LongTimeLurker

Think most people realise that Option W won't be happening given what we are seeing coming directly or indirectly from SJFA and WRSJFA blazers, so it will almost definitely be a case of a WoS being organised initially as part of the LL, if it's going to launch by next season. Suspect a lot will depend on numbers interested and the attitide on this of Mother Kilwinning Club No. 0 and Clydebank.

^^^ It reads: "Irvine Meadow will fully support the SJFA for any possible solutions. "Irvine Meadow, however, would definitely express interest in any proposed West of Scoltand league set-up. "This however would need to be discussed by shareholders and fans kept fully informed of any further developments."

Not really, the Alliance party is a crypto-Unionist party for people too posh to want to label themselves politically the same way as William Ulsterman types, so it's really 9-9 and the Unionist vote is still significantly larger in percentage terms than the Nationalist/Republican one. There's no more seats that are likely to swing Nationalist/Republican any time soon, but there are still seats that could still turn Unionist again on a good day for the DUP or UUP. The Union may well end eventually, but that isn't likely to be in any way imminent unless something really mental happens on the EU exit agreement that has yet to be negotiated by Boris J.

They are probably confident that the SJFA has no interest in expanding into their fiefdom, while the EoS did it in the past when clubs like Dalbeattie, Annan and Threave Rovers decided they wanted to play in a more challenging league setup.

Hopefully a west feeder would mean two up two down. If the SoS gets awkward, second bottom place could be for the WoS champion from what would effectively be the lower LL divisions and the existing EoS/SoS playoff format could be for the bottom placed team as it is now. If the SoS doesn't, hopefully it would be a three game three-way playoff for two promotion places, similar to how the EoS handled having three conference champions last season.

It has been obvious for a long time that the SoS were not on the same page as the EoS. This isn't a new development or in any way surprising. If the WoS initially launches as part of the LL after a series of internal rule changes are implemented at the LL's 2020 AGM, there are probably procedural ways available to still keep the EoS/SoS playoff intact because of the way that the playoff-format wording was future-proofed, although it would be easier to proceed with SoS agreement on a modified playoff format. All the SoS appear to be doing is urging the various parties to compromise, so there is no suggestion at this point they would try to block any change.

All the shenanigans with the north region last season led a lot of people to believe that had changed in some way, but it clearly never had. Think the reason we haven't heard all the details on the WoS so far in terms of the application process is that a narrow window of opportunity is being left for the SJFA to respond sensibly to the LL/EoS statement.

Reading the SoS statement again it comes across as a plea for all parties to belatedly agree to Option W more than anything else. Something Kilwinning Rangers appear to be leaving the door ajar to as well.

The EoS took away some of the top clubs like Dalbeattie Star from the SoS catchment in the past, so there may be some old resentments there.

No more PWG meetings planned, and I think you'll find St Anthonys are the club of one of the leading SJFA blazers. http://www.theants.co.uk/ants-match-secretary-felix-mckenna-sworn-in-as-sjfa-president/

Holy mixed metaphors, Batman!

Whitburn was the biggest although they've fallen on hard times in recent years. Armadale, Bathgate and Fauldhouse would be others that sometimes featured at the superleague sort of level.

Still people in the west region that seem to think that the SFA will impose a solution they like. Ain't happening and the sooner they grasp that the better.

I'm slow the day. Took me 10 minutes to get that. Square, ya bass! Wouldn't read too much into Kilbirnie being opposed at this point. Plenty of big names in the east adopted that posture intially two seasons ago as well.

Harthill Royal play in Greenrigg, which is in West Lothian. Think you'll need to have been in the WRSJFA to get into the WoS, but we'll see what happens.

Seriously doubt they would be allowed to given the EoS is featuring prominently in the press release.

The SoS were siding with the SJFA in the PWG meetings according to some of the stuff that has appeared on here, so think it's definitely just LL and EoS at this point.

Good to see the announcement, but it's a little short on specifics. Hopefully the details on how to apply and what the deadline is will follow shortly.

If you look at his bizarre email to member clubs, TJ claims that one of the LL reps (from BSC Glasgow) at the meeting stated that the LL had been broadly on board with Option Z eight months ago, but had since changed its mind due to a dissident minority that persuaded the rest. Said rep has since stated on twitter that TJ's account of what happened is "creative writing", so who knows what the truth is. It's possible though that the LL may have been split internally on the idea of having an LL West and LL East and TJ and others were taken in by over-optimism on the part of the faction that was in favour of it. From an SFA standpoint it was probably a case of we'll go through the motions on this and if by some miracle it works that's fine, and if it doesn't we'll just exit the whole PWG process. Where I think the SJFA reps completely lost the plot is that they seem to have expected the SFA board to force it through anyway when there is no obvious way for them to do so in terms of their constitution.

There were posters on here stating that they had been told at the west region meeting that both the LL and SPFL were on board with Option Z. The HL:LL boundary had to be shifted for it to work so the HL and SPFL both needed to agree as well.

That's far from clear. Looks more like Petrie and Maxwell eventually realised they had made a mistake by being seen to back the entry of all three SJFA regions back in 2018, because there was no way they could force it through in the absence of a consensus, so they came up with Option Z as their exit strategy. Option Z was what needed to happen to achieve SJFA entry and splitting the LL was the lynchpin to everything. It's difficult to believe the SFA were taken completely by surprise by LL opposition to having that happen, so if somebody was being conned into believing there was support where there wasn't, it appears to probably have been Tom Johnston. Once Option Z went down in flames Petrie and Maxwell were able to save face by effectively saying, well we tried, and walked away from the PWG process leaving the SJFA high and dry. {Edit: as lowenan points out above, time to move in. There is zero chance of the SJFA being involved with the pyramid at this point. If clubs in the west want in, it will have to be on the terms set by the LL}