New clubs in the East of Scotland

[Burnieman]

Just now, FairWeatherFan said:

Nobody has said anything about the EoS being full. The suggestions above have been about finding a means to extend beyond it. 

There are clubs that would want to be part of the pyramid that can't access due to ever increasing ground criteria. Clubs that are currently in it that wouldn't be today if they were an applicant. 

I was responding to a post which intimated a solution was required to a problem. To repeat, there is no problem on the EoSFL.  There are what, 6 vacancies potentially upto 8 which aren't all going to be filled anytime soon. 

Clubs wanting to join the EoSFL need to meet some basic ground criteria, EoSFL clubs wanting to join the LL need an Entry Licence, clubs wanting to join the SPFL need a Bronze Licence. You need to meet standards to progress, and if you want to come out of amateur or youth football into the EoS, you need to put in a bit of effort. Linton Hotspur have shown what can be done, but I don't think there's much of a queue of clubs ready to follow them at the moment.

Existing clubs who don't meet criteria were assessed and warned some time ago to bring their grounds upto EoS requirements.  

[Sergeant Wilson]

The pyramid should be infinite and open to all clubs whether they exist or not.

[Burnieman]

3 minutes ago, Sergeant Wilson said:

The pyramid should be infinite and open to all clubs whether they exist or not.

 

Agree, and I'm not sure why the WoS went down the route of closing the door at 80 clubs.

[Sergeant Wilson]

Just now, Burnieman said:

 

Agree, and I'm not sure why the WoS went down the route of closing the door at 80 clubs.

Elitism. Why shouldn't Bonkle YMCA have a senior club, whether they want it or not. It's about ambition.

[Burnieman]

Just now, Sergeant Wilson said:

Elitism. Why shouldn't Bonkle YMCA have a senior club, whether they want it or not. It's about ambition.

Part of the issue here is there is no overall application of standards in the Pyramid, it's every league for itself.  The SFA are also useless and causing issues by refusing to allow regionalisation of lower divisions.

[GordonS]

2 hours ago, Basile Boli said:

Do you want a full pyramid or not?

Are you asking if he wants every amateur league in the country in the pyramid?

I think it's reasonable to draw lines at various levels of the pyramid, in different places in different parts of the country to reflect the populations and football traditions, and say above this you need to meet certain ground and club criteria. It's reasonable to draw a line that clubs won't get relegated below because it would drop them into semi-organised, social football.

What's not reasonable is telling clubs that meet the criteria that their part of the pyramid is full up and they need to wait until an existing member club dies.

[Dev]

3 hours ago, Burnieman said:

Part of the issue here is there is no overall application of standards in the Pyramid, it's every league for itself.  The SFA are also useless and causing issues by refusing to allow regionalisation of lower divisions.

As already mentioned, there is a licence system in place as far down as the Tier 5/6 boundary within the Pyramid. Do leagues beneath that really need to have the same promotion/relegation rules and criteria with lower levels of the game? FWIW. I don't see why that should be.

Presumably there is nothing to prevent any of the feeder leagues to Tier 5 from making agreements with any lower level leagues of any type if they choose to do so?

Barring applications from the likes of Edinburgh College or, potentially from University clubs which play outside the SAFA or even Welfare clubs, really isn't necessary, and that is a weakness of the route recently taken by the WoS and the SAFA.

The idea of giving the opportunity for potential applicant clubs to the Tier 6 leagues a chance to join a list of pre-approved clubs sounds good but  the SAFA only restriction needs deleting ASAP.

The sometimes mentioned refusal of the SFA to accept regionalisation within the Tier 6 leagues seems to be a potential constraint of trade situation (some here will know better) and, on the face of things, is only needed in order to help sustain SFA's sub-groups i.e. the Blazers within the SAFA, Welfare, Juniors, etc. Why not let Tier 6 league have regionalisation at the bottom of their leagues? If there are clubs which meet the necessary entry requirements to move up to regional levels which maybe have intermediate facility needs then why not accept them say as associate member clubs?  

I would like to see SAFA, Welfare, Juniors, etc groupings deleted with all clubs placed at appropriate levels within or outside the existing Pyramid. If needs must then create a Recreational Football Association within the SFA but the Juniors would simply become what they are already i.e. Senior Leagues within the Pyramid.

The leagues affected would continue anyway, some as part of the Pyramid and others as purely recreational football leagues which would be a source of potential new clubs to the Tier 6 Pyramid leagues, as at present.

[searchers1963]

The same as I've said when people go on about the junior Cupbeing all in. It's fantasists that are obsessed with it rather than the clubs. I'm sure the North juniors don't want to travel down as it costs money and same for teams to go up there.

 

Only changes I'd make is create a lowland league first division and it could improve the promotion relegation and sosfl problem. 

 

Or another possible is put brechin in lowland league and make midland league as a 4th feeder and allow St Andrews  newburgh, luncarty kinnoull and jeanfield to move to that as it would cut their travel

[kevsmart]

1 hour ago, Dev said:

As already mentioned, there is a licence system in place as far down as the Tier 5/6 boundary within the Pyramid. Do leagues beneath that really need to have the same promotion/relegation rules and criteria with lower levels of the game? FWIW. I don't see why that should be.

Presumably there is nothing to prevent any of the feeder leagues to Tier 5 from making agreements with any lower level leagues of any type if they choose to do so?

Barring applications from the likes of Edinburgh College or, potentially from University clubs which play outside the SAFA or even Welfare clubs, really isn't necessary, and that is a weakness of the route recently taken by the WoS and the SAFA.

The idea of giving the opportunity for potential applicant clubs to the Tier 6 leagues a chance to join a list of pre-approved clubs sounds good but  the SAFA only restriction needs deleting ASAP.

The sometimes mentioned refusal of the SFA to accept regionalisation within the Tier 6 leagues seems to be a potential constraint of trade situation (some here will know better) and, on the face of things, is only needed in order to help sustain SFA's sub-groups i.e. the Blazers within the SAFA, Welfare, Juniors, etc. Why not let Tier 6 league have regionalisation at the bottom of their leagues? If there are clubs which meet the necessary entry requirements to move up to regional levels which maybe have intermediate facility needs then why not accept them say as associate member clubs?  

I would like to see SAFA, Welfare, Juniors, etc groupings deleted with all clubs placed at appropriate levels within or outside the existing Pyramid. If needs must then create a Recreational Football Association within the SFA but the Juniors would simply become what they are already i.e. Senior Leagues within the Pyramid.

The leagues affected would continue anyway, some as part of the Pyramid and others as purely recreational football leagues which would be a source of potential new clubs to the Tier 6 Pyramid leagues, as at present.

Edinburgh College and Heriot Watt University play on the caged astro at Oriam and it's not licenced because of the amount of seats in the venue, think it's less than 200

[kevsmart]

55 minutes ago, searchers1963 said:

The same as I've said when people go on about the junior Cupbeing all in. It's fantasists that are obsessed with it rather than the clubs. I'm sure the North juniors don't want to travel down as it costs money and same for teams to go up there.

 

Only changes I'd make is create a lowland league first division and it could improve the promotion relegation and sosfl problem. 

 

Or another possible is put brechin in lowland league and make midland league as a 4th feeder and allow St Andrews  newburgh, luncarty kinnoull and jeanfield to move to that as it would cut their travel

Brechin will be in SFL2 next season

[searchers1963]

2 hours ago, kevsmart said:

Edinburgh College and Heriot Watt University play on the caged astro at Oriam and it's not licenced because of the amount of seats in the venue, think it's less than 200

You don't need seats to be licensed. Dunipace don't have seats 

[GordonS]

3 hours ago, kevsmart said:

Edinburgh College and Heriot Watt University play on the caged astro at Oriam and it's not licenced because of the amount of seats in the venue, think it's less than 200

It's not licensed because of the distance between the changing rooms and the pitch, and no separation between players and spectators. There might be other issues like toilets for spectators.

Plenty of licensed grounds have no seats at all, like Bo'ness. For Entry level you just need 100 covered spaces. They've changed the rules for Bronze and they'll now need at least 500 covered spaces, including at least 100 seats, but that only affects SPFL clubs.

[kevsmart]

9 minutes ago, GordonS said:

It's not licensed because of the distance between the changing rooms and the pitch, and no separation between players and spectators. There might be other issues like toilets for spectators.

Plenty of licensed grounds have no seats at all, like Bo'ness. For Entry level you just need 100 covered spaces. They've changed the rules for Bronze and they'll now need at least 500 covered spaces, including at least 100 seats, but that only affects SPFL clubs.

Yes. That's the problem everyone uses the same gate to emter the [itch also there's no cover over the path from changing rooms to pitch, definitely won't have 500 seats ever

[GordonS]

4 minutes ago, kevsmart said:

Yes. That's the problem everyone uses the same gate to emter the [itch also there's no cover over the path from changing rooms to pitch, definitely won't have 500 seats ever

They easily meet the cover requirements for entry level though, which is fine for the Scottish Cup and as far as the Lowland League, between the 3 stands there's definitely more than 100 covered spaces. But it would be very expensive to meet the other criteria.

A bit mad that Women's Champions League games have been played there.

[patriot1]

4 hours ago, searchers1963 said:

The same as I've said when people go on about the junior Cupbeing all in. It's fantasists that are obsessed with it rather than the clubs. I'm sure the North juniors don't want to travel down as it costs money and same for teams to go up there.

 

Only changes I'd make is create a lowland league first division and it could improve the promotion relegation and sosfl problem. 

 

Or another possible is put brechin in lowland league and make midland league as a 4th feeder and allow St Andrews  newburgh, luncarty kinnoull and jeanfield to move to that as it would cut their travel

Yet again someone assumes that St Andrews want to play in the Midland league and don’t want to travel.

It’s the SCOTTISH football pyramid that we are in not a Fife and Tayside one. We will play anywhere in Scotland. St Andrews didn’t complain when they had to go to Tweedmouth the last couple of years or when they went to Ardrossan this season.

If Camelon were ever good enough to win the Lowland League and then win the playoff would you turn down promotion to the SPFL on the grounds that you don’t want to travel to Elgin or Stranraer?

 

[searchers1963]

9 minutes ago, patriot1 said:

Yet again someone assumes that St Andrews want to play in the Midland league and don’t want to travel.

It’s the SCOTTISH football pyramid that we are in not a Fife and Tayside one. We will play anywhere in Scotland. St Andrews didn’t complain when they had to go to Tweedmouth the last couple of years or when they went to Ardrossan this season.

If Camelon were ever good enough to win the Lowland League and then win the playoff would you turn down promotion to the SPFL on the grounds that you don’t want to travel to Elgin or Stranraer?

 

I said allow. The people of  these clubs maybe would prefer it. Camelons quite central that travel anywhere east or west even to St Andrews isn't the end of the earth.

It might come a point that it might to be too much for any of these clubs. 

[bobbydazzler]

the issue with just sticking the amateur leagues in below the third division is that these teams and players don't want that whatsoever.

I'm more than sure a good few of these amateur teams and players are probably better than the teams operating at that level.

[Spyro]

I don't think it's an issue in the East. There should definitely be a hard border between semi pro and amateur which the current application model was doing fine until the WoS decided to close their doors. Along with the state of the amateur leagues there I can see why they are trying something different, but I'm not convinced. I really don't think there is any need for change in the east, even the amateur leagues are all doing as well as can be expected under the circumstances 

[patriot1]

I think the issue is that in the west any team that wants to enter the pyramid and has a bit of money to invest to create a team that will progress through the ranks now has to become amateur.

what happens if they want to pay their playing squad? Why should they be forced to join an organisation they have no interest in?

 

[PossilYM]

10 hours ago, GordonS said:

They easily meet the cover requirements for entry level though, which is fine for the Scottish Cup and as far as the Lowland League, between the 3 stands there's definitely more than 100 covered spaces. But it would be very expensive to meet the other criteria.

A bit mad that Women's Champions League games have been played there.

Hail Hail, bet you wish the LL was around in 2012 lol