New clubs in the East of Scotland

[cowdenbeath]

Just now, heedthebaa said:

I could be wrong, but I heard Tweedmouth had been given a certain amount of time to get things in place 

Don't know was just letting the guy know that the criteria was low a few seasons back anyway when the league was struggling, Maybe change now that a lot more sides are applying?

[heedthebaa]

2 minutes ago, cowdenbeath said:

Don't know was just letting the guy know that the criteria was low a few seasons back anyway when the league was struggling, Maybe change now that a lot more sides are applying?

Aye changed days, having to fight clubs off with a shitty stick now  

[Burnie_man]

9 minutes ago, heedthebaa said:

Aye changed days, having to fight clubs off with a shitty stick now  

That's what that smell is.....

[heedthebaa]

2 minutes ago, Burnie_man said:

That's what that smell is.....

No as bad a smell as on your thread in the juniors forum today  never drink alcohol and post peeps 

Just now, gogsy said:

Peebles have got one already.

In fairness that was hilarious gogsy 

[Burnie_man]

Just now, heedthebaa said:

No as bad a smell as on your thread in the juniors forum today  never drink alcohol and post peeps 

 

It's an awesome piece of work

[heedthebaa]

13 minutes ago, Burnie_man said:

It's an awesome piece of work

Can’t quite understand where some of the seethe comes from tbh, no one has been forced to move. Respect to those making the leap, hey ho to those who don’t. The thread though is hilarious 

[tynie1874]

EOS was dead to the dogs only last season before Kelty joined. Will be interesting to see how borders clubs cope with this.

[I’m a celebrity]

12 hours ago, parsforlife said:

Hillfield swifts would be a good addition.

Incredible to think kelty,Burntisland, inverkeithing,rumoured crossgates and if relegated Cowdenbeath could all potentially be playing each other next season.

God help hillfield if the rumours are to be confirmed Lee Richardson going to be the new manager. 

I’m also lead to believe hill of beath and dundonald have both applied. 

[Ginaro]

If you had a full pyramid with all of the seniors/juniors involved then the ground requirements for the lowest division (tier 8/9?) should be minimal so that leading amateur clubs can make the step up from their region. Do any of the East Juniors have similar public park facilities just now?

The EOS application form does ask if the ground is enclosed, has a spectator barrier, etc. so maybe those are requirements? http://www.eosfl.com/downloads/eosfl/Application-for-Membership-East-of-Scotland-League.docx

[Cyril]

Ballast Bank is basically a public park, I am not sure how they would be allowed to play out of there. They must be looking at the astro in Dalgety Bay or perhaps fleetgrounds, Rosyth.

[MDM]

Great opportunity for the EoSFL Committee in my opinion.

Leave the teams currently playing EoS football as the first division.  Create a second division with the new teams.

Two automatic promotion and relegation spots, and two legged playoffs with the 3rd & 4th top and bottom sides.  Then a one-off game to decide on the final promotion spot.  If it's the second division team that wins then the 3rd bottom team from the first is relegated.  If it's the first division team that wins then the 3rd bottom team is saved.

Let the 'big' teams work their way up the league over a few seasons.  No need to place them in the top division because they've decided they now want a piece of the action after refusing all those years ago.

As I've said before, it's only right that the EoSFL Committee show loyalty and appreciation to the teams who've been part of the league for years.  Remember what happened to Easthouses when they joined the juniors, they weren't 'seeded' and placed in a higher division; they joined from the bottom.

[Khufu2]

8 minutes ago, MDM said:

 

Let the 'big' teams work their way up the league over a few seasons.  No need to place them in the top division because they've decided they now want a piece of the action after refusing all those years ago.

As I've said before, it's only right that the EoSFL Committee show loyalty and appreciation to the teams who've been part of the league for years.  Remember what happened to Easthouses when they joined the juniors, they weren't 'seeded' and placed in a higher division; they joined from the bottom.

I'm struggling to think why Easthouses would have been "seeded" anywhere other than in the bottom East Junior division, where they have remained. 

It would be an utter nonsense to have an EoS  League with the rubbish teams in the top division and the strongest teams in the lower division. It would make far more sense to have two regional divisions  in 2018-19 with the top half going into the 2019-20 Premier Division and the rest into Division One (although of course there might be a mass influx in that season).

[Pink Flag]

Great opportunity for the EoSFL Committee in my opinion.
Leave the teams currently playing EoS football as the first division.  Create a second division with the new teams.
Two automatic promotion and relegation spots, and two legged playoffs with the 3rd & 4th top and bottom sides.  Then a one-off game to decide on the final promotion spot.  If it's the second division team that wins then the 3rd bottom team from the first is relegated.  If it's the first division team that wins then the 3rd bottom team is saved.
Let the 'big' teams work their way up the league over a few seasons.  No need to place them in the top division because they've decided they now want a piece of the action after refusing all those years ago.
As I've said before, it's only right that the EoSFL Committee show loyalty and appreciation to the teams who've been part of the league for years.  Remember what happened to Easthouses when they joined the juniors, they weren't 'seeded' and placed in a higher division; they joined from the bottom.

Highly unlikely in my opinion, but it’s what SHOULD happen. As you say, just because ‘bigger’ teams now want to join in the fun, why should they automatically be seeded above existing members. Let the new guys have some kind of play off system if needs be to determine which ones join the first division to even them up, the rest can work their way up over time. What about this scenario - say Kelty win the league this season. As things stand with HW dropping down, very good chance LTHV would gain promotion next season. Their chances of that of up against the top junior sides would be significantly diluted. They are supposedly working towards being licensed so why should their progress potentially be hindered by a smooth pathway being created for the juniors?

[Khufu2]

1 minute ago, Pink Flag said:

Highly unlikely in my opinion, but it’s what SHOULD happen. As you say, just because ‘bigger’ teams now want to join in the fun, why should they automatically be seeded above existing members. Let the new guys have some kind of play off system if needs be to determine which ones join the first division to even them up, the rest can work their way up over time. What about this scenario - say Kelty win the league this season. As things stand with HW dropping down, very good chance LTHV would gain promotion next season. Their chances of that of up against the top junior sides would be significantly diluted. They are supposedly working towards being licensed so why should their progress potentially be hindered by a smooth pathway being created for the juniors?

If you are developing a pyramid then the better clubs should be higher up the pyramid. If there's a better team  than LTHV worthy of joining the Lowland League then that's the team that should join. 

[the tin man]

Every club from bottom o pile to top should all get to reap the benefits of the new teams and there away support. A Random draw of 2 16 team leagues is fair

[Jason King]

No its not.

[heedthebaa]

I’m split with this issue, on one hand should the juniors stroll in to a top division, or should they start up in a second. Personally I think the league cup, again in a mini league set up should be used to form the leagues. Imo you just can’t have say Bonnyrigg in a lower division than the current so called lesser clubs. The juniors that are coming have made a big commitment here and shouldn’t have the piss ripped out them neither. All clubs have self interest, but if I’m off to see say 10 goals, I’d rather see a 5 5 than a 10 0, just look at Kelty this year.  Kelty as a club have shown great respect to the EOS this season, right down to the fans, even on here whilst anonymous and although they’ve seen a massive amount of goals, surely must crave more tense and close games. Common sense has to prevail, ahead of self interest and ahead of loyalty towards the long standing EOS clubs. If there’s 32 clubs, 8 leagues of 4, top 2 go premier, bottom 2 go first. Common sense to firstly seed the groups, based on end of this seasons league positions for the EOS sides, LL relegated clubs seeded and super/premier  league clubs seeded. Any amateur, lower EOS and south league not. 

[Burnie_man]

24 minutes ago, heedthebaa said:

I’m split with this issue, on one hand should the juniors stroll in to a top division, or should they start up in a second. Personally I think the league cup, again in a mini league set up should be used to form the leagues. Imo you just can’t have say Bonnyrigg in a lower division than the current so called lesser clubs. The juniors that are coming have made a big commitment here and shouldn’t have the piss ripped out them neither. All clubs have self interest, but if I’m off to see say 10 goals, I’d rather see a 5 5 than a 10 0, just look at Kelty this year.  Kelty as a club have shown great respect to the EOS this season, right down to the fans, even on here whilst anonymous and although they’ve seen a massive amount of goals, surely must crave more tense and close games. Common sense has to prevail, ahead of self interest and ahead of loyalty towards the long standing EOS clubs. If there’s 32 clubs, 8 leagues of 4, top 2 go premier, bottom 2 go first. Common sense to firstly seed the groups, based on end of this seasons league positions for the EOS sides, LL relegated clubs seeded and super/premier  league clubs seeded. Any amateur, lower EOS and south league not. 

That’s a pretty good idea, a pre-qualifying “League Cup” style competition with the remainder of the season traditional league games based on finishing positions.

If there’s 28 clubs (13 existing and 15 new), then 7 groups of 4 would probably suit, play each other home and away with top two in each group entering the top division and the remainder form the second division. That’s 6 games, followed by 26 “normal” league games.  Two up and two down at seasons end, if there’s more of an influx for 2019-20, then scrap relegation and promote two clubs giving a top 16, with 4 vacancies in the second, or promote 4 clubs to go to 18 and create 8 vacancies in an 18 team second division.

If the names I’m hearing are correct, there’s 4 Superleague clubs and 3 Premierleague clubs joining (maybe 4),  they are the seeded newcomers.  Then you’ll have Hawick (maybe VoL), plus LTHV (for arguments sake), Leith, Tynecastle, Heriot Watt, Preston Ath and Peebles as the EoS seeded clubs.  The remaining EoS clubs and the lower newcomers make up the unseeded clubs, again splitting them EoS and the newcomers.  You therefore ideally end up with two clubs in each group that are newcomers, and two clubs are existing members, wouldn’t work out exactly but near enough.  Would create an exciting start to the season.

All that said, if the existing members want all newcomers to form a second division then that has to be respected as well, it’s their league.

[MDM]

1 hour ago, Khufu2 said:

I'm struggling to think why Easthouses would have been "seeded" anywhere other than in the bottom East Junior division, where they have remained. 

It would be an utter nonsense to have an EoS  League with the rubbish teams in the top division and the strongest teams in the lower division. It would make far more sense to have two regional divisions  in 2018-19 with the top half going into the 2019-20 Premier Division and the rest into Division One (although of course there might be a mass influx in that season).

Easthouses left EoSFL after losing the league on goal difference if I remember correctly.  But it wouldn't have mattered anyway because the juniors gave zero thought to seeding them - that's my point, why should the EoSFL even think about seeding the junior teams?

Quote

(although of course there might be a mass influx in that season)

And what will happen that season if the new teams are strong teams - try another mash-up; or have them start in the bottom division?

[Burnie_man]

2 minutes ago, MDM said:

Easthouses left EoSFL after losing the league on goal difference if I remember correctly.  But it wouldn't have mattered anyway because the juniors gave zero thought to seeding them - that's my point, why should the EoSFL even think about seeding the junior teams?

And what will happen that season if the new teams are strong teams - try another mash-up; or have them start in the bottom division?

You're using one club joining a league of 60+ clubs as an example.  Next season there are more new applicants to the EoS than existing  members (not all of them from the Juniors), so I can see why the thinking is not to push all of them into a second division unnecessarily and give everyone an equal chance of a top division spot.  It's a fairly unique situation and there's no right or wrong answer.