Marten

Maxwell is utterly out of his depth. He can sound very convincing, so much so that he probably genuinely believes the stuff he comes out with himself. Yet when it gets to the formalities of actually getting it sorted, he has no clue what the procedures are. This was also shown in the "done deal" of the juniors entering the pyramid for example. This shambles really should mean he gets shown the door...

Seen that tweet yes, that's at least encouraging. Just been down to Lochee United for the end of season awards. Expectation amongst non-league clubs is this will be roundly rejected. We don't get a vote but are firmly against.

So the SFA claimed that League 2 clubs support this, yet Stenhousemuir, Bonnyrigg, Dumbarton and Peterhead are all confirmed NO. Hopefully more to follow!

Dumbarton confirmed good guys. https://twitter.com/Dumbartonfc/status/1664687388751167522

Linlithgow Rose will count as LL members already. But regardless, they were members pre-2018, they were one of the few outside the pyramid who became members before the SFA changed the rules so any applicant had to be in the pyramid. The others in that category were (off the top of my head) Girvan, Banks O'Dee, Glasgow University & Golspie Sutherland.

The ones with the most obvious links to these 2, clubs like St. Roch's / Cambuslang Rangers for example, have no voting rights.

Shame, was thinking of going there. Seen them in pre-season against Stirling Uni EOS and they played quite well.

I get that in this part of the country too. At Lochee United I get the idea that most people know that if we were to win the league, we get in a play-off for promotion to the Highland League as we are licensed. But that's largely down to the club communicating to the fans about this and making clear that our medium-term objective is to achieve exactly that. When I speak to fans and even committee members of other clubs in the area I often get puzzled looks when I talk about a potential HL play-off if the ML has a licensed champion. People are more aware of changes in the East due to the amount of clubs leaving our league, but the HL pyramid being established is something many people here are still not really aware of.

Simple, no. Players on loan can play at a higher level. One of the arguments Hibs made for not getting involved with a B-team in the LL or Conference League was also that players on loan don't just benefit from playing against experienced players, but also with experienced players, which wouldn't be the case in a B-team. For players close to the first team, Hibs feel that reserve team football is better because they don't play at the same time as the first team, so unused first team substitutes can play in the reserves to get some game time. And let's not forget that Hibs have one of the best academies in Scotland. Outside of Scotland, Feyenoord used pretty much the same arguments as Hibs to explain why they didn't get a B-team in the pyramid. They just won the league convincingly with a team full of homegrown talents.

That final is usually on a Saturday, it definitely was last year.

Only 93.2% against? What were the remaining 6.8% thinking?

Thanks, that answers my question on Airdrie as the "entry" is not related to the ground but to the first team. So I guess it's more paperwork issues or staff qualifications or something like that.

"A number of clubs in the senior leagues, including Airdrie, Bonnyrigg Rose, Cove Rangers, FC Edinburgh and Kelty Hearts also fail to meet the Bronze level criteria and have now been given 12 months’ grace to meet the required level." Other than them once again not understanding what "senior" means, I wonder what would be wrong with Airdrie's ground then? From my trips there I can't see what would be the issue?

Yeah, a bit of a dodgy character...

I'd say the latter is more likely, seeing as they don't have a history of violence, this was the first real crowd trouble incident for them.

Absolutely laughable "argument". It's really a whole load of bollocks they came up with.

Rumours are they are going to Broadwood, their women already play there so I suppose it would make sense.

Agreed. Clumsy, yes. But no excessive force or bad intent. Clear yellow card.

I've criticised him a fair bit, but in fairness, he wasn't particularly excited about the prospect of a conference league to put it mildly in an interview I listened to. He thought it was a done deal, but that doesn't mean he will support it actually happening.

I don't think any new national division is needed, regionalisation shouldn't start even lower than tier 5.

Quite a change to the league geographically. All 3 promoted teams other than Dunbar are further north than all 4 teams that got promoted or relegated from the EOS Premier. And in the case of VOL v Luncarty/Kinnoul the difference is quite massive obviously. Jeanfield's mileage will go down a fair bit!

I wouldn't say there has been a crash and burn here. There has been a short period of turmoil, but the club recovered relatively quickly. Largely because the rest of the committee didn't trust Carling (rightly imo) so they slammed on the brakes before it got out of hand.

Brora are consulting their fans so I assume their position might well change. Can't see Gala Fairydean going for it either as they'd effectively vote to relegate themselves.

It will be interesting to see if they manage to pick themselves back up for the play-off. This will have been such a massive blow mentally to Hamburg that it could affect them badly. Losing it in such a way will have been so much tougher than had Heidenheim just spanked Regensburg so Hamburg knew from early on that it wasn't to be yesterday.

They apparently had plans ready to set in motion as soon promotion would be realised and work is expected to start next week already.