Junior football, what is the future?

[AlanCamelonfan]

1 hour ago, rednblack said:

Obviously  oh no wait the only way to an 'ambitious' club is to abandon what you have always been to join the south of Scotland league and 'pyramid '.

Lot of nonsense junior football clubs can be just as ambitious as any club at any other level, being the best you can be at junior level and only junior level is perfectly fine and as ambitious as wanting to join some other system.

Don't come on here and patronise us, most of our clubs were winning trophies and had decades of history before your own club had ever been heard of.

 

 

 

 

 

I think the bigger embarressment could be Burnt Island Shipyard getting turned over by Colville Park

[Burnie_man]

1 hour ago, rednblack said:

Lot of nonsense junior football clubs can be just as ambitious as any club at any other level, being the best you can be at junior level and only junior level is perfectly fine and as ambitious as wanting to join some other system.

 

So what happens when you hit the glass ceiling and can't go any further, or can't enter the national cup competition,  where does that leave your ambition?  you can be an ambitious club playing in the Juniors, no doubt, but it can only take you so far and not as far as Kelty Hearts or Spartans, or Edinburgh City, or Ross County.

Edited July 10, 2017 by Burnie_man

[Sunrise]

1 hour ago, rednblack said:

Obviously  oh no wait the only way to an 'ambitious' club is to abandon what you have always been to join the south of Scotland league and 'pyramid '.

Lot of nonsense junior football clubs can be just as ambitious as any club at any other level, being the best you can be at junior level and only junior level is perfectly fine and as ambitious as wanting to join some other system.

Don't come on here and patronise us, most of our clubs were winning trophies and had decades of history before your own club had ever been heard of.

While gogsy is no fan of the juniors, it wasn't long ago Edinburgh City or East Kilbride would have been written off by some dafties here and elsewhere on Pie and Bovril. Yes, these clubs have had some good fortune to be where they are now, but don't write them off just because of "history"... you're quick to point out Rob Roy don't have the resources some top juniors do!

[Che Dail]

2 hours ago, lowenan said:

The Norwegian league system works fine as well, and lots of small clubs travel more than five hours here. Long country and lots of fjords.

Do clubs outwith the top two divisions travel long distances, I.e over 2hrs? According to website it is regional below that at 2nd division  (fair play league, 56 clubs in 4 groups) then 12 regional sections below that (3rd division split north / south). 

I noticed that reserve teams can play in 2nd division also.

[Che Dail]

4 hours ago, archieb said:

The SoSL a route into the Pyramid for West Junior clubs? What a joke!

The LICENSED team that finished 1st, 3rd, 2nd in the last 3 seasons (Wigtown) has just folded, apparently unable to raise a squad of players in sparsely populated Galloway.

And yet theirs is the League that ambitious West clubs are expected to aspire to joining? Unbelievable!!

The level of aspiration suggested by proponents of the pyramid is for clubs like yours to reach the Lowland League and the SoS is the route to that.

A well run club is not likely to be ruined by aiming for the LL.

Ballingry folded recently (East SL) and West region juniors have too due to financial mis-management or other reasons.

Rangers, Hearts, Gretna were all licensed though difficult times... really comes down to the people in charge.

 

Edited July 10, 2017 by Che Dail

[archieb]

33 minutes ago, Che Dail said:

The level of aspiration suggested by proponents of the pyramid is for clubs like yours to reach the Lowland League and the SoS is the route to that.

A well run club is not likely to be ruined by aiming for the LL.

Ballingry folded recently (East SL) and West region juniors have too due to financial mis-management or other reasons.

Rangers, Hearts, Gretna were all licensed though difficult times... really comes down to the people in charge.

 

That post is almost complete codswallop from beginning to end and fails to make any coherent point that I can fathom!

Portraying the LL as a target for Pollok etc to aspire to? - maybe just the merest hint of a grain of potential future in that one - or maybe not.

Claiming as you and the SFA do that the SoSFL is a viable route for WSJFA clubs into the LL - or anywhere else other than oblivion - utter nonsense.

Quoting Ballingry's demise (a lower division ESJFA club) and unspecified West clubs as equivalent to the loss of a leading, licensed SoSFL club is puerile. What was the last time a club in the top division of the West Juniors folded at the start of a season for ANY reason?

Sevco, Hearts & Gretna - relevance? None. And here I think you must be confusing licensing with administration!!

[rednblack]

Well the fact that you think Ballingry were a lower division ESJFA club when they went out of business, probably shows up your ignorance of the East region.

They were an amateur side for a while as you will know, they didn't do much and didn't win much therefore didn't have much pedigree and can be rightly be classed as a lesser junior club with no real tradition in the juniors . No matter what grade they played in they would never have been a sustainable club so it's a stupid example.

Whatever league they were in when they went bust they were a lower level junior club.   

 

 

 

 

 

[Hillonearth]

1 hour ago, Che Dail said:

The level of aspiration suggested by proponents of the pyramid is for clubs like yours to reach the Lowland League and the SoS is the route to that.

A well run club is not likely to be ruined by aiming for the LL.

Ballingry folded recently (East SL) and West region juniors have too due to financial mis-management or other reasons.

Rangers, Hearts, Gretna were all licensed though difficult times... really comes down to the people in charge.

 

WTF? The sum total of two West Region clubs have folded in the last 20 years - Baillieston through being shafted through a land deal and Stonehouse Violet through local apathy (short version: nobody in the village wanted to join the committee, outsiders revived the club and the locals never subsequently went to see them because outsiders were running it - go figure...).

We're talking here about one of the leading lights in the league we should apparently be aspiring to join chucking it on the eve of a new season for various reasons according to the SoS subforum on here - the cost of licensing is being cited as a contributory factor along with too many local sides competing for too few players in a sparsely populated area. It's also worth noting that they were running away with the league last season until they did their sums and worked out what promotion to the LL would cost them, after which they did their level best to come second.

Incidentally, I seem to remember your proposed league structure from last week omitted them - do you possess voodoo powers?

 

 

[Che Dail]

7 hours ago, Hillonearth said:

WTF? The sum total of two West Region clubs have folded in the last 20 years - Baillieston through being shafted through a land deal and Stonehouse Violet through local apathy (short version: nobody in the village wanted to join the committee, outsiders revived the club and the locals never subsequently went to see them because outsiders were running it - go figure...).

We're talking here about one of the leading lights in the league we should apparently be aspiring to join chucking it on the eve of a new season for various reasons according to the SoS subforum on here - the cost of licensing is being cited as a contributory factor along with too many local sides competing for too few players in a sparsely populated area. It's also worth noting that they were running away with the league last season until they did their sums and worked out what promotion to the LL would cost them, after which they did their level best to come second.

Incidentally, I seem to remember your proposed league structure from last week omitted them - do you possess voodoo powers?

 

 

I thought his club was Pollok - They're shown in the LL alongside Airdrie, Clyde, Albion Rovers, Dumbarton, Auchinleck, Glenafton. 

Edited July 11, 2017 by Che Dail

[rednblack]

I thought his club was Pollok - They're shown in the LL alongside Airdrie, Clyde, Albion Rovers, Dumbarton, Auchinleck, Glenafton. 

Are you Stuart Regan . Full of hot air no really got a clue just making it up as you go along [emoji28][emoji28][emoji28]

[Che Dail]

9 hours ago, archieb said:

That post is almost complete codswallop from beginning to end and fails to make any coherent point that I can fathom!

Portraying the LL as a target for Pollok etc to aspire to? - maybe just the merest hint of a grain of potential future in that one - or maybe not.

Claiming as you and the SFA do that the SoSFL is a viable route for WSJFA clubs into the LL - or anywhere else other than oblivion - utter nonsense.

Quoting Ballingry's demise (a lower division ESJFA club) and unspecified West clubs as equivalent to the loss of a leading, licensed SoSFL club is puerile. What was the last time a club in the top division of the West Juniors folded at the start of a season for ANY reason?

Sevco, Hearts & Gretna - relevance? None. And here I think you must be confusing licensing with administration!!

A thing isn't nonsense just because you don't understand it.

'Level of aspiration' refers to an approach by a group or an individual to achieve or perform a task.  The success is determined in part by the drive to complete it.  In the context of this conversation, if the 'drive' is to get to the Lowland League then the SoS route is the 'process' (as things stand).

In other words, no matter what standard the SoS league is, and regardless of the increased travel distance, if the LL is the target you will get there.  And in the process (Obtaining a License and competing in the Scottish Cup) a well-run club should thrive and improve. 

If Junior clubs were to commit to the pyramid they would have a say in how the route into LL is structured. At the moment they stand on the outside and can only look on and see how it develops without them.  'The pyramid is flawed' we were told at the recent AGM.  Of course it is flawed, because Junior clubs are not in it!

Nobody is saying that SL Junior clubs should 'aspire' to play in the SoS.  Similarly, at the opposite end nobody is suggesting that Premier League football is a reasonable or appropriate level of ambition. 

[Che Dail]

19 minutes ago, rednblack said:

Are you Stuart Regan . Full of hot air no really got a clue just making it up as you go along

Nope.  Not full of hot air either -  just looking to Denmark, Norway, Germany for inspiration. 

Are you Alf Garnett?

[archieb]

2 hours ago, Che Dail said:

I thought his club was Pollok - They're shown in the LL alongside Airdrie, Clyde, Albion Rovers, Dumbarton, Auchinleck, Glenafton. 

Read the post again, the reference was to Wigtown, not Pollok!

1 hour ago, rednblack said:

Are you Stuart Regan . Full of hot air no really got a clue just making it up as you go along

Exactly. And the reason I described your post as nonsense wasn't because I didn't understand it but because it was so hopelessly wrong!!

[Che Dail]

20 minutes ago, archieb said:

Read the post again, the reference was to Wigtown, not Pollok!

Aye I see what you mean, I thought you were saying Pollok were left out... 

The structure is literally a cut and paste of club names taken from league websites and Wigtown aren't in the SoS set-up. 

No voodoo powers I'm afraid!

Edited July 11, 2017 by Che Dail

[Burnie_man]

2 hours ago, Che Dail said:

If Junior clubs were to commit to the pyramid they would have a say in how the route into LL is structured. At the moment they stand on the outside and can only look on and see how it develops without them.  'The pyramid is flawed' we were told at the recent AGM.  Of course it is flawed, because Junior clubs are not in it!

 

Pretty much.  The SJFA’s approach to the Pyramid so far is like a monkey flinging shite.

The SoSFL is NOT a league that should be at the 6th tier of a Pyramid, nor a route for west of Scotland teams to join it, but that won’t change if all TJ does is fling shite and clubs say and do nothing.

[rednblack]

A thing isn't nonsense just because you don't understand it.

'Level of aspiration' refers to an approach by a group or an individual to achieve or perform a task.  The success is determined in part by the drive to complete it.  In the context of this conversation, if the 'drive' is to get to the Lowland League then the SoS route is the 'process' (as things stand).

In other words, no matter what standard the SoS league is, and regardless of the increased travel distance, if the LL is the target you will get there.  And in the process (Obtaining a License and competing in the Scottish Cup) a well-run club should thrive and improve. 

If Junior clubs were to commit to the pyramid they would have a say in how the route into LL is structured. At the moment they stand on the outside and can only look on and see how it develops without them.  'The pyramid is flawed' we were told at the recent AGM.  Of course it is flawed, because Junior clubs are not in it!

Nobody is saying that SL Junior clubs should 'aspire' to play in the SoS.  Similarly, at the opposite end nobody is suggesting that Premier League football is a reasonable or appropriate level of ambition. 

Do you not think Pollok Archie team have 'level of aspiration ', of course they do that's why they are recruiting and investing in a very good playing squad. They have hundreds of punters every week who are eager like all fans to see there team excelled and win as much as possible in the junior game. Many junior teams have high levels of ambition and aspiration without even thinking or bothering about some pyramid or lowland league.

 

[Auld Heid]

1 hour ago, Burnie_man said:

Pretty much.  The SJFA’s approach to the Pyramid so far is like a monkey flinging shite.

The SoSFL is NOT a league that should be at the 6th tier of a Pyramid, nor a route for west of Scotland teams to join it, but that won’t change if all TJ does is fling shite and clubs say and do nothing.

I always felt given his prominence within the SFA that TJ was very much a company man.  Which suggests that the SFA don't see anything not linked to the LL being of any importance.  Maybe that explains the perceived lack of leadership being shown to move the juniors forwards.

Further proof being not allowing Kelty to be licenced outside the EoS feeder league.   Linlithgow being an exception before the goalposts were changed (but for how long). 

[rednblack]

Nope.  Not full of hot air either -  just looking to Denmark, Norway, Germany for inspiration. 
Are you Alf Garnett?

So those who don't buy into this pyramid or lowland league are stuck in the 70s and backward thinking right you are whatever you say.

[Shanner]

Unless you think that winning Junior honours is the zenith of footballing achievement then it does display a very limited ambition to reject the chance to face bigger challenges in a National scale against better sides. 

The bigger Junior sides will always attract the flat track bully label as long as they seem content winning things in their wee separatist bubble. 

 

[Glenconner]

6 minutes ago, Shanner said:

 in their wee separatist bubble. 

 

Politics forum for this pish.