LongTimeLurker

^^^not coping well with being the second best club in blue from a former coal mining town in Scotland's fifth tier. The table doesn't lie is an irritating cliche but there's a definite gulf between Bo'ness and Cowdenbeath in that context right now whether you like it or not. Maybe you should be worrying more about what gets done closer to home to turn that around than what gets posted in a Bo'ness United thread?

The Ukrainians were claiming to be shooting down 100% of Iranian drones being launched at the very end of last year. Saw this recently. No idea how accurate it is: but the suggestion appeared to be that the Russian's ability to go after the Ukrainian power grid to the extent they had been was almost exhausted.

Interesting take on Soledar:

That doesn't actually contradict what I posted in any way just in case you think we are having an argument. I have played football in Tullibody a few times at the set of pitches that would probably have to be upgraded for a Tullibody team to be able to join the pyramid although that was back when dinosaurs roamed the earth. At youth level, Tullibody has been strong over the years with Tullibody Hearts (who may have fallen by the wayside recently, I haven't been following closely), while Sauchie and going back a bit Clackmannan had junior teams and Alloa had the senior team. Both Tullibody and Sauchie are basically outer suburbs of Alloa. Think Tullibody was a new council scheme built post-WWII when a superpit was opened at Glenochil that soon failed and got converted into the young offenders institution. Over the last 30 years or so quite a lot of new private housing has also been built as well once road links over the Forth improved. Causewayhead and Kincardine used to be really bad bottlenecks for traffic before that, which limited the appeal of the area as a commuter belt.

Not great if you are one of the soldiers on the ground but the setback at Soledar seems to have galvanised NATO into action:

A bit like the Lowland League when Broomhill Sports Club applied basically. Think what's important with any club entering the pyramid is that they should be very much grounded in a certain community with their own ground and not one guy's ego trip that basically amounts to a bag of strips that can flit from town to town to achieve licensing through a groundshare with whatever club with a 4G playing surface will take them.

Haven't been paying too close attention but the Alloa Advertiser may have been monitoring this thread: https://www.alloaadvertiser.com/news/23238516.clacks-man-set-tullibody-st-serfs-football-team/ ..."Long term, the plan is that we'll have a team for if we can get into the pyramid but we would always maintain the amateur scene that's open to anyone...

Maybe a good way to think about this is do you really want to ever have to tell people who want to resurrect a club with a bit of history like Annbank United, Baillieston or Blantyre Celtic that they can't get in because the league is full up after the powers that be allowed duplicate Rossvales and BSC Glasgows into senior football?

Conferences is the way the EoS handled that. For example, 24 clubs would mean two conferences of 12. Play home and away inside conference for 22 games plus 12 against the other conference for 34 in total. A playoff can be used to determine the overall champion and promotion issues.

^^^this is what that's all about: https://www.nonleaguematters.co.uk/forums/index.php?threads/glasgow-wellington-to-join-south-of-scotland-league.8910/#post-180681

If there winds up being a Tullibody team down the road hopefully it will be Tullibody Hearts who have been around for decades and have unearthed plenty of players who have gone onto have strong careers in the game rather than some BSC Glasgow/Alloa/Cumbernauld clone.

Will be interesting to see if any more SoS clubs decide to follow Threave.

Think they are hoping that if the UK breaks the ice on supplying NATO standard main battle tanks a lot more German Leopard tanks would soon follow from various European countries.

Guess there's always Castle Park in Blantyre as well if the Vics would take a lodger. Stirling Albion and Clyde have similar sized home supports to Accies and have flirted with it so it's not completely inconceivable that a very badly run Accies could wind up in that predicament if there's no Ronnie McDonald or Jan Stepek type figure around.

Spent a lot of money on their ground rather than the team is the most likely explanation.

Doon the wa'er fur The Fair

Judging from the SoS league table: https://www.southofscotlandfootballleague.co.uk/match-info/tables?table_id=d-5782495 there's very little danger of an licensed SoS champion this season.

The HL and LL have to sign off on changes to the Club 42 playoff rule so there is a limit to what the lower division SPFL clubs can do to close the trapdoor again. The biggest problems with bronze level being the SPFL entry standard for some clubs would be that the pitch dimensions have to be a minimum of 95×60 m, gradients need to be sorted out, there needs to be cover for 500 rather than 100 and floodlights need to be 300 rather than 200 lux. Google suggests Newtown Park in Bo'ness is bang on the minimum where the width is concerned, but a club like Pollok would need to find a way to widen and lengthen their pitch by four feet or so.

They do potentially get a choice now. That rule was changed when the Club 42 playoff rules was amended to accomodate the presence of the Colt teams in the LL. There is no longer anything about the midpoint of the Tay Bridge in any set of rules.

Do we know for sure that Forfar opted for the Highland League? Has that ever been publicly announced?

Maybe Whitburn will be a factor two seasons from now but sounds about right. It's only a matter of time until there are former SPFL clubs in the EoS premier plus the likes of Syngenta, Whitburn, Bo'ness Athletic and Armadale who stayed junior to the bitter end so some balance between the strength of the east and west feeders will be restored eventually as the stronger west clubs start to progress to their natural level. Hopefully pro-rel between tiers 5 and 6 will be opened up to speed things along once the likes of Dalbeattie, Edinburgh Uni and Gretna have been relegated. If Brechin City are promoted this season two of those clubs will be gone if Club 42 is relegated to the LL.

Wagner appear to have given up on Bakhmut for now and switched their focus to slightly further north. Losing a town called Yakovlivka about a month ago made Soledar a lot more vulnerable to this latest attack apparently. Have to wonder if the Orthodox Christmas ceasefire was going to be used to lull the Ukrainians into a false sense of security and this attack was always going to happen regardless.