Gordon EF

It's not a totally unreasonable point but I think you mean to say "containing the Nike conference outbreak".

In reality, there was just no solution that was going to make every club feel like they hadn't been denied something or be disadvantaged. I was in favour of reconstruction but it would just have resulted in a different set of clubs complaining.

I have no idea what you're talking about.

West Region Junior clubs are now being held up as bastions of football vision and progressivism. We really are through the looking glass now.

Oooft. Well, you're wrong as I'd love to see Kelty in the SPFL and begin a new Fife derby. I've got nothing at all against their progression up the pyramid. I've praised them plenty of times for being the first big junior club to make the step over. I'm always going to point at laugh at idiots like you and their stupid opinions though.

How have old firm colts crowds been like in the Challenge Cup? Go away, check, then come back and admit you're talking shite. Never see a bad game at Kelty? If your idea of a good game is watching a team assembled on a League Once budget dismantling a team like Dalbeattie Star, then maybe you're right.

I loved the first game but I'm fairly underwhelmed by what I've seen / heard / read about this one. I think I agree with the general consensus of pick it up when the price drops.

Imagine if Falkirk end up getting promoted because Hearts and Partick get punted from the league.

in that case, the majority of clubs could probably take action as they theoretically could have been promoted. You can make the reverse argument but it's much more ridiculous.

This gets said so often and never sounds any less like utter horse shit.

It's true though. Apart from a couple of seasons where Spencer Fearn's sacks full of "forward-thought" saw them not finish bottom of the league.

True. But it's not primarily the "forward-thinkingness" of Kelty, Brora, Cove, etc than will worry L2 clubs. Stenhousemuir and the like don't care if Kelty have invested in their facilities or have great coaching for the under 12s. They care that these clubs will come up and outspend them significantly.

Are we all using "forward-thinking" as a euphemism for 'has a sugar daddy' now?

Well what you're basically arguing for is a step towards individualism, rather than collectivism generally in Scottish football, weird obsession with part-time clubs aside. Albion Rovers, Falkirk, Hearts, and Celtic are all different clubs in different situations so why should any of them have any influence on any of the others. You could equally just say why should Celtic have any say on what happens in League 2.

Should full time clubs that find themselves in a lower league than some part time clubs also get a vote... just out of interest?

Why is England's particularly high excess death rate during the height of the pandemic any kind of reason to continue lockdown longer than is necessary in Scotland?

These are brilliant.

At no point during the pandemic has Scotland had the worst excess death rate in Europe.

Bit harsh. I'm sure Barry Ferguson would also manage to f**k it up.

Well that's shite for a start seeing as East Fife and Montrose basically have almost full squads signed up. Absolutely no way they're doing that then voting to mothball.

I never thought I'd feel like a kid on Christmas Eve at the thought of watching my 100th East Fife vs Forfar fixture in the past 5 years.

True

And we've broken the world record for most premature league prediction thread ever.

Well you're framing it as if we're saying clubs can play but just don't fancy it. Clearly clubs can take decisions that would not be their first choice when faced with certain circumstances. Clearly all clubs would like to play if it was possible. Some clubs may feel that the best decision is to mothball though. I'm not sure why that distinction is getting such a bee in your bonnet.

I don't think anyone's suggesting that there are clubs out there who could play next season but just don't want to. But clearly once we know what next season might look like, there's a possibility that some clubs might see mothballing as the better choice for them and some clubs might not. This is effectively what Clyde have already said. We won't know until some plan for next season materialises though. So we either decide that we all have to play, none of us play or we come up with some plan that let's those who can play and those who can't mothball. That clearly leads to some potentially complicated scenarios where for example, six L1 clubs decide to play and four L2 clubs decide to play. What do you think should happen in that scenario?