looks like no Junior club in the West will be left behind. No conferences which was going to be a hard sell for supporters in the West especially at our club and with no Junior Cup it would have been a tight 50/50 decision for many teams on whether to join the pyramid or not with committee and supporters split. Now it should be a much cleaner way for all West teams to join the pyramid with no teams like Bathgate, Fauldhouse left behind. Now it's a no brainer and every West team will hopefully now join the pyramid. If it's not for them they can always go amateur but I don't think any clubs would want to do that. Well done for being sensible. Hopefully all goes through with no last minute hiccups is my only worry and teams will need a back up plan to join pyramid if talks do break down but it all seems very, very positive with lot of credit to everyone involved so far.

With no senior football to talk for a few weeks about maybe a sports journalist will do a decent well.researched article on the pyramid in Scotland or is that too much to ask [emoji848]......