Amateur following WOSFL

[Need to get fit]

Does amateur football have to change and follow a similar route as the WOSFL ie top league with subsequent leagues ,  then all teams will find the level that makes for more competitive leagues 

[Ray Patterson]

I think that's what most people would like to see in the long term, hopefully it would be done in a way that teams were only promoted if they met EOS, WOS, North Region criteria.

[Need to get fit]

I think something will need to be done to improve the game at our level, to many teams and different leagues imo 

[Kickbaw]

It is a possibility but the first problem shall be getting morning leagues and afternoon leagues to come to an agreement of ko time. 

[Need to get fit]

A lot of league committees might be a problem as well, don’t want to let go of the positions that they hold, but think a conversation has to take to try and make some sort of change or amateur Football  could be in danger of disappearing 

[Ginaro]

50 minutes ago, Need to get fit said:

I think something will need to be done to improve the game at our level, to many teams and different leagues imo 

There's distinct leagues covering Aberdeenshire, Tayside, Perthshire, Fife, Edinburgh & Lothians, Borders, Stirling (kind of) and Ayrshire - but basically four separate leagues covering the greater Glasgow area. See map below, which features the locations of the top division in each league (in 2018/19).

That can't be healthy - amateur football should be regionalised and with distinct leagues for each geographic area, if players or clubs want to play further afield they can move up to the WOS or EOS.

Edited April 23, 2020 by Ginaro

[Need to get fit]

Agree needs to be put into one, the difficulty is how do we do it? 

[Kickbaw]

Regionalised leagues aren't the answer either one or two teams could potentially win everything every season who wants that hence why the caley and central have teams from a few different regions.

[Need to get fit]

Would there be an option then if you win the top league you can move into WOSFL then it would stop the same team winning all the time 

[Kickbaw]

That reply was more to ginaros about amateur football should be regionalised.... As for amateur teams getting promoted to the wosfl a don't know if that would work for that to happen there would have to be a team relegated which won't happen as I am assuming most teams in the wosfl shall be paying their players. If amateur teams want to take the step up then that's fine but they would have to do it the way Drumchapel Glasgow uni and the other amateur teams have done to gain access to wosfl. 

[Need to get fit]

Yes your probably correct teams in WOSFL wouldn’t want to drop out. Not sure that same team would win everything all the time,  though be interesting to find out 

[Kickbaw]

Definitely not too many good amateur teams about for one team to win all the time now. 

[Need to get fit]

Think it would make for some cracking leagues and maybe get the interest back in the game. It’s back to the question of how to make the change 

[Ginaro]

24 minutes ago, Kickbaw said:

Regionalised leagues aren't the answer either one or two teams could potentially win everything every season who wants that hence why the caley and central have teams from a few different regions.

Same could happen in any of the other leagues I listed though, but would you get a Fife team going to LEAFA or an Ayrshire team going to Glasgow if they won everything?

I don't think the current setup helps in that regard either - Caley and Central seem to cover the same area, so you're basically diluting the quality of both. If one teams keeps winning everything in each league, where do they go from there?

30 minutes ago, Kickbaw said:

As for amateur teams getting promoted to the wosfl a don't know if that would work for that to happen there would have to be a team relegated which won't happen as I am assuming most teams in the wosfl shall be paying their players.

Unless you abolished the senior/amateur status like in England and the leagues were properly integrated, I don't think you would need to relegate a team from the WOS so that an amateur team can join.

[Ray Patterson]

5 minutes ago, Ginaro said:

Unless you abolished the senior/amateur status like in England and the leagues were properly integrated, I don't think you would need to relegate a team from the WOS so that an amateur team can join.

I think this needs to happen anyway.

[Need to get fit]

Maybe that the English structure is the way to go. As I said previous something has to change 

[Kickbaw]

Think that route would end up killing the amateur game... It would probably make more amateur teams fold 

[Need to get fit]

Do you think that the amateur game is in trouble anyway with the new WOSFL? Will the good amateur players want to have a go in that league to see if they can progress, with maybe getting some money. Which means amateur teams could struggle anyway 

[Kickbaw]

It's not going to be any worse than when it was juniors.... In my view as it stands just now its still the juniors just rebranded.... The junior leagues never killed the amateur game so why should the wos. There is enough good amateur teams about that if a player was good enough to progress it would happen amateur to wos anyway. 

[Need to get fit]

Think it’s a bit different now from the junior game teams with ambition can progress as much as they want and teams that have maybe treading water in the professional league could find themselves being pushed down the leagues