LongTimeLurker

Not quite accurate. The RUC carried on the traditions of the RIC and in the early years had a lot of Roman Catholic officers that were former RICmen (over 20% from what I remember reading).

Think it's what the ERSJFA decide at a meeting on these options that matters more. If they decide they only want in at tier 6 as a feeder to the LL including clubs north of the Tay boundary and the SJFA is doing the negotiating rather than the regions what happens next? The initials of the national association provide a hint. There's a reason why the SJFA would have still wanted the east and west in at tier 6 as one of the options for discussion. It's unfortunate the issue of whether the Tayside boundary actually matters is superimposed on top of all of this as it means a straight absorption of junior clubs in the east by the EoS doesn't make the issue of what to do with what would be left of the ERSJFA north of the Tay go away. Under those conditions the ERSJFA is likely to also linger on south of the Tay as well and that spells ongoing trouble for coming up with any solution when the SJFA is doing the negotiating as a national association. I doubt anything is going to be resolved on this in time for next season unless the SFA have mysterious yet to be revealed powers to impose a solution, which seems unlikely. Best thing to speed things along would probably be a further mass defection from the ERSJFA to the EoS but all the recent posts from the new teams in at tier 8 brigade on here shows that there are people around in EoS circles who are likely to wind up actively undermining that possibility by their words and actions.

Are the SJFA likely to be keen on the LL west and LL east concept when that means they would quickly lose most of the clubs that can usually be expected to be appearing in the junior cup quarter finals? What the SJFA probably would have wanted was having their own superduperleague in at tier 5, but the horse has long since bolted on that scenario. Suspect it's the LL that are pushing that option and it's part of the LL2 idea that sometimes gets mentioned. The reason they would be keen on this is that it provides more of the existing LL clubs (Spartans would be a prime example) with a much better shot at playing in tier 5 over the long term.

There was a question of why he was able to fight Kylo Ren quite effectively at one point in TFA and maybe JJ Abrams thought it would have been in tune with the broom boy stuff in TLJ. Disney seem to have been more intent on making sure nobody thought him and Poe were gay when the final cuts were made. All a bit of a mess in the end but a three hour run time would probably have helped make it less chaotic and disjointed.

Think that puts the league title into would take a miracle territory.

As things stand it has to be the champion. So if a non-licensed club kept winning the west region season after season there would be no promotion.

My original point was more that if there is ever a question on how rules are being applied that definitely falls very much under the SFA as that's where the appeal would go. Beyond that the PWG is a committee set up by the SFA Board and it remains to be seen to what extent power devolved is power retained. It definitely looks to me like the EoS hold a veto on what happens next given the wording on who needs to sign off on changes to the LL playoff rule, but there are people who have argued things would be otherwise if the PWG reaches an impasse. They've been wrong so far.

True but the clubs delegate a lot of decision making power to the SFA Board.

That's the way it looks to me and letting them in would be a case of still further mission statement creep.

You are not the ultimate arbiter of what is right and wrong on this. That would normally be the SFA's job as the FIFA sanctioned national association.

...but what has been noteworthy is that the SFA don't appear to see it that way in terms of what can and can't be an LL feeder.

So how did Sauchie, Jeanfield and Kinnoull get in, and how could they give Clydebank a deferred membership? A mission statement is different from a rule or regulation.

The LL chose to apply the boundary in terms of the application process last season, but there was no obvious reason why they had to based on what's in their constitution.

What you are forgetting is that my argument is that this rule appears nowhere in the EoS or LL constitutions, so as things stand they could reasonably add any ERSJFA north section club that puts in an application. For whatever reason they choose not to.

Try doing what I did and actually looking at the Club 42 rule: https://spfl.co.uk/admin/filemanager/files/shares/SPFL Rules and Regulations 22-Jul-19.pdf In the event of Club 42 losing the PyramidPlay-Off Match, it will be relegated to the SHFL League if its Registered Ground is located North of Degree of Latitude 56,4513N or to the SLFL if its Registered Ground is located South of Degree of Latitude 56,4513N and it shall thereafter comply with the rules and regulations of the relevant league. There is nothing in that other than the location of the registered home ground with respect to a specific line of latitude. If this boundary is relevant to the EoS as some have argued on here, Luncarty are not in the EoS/LL catchment unless they move their registered home ground to a different part of the village.

I explained above the technicalities of the question of whether Luncarty could be allowed into the EoS if the team 42 Tay boundary is applicable. That has nothing whatsoever to do with the concept of blame over SJFA entry.

At no point have I done that. Describing the rules that are actually in place has SFA to do with the concept of blame over anything.

One last try to get my argument across with no follow ups. Tayside is still up for discussion at PWG level as far as the SFA is concerned. If the EoS posture is that there is no need for that and it is a closed issue because the team 42 boundary logically applies at tier 6 as well, there can be no flexibility for Luncarty at their current registered home ground because the rule as written for team 42 is crystal clear and provides no scope for that.

It's only the LL side of things that are covered by the current set of meetings. If the SJFA wants to remain relevant as a national association they need either all three regions in or all three remaining on the outside. As things stand at the moment the way to achieve the latter is to only agree to options the EoS can be relied upon to block. This would be the most obvious explanation for why a complete non-starter option from an EoS standpoint (i.e. east region entry at tier 6) is still part of the package for discussion apparently at SJFA insistence. If the west wants in next season best to push very hard for the west in with east left to be sorted out later option at the meeting.

He might get a chance to make Stenny regret letting him go in a league fixture next season given how their season is going.

We'll see what happens, but it's important to remember that it's not the west region that does the negotiating at PWG level but the SJFA doing so on behalf of its entire membership.

...on the surface until you stop to ponder why options that clearly have zero chance of actually happening would still have been included as part of the package for discussion by the various leagues.

I have been arguing that the tier 7 conferences should continue to be the lowest level and that should be the entry point for Fauldhouse. At no point have I suggested tier 6 entry for Fauldhouse.

As stated previously I hope the EoS board are more strategic in their thinking than many of the people who post on here.

In theory the existing members could have done that but everybody knew at the time that the EoS board were recommending parallel conferences.