LongTimeLurker

Cmon, you know as well as I do WL clubs should go to the EoS. The leagues will meet to hopefully agree the boundary and applications will then be dealt with accordingly. They won't even be assessed until after the application deadlines, by which time the boundary will probably be defined. Given you have no role with the WoS you are not in a position to clarify the finer points of how an application to the WoS would be handled. Apparently there is a general meeting of WoS clubs on Monday (?) after the elections for officeholders where issues like this will be discussed. If so, there's a good chance we will have a much clearer picture of what is happening in a few days time well before the deadline for applications to the EoS and WoS on March 31st.

Think rules were changed so there would be no more replays? My impression was challenging but not impossible to do it alongside the SCC, but maybe the WoS will now amend its rules in that regard once the LL no longer pulls the strings to make it easier? Personally hope the SJC and SCC get merged into something bigger and better than both eventually and that West Lothian clubs (Harthill are arguably really Lanarkshire) do wind up in the EoS, but find it bizarre to see Burnieman of all people trying to argue that Whitburn and co could stay in the SJFA and enter the SJC as things stand at the moment from the EoS. You don't need to counter every single argument from an opponent with its reverse when you are debating something and will tend to just wind up undermining your credibility if you do so in a manner that is far-fetched at best and disingenuous at worst. A more sensible approach might have been to talk up the virtues of playing stronger LL clubs like Kelty, Berwick Rangers, East Stirling, Bonnyrigg, BSC, Spartans, East Kilbride and Bo'ness United in the SCC, because the SJC is now reduced in scope to something that is not even close to the competition that we grew up with.

You are perfectly well aware that this alone makes future SJC participation impractical. The EoS and LL have pushed the SCC this season to a bizarre extent given the prevailing circumstances when the obvious priority should have been league games to get seasons complete enough to be able to declare a champion. It is abundantly clear what their priority is in flagship cup tournament terms and it clearly isn't the SJC.

A congested fixture calendar can easily be used to make the SJC participation impractical so it is HibeeJibee that would really need to clarify that before ongoing SJC participation from the EoS could be viewed as a credible possibility. The WoS has an SJFA majority in membership terms while the EoS currently has zero SJFA members. It's abundantly clear who is the more likely of the two to free up prime Saturday fixture dates for it to make away trips up to the north region viable. You have been making a fair enough point about what the traditional geography of east and west has always been in footballing terms, so not sure why you feel a need at this point to move beyond that and start making questionable assertions where future SJC participation is concerned.

They can do that in the EoS if they want. Would @HibeeJibee set aside the fixture dates required for that next season if a newly entering club retains SJFA membership? Would former SJFA members in the EoS be allowed to rejoin at this point and would similar accomodations be made for them?

2008 team would typically draw 0-0 at home then win on aggregate with a 1-1 or 1-0 away. No chance they would have conceded five over two legs to a club like Antwerp. Would be good to see Rangers knock out an English club so Scottish fitba gets a wee bit more r-e-s-p-e-c-t from Sky pundits.

Prohibitively expensive so unlikely to ever happen. A metro system that would combine commuter rail with a tram like format appears more likely: https://www.glasgowlive.co.uk/news/glasgow-news/gamechanger-glasgow-metro-system-takes-19761712

To paraphase Dave Baikie of Tayport on a recent podcast: "...the Highland League dinnae want them, the East of Scotland League dinnae want them..." Applications can be made in either direction by either the clubs or league in a Tayside context but it is as clear as mud what the outcome would be because other league memberships get to vote on these issues as well who will have their own selfish self-interest agendas.

This one solitary P&J quote from many years ago is consistent with what I am emotionally invested in as the outcome so I am now just going to ignore everything else that has happened subsequently on PWG negotiations, stick my fingers in my ears and go la la la la la la, if anybody points out that applying is not the same thing as being accepted.

It's more the EoS and WoS you need to worry about on a Midland League as they would also need to sign off on it and are unlikely to want another promotion playoff entrant. Available evidence (admittedly anecdotal) points to the LL not being that bothered about a rule change on Club 42 as long as they can get something out of it, but they are also clearly not going to roll over on that just because the SPFL orders them to. HL meanwhile would likely point to the SFA having only considered the NCL and north region in PWG terms on the north feeder negotiations as being more relevant than the Club 42 rule because they would also be likely to latch onto only those actions from on high that fit their preferred outcome. Think there would be a solution eventually if enough of a fuss is kicked up by the Tayside clubs but nobody is likely to be in a rush to accomodate them so it could take a while (as in years rather than months).

But accurate given Auchinleck is an outlier rather than the norm in interest terms. Look at Ashfield. Vaguely remember reading something online about them having something outlandish sounding in present day terms like 96 coach loads of fans for a junior cup game in Bo'ness not long after WWII. Would you even be able to find 96 people that would call themselves an Ashfield fan now? Clubs like that have a ground that was built in an era when they must have been hugely relevant to their local coimmunity, but in 2021 how many people really care in their local catchment? A club like BSC Glasgow can justifiably be criticised for playing in Alloa, but nobody can sensibly question whether they are relevant to large numbers of people in their local community through what they are doing at the youth level. Having clubs like that enter the league system is about reflecting what's happening in the 2020s rather being a fossilised relic of what was happening back in the 1920s. {Edit: having checked the SFHA records that have been posted elsewhere the game described above almost certainly involved Irvine Meadow rather than Ashfield}

But on the flip side a potential pool of votes for said clubs if the remaining SJFA members stick together in a make junior fitba great again sort of way. What gets posted on P&B by a small self-selecting group of posters often tends to be out of tune with how votes tend to wind up going hence why the pyramid debate dragged on and on... The West Lothian clubs will enter the pyramid one way or the other, so they have a viable plan B. What I think would be most concerning in terms of where the WoS is heading would be if applications from ambitious amateur/youth clubs get rejected because of the delusions of grandeur type sentiments. With all due respect to Glasgow Perthshire, clubs like Rossvale and Gartcairn are doing a lot to foster participation in the sport at the youth level in their communities and should not have a glass ceiling placed on their ambitions by clubs that are trundling along at this level with a minimal fanbase largely due to having a ground that was built in a very different era.

Over the line according to the Club 42 rule so shows clearly that rule is irrelevant at tier 6 and below if they can get in, but whatever at this point. The same small gaggle of posters on here will keep posting the same misleading assertions over and over because they are emotionally invested in the outcome, so will simply dismiss the evidence that doesn't fit their preferred picture.

Whatever bud. Reality is the Club 42 rule only applies to Club 42 and has had zero impact on how the SFA board has handled PWG negotiations related to tier 6.

^^^prime example of myopic P&B posts that latch onto the one thing they can find that fits their preferred line of argument and extrapolate wildly from there rather than looking at the totality of the available information that's a lot more complex.

In recent years, the SFA and SPFL boards have actually both sided quite strongly with the idea that Dundee and Angus clubs should fall under the LL catchment, if they want to be. The idea that Tayside is definitively in the HL catchment is only really something you see on P&B at this point.

A tier 6 Midland League feeding into the LL is a scenario that sometimes gets mentioned by people from the Dundee area but I agree it would be problematic to have four leagues feeding into the LL. Flip side of that is that if the HL also don't want a league like that as a tier 6 feeder then it isn't happening in that context either no matter how much that messes up some people's vision of what the pyramid should be. I have no strong opinion either way on where Tayside fits in and I am not campaigning for anything. Think you'll find Tayside's record in the SJC was actually quite reasonable in terms of finalists if you went back 10 to 30 years ago. Tayport (technically in Fife but very much a Dundee area team) were very strong for many years after stepping up from the amateurs to the Tayside juniors setup before the superleagues came in. All-Tayside finals even happened in that era with Carnoustie Panmure and Lochee United: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scottish_Junior_Cup In more recent seasons, Lochee United have tended to be a major factor in the latter stages and Broughty Athletic might still be playing in the closing stages of last season's competition this year lockdowns permitting. The Dundee juniors scene is a lot stronger than Aberdeen's where the HL takes most of the best players away. On the last bit, the SoS or EoS might be a plan B in that scenario and I guess that's one of the arguments for not having fixed boundaries even though I agree with you that a higher authority should be able to intervene on appeal instead. No fixed boundaries provides flexibility to fix an issue like that where a club that clearly should be allowed into the senior grade is being blocked from doing so for whatever reason. Forget the gory details but Gretna 2008 winding up in the EoS rather than the SoS might be a relatively recent example of that happening in practice.

Stoneyburn not in the mix as well? Know the area well and agree that travel considerations are unlikely to be what gets you knocked back because there's no obvious reason on distance to Glasgow or Edinburgh why these towns would be viewed as east rather than west. What I was suggesting was that it boils down more to traditions revolving around counties for a lot of people and that's why there's so much of a kneejerk response that you should be EoS from some people. Will be interesting to see what happens.

Worth checking out where Aberfeldy is on a map. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aberfeldy,_Perth_and_Kinross That would be controversial, but we know they could put in an application if they wanted to. The risk posed by stray golf balls from a nearby course was the excuse used not to allow them into the east region many years back. There was somebody from that club that posted on here sporadically at one point. Think they were talking about licensing at one point more recently, but were a lot keener on east region north than the Highland League as a possible future home.

Ayrshire clubs moaning about extra travel is what sunk the "superduper league" that would have combined the top east and west region clubs into a division similar in geographical scope to the Lowland League. That in turn was what prompted Kelty to join the pyramid and set off the chain of events that led to the formation of the WoS, but this time around it will revolve around a simple majority rather than building a clear consensus, so not sure that's what will sink it. There are more former central region clubs than Ayrshire ones and for most of them Whitburn will be closer and easier to get to than Cumnock. Think the argument that West Lothian is traditionally east and any town clearly over the county boundary (i.e. I am not talking about Harthill) doesn't belong in a league with West in its title is more likely to resonate.

Low risk outdoors activities that boost people's health should be open/allowed well before any non-essential high risk activity indoors that geniunely does have an effect on the R0 value, but the politicians are listening to curtain twitching scum that would be moaning about how folk are out playin fitba while they cannae go for a pint.

They did pubs before stadiums previously.

Anyone coming out with that isn't old enough to have ever heard the chant "Come and have a go with the Gorgie Agg-a-ro". All from Wester Hailes or some wee mining village in West Lothian with a skinhead haircut, Doc Martens laced up to the knees and a Red Hand of Ulster draped around their shoulders would have been the stereotype 40 years ago. Wrong forum for this though?

The phrase "sterilising immunity" was always going to cause issues amongst the hard of thinking.

^^^ https://www.bbc.com/sport/56151863 It would be nonsensical not to allow low risk outdoor activities that were following appropriate protocols to resume at this point but as you say Nicola and co always need to find a way to be different from Boris and co.