Scottish Amateur Club Ranking (working at last!)

[Ammy Footy Fan]

On 23/04/2024 at 13:45, scotscores said:

You can drop down the rankings if you don't live up to your own standards - once you get to the top, it's hard to stay there unless you keep winning as you would be expected to win (i.e. by 2 or 3 goals against teams further down the rankings, not just 1-0).  Cupar's doing just fine just now - third place and a chance to win the Scottish (although now that they've got to 3rd, they'll be expected to win against Steins in the semi, and then win comfortably against Garrowhill in the final - anything less and they won't be going any further up).

 

 

I’ve noticed it’s extremely close at the top of the rankings now between Obc and St pats, the cup final on Friday will be massive for both teams. Also seen the league will go down to the last day in SPAFA this season. 

[Basile Boli]

21 hours ago, Ammy Footy Fan said:

I’ve noticed it’s extremely close at the top of the rankings now between Obc and St pats, the cup final on Friday will be massive for both teams. Also seen the league will go down to the last day in SPAFA this season. 

St Pats not beat a decent team for 2 months now, fancy Castlemilk for both league and cup.

Seen that St Pats captain was playing with Castlemilk recently too and turns out he had a fall out with the Pats manager and left. Certainly adds a bit of drama to the end of season run in.

[Ammy Footy Fan]

4 hours ago, Basile Boli said:

St Pats not beat a decent team for 2 months now, fancy Castlemilk for both league and cup.

Seen that St Pats captain was playing with Castlemilk recently too and turns out he had a fall out with the Pats manager and left. Certainly adds a bit of drama to the end of season run in.

Have you seen both teams this season? Noticed he’s the Scotland captain so it must be a good signing for Obc, I seen St pats lost a couple of games against a much improved Greenock side who look as if they can beat anybody on their day. 

[Brad Bobley]

I was under the impression that ex-Pros weren’t allowed to play with the SAFA Select. 
An excellent player, of course, but recall two boys going to Bosnia last year (?) and finding out they were ineligible when they arrived. Have also watched some of St Pat’s highlights of late and they look to be a shadow of what they formerly were, for whatever reason.

Castlemilk, in comparison, are a top, top team.

[Basile Boli]

19 hours ago, Ammy Footy Fan said:

Have you seen both teams this season? Noticed he’s the Scotland captain so it must be a good signing for Obc, I seen St pats lost a couple of games against a much improved Greenock side who look as if they can beat anybody on their day. 

Saw Castlemilk give Gartcosh a doing a few weeks ago but haven’t seen St Pats play for 3/4 months now, just keeping up to date with the scores

[Ammy Footy Fan]

2 hours ago, Basile Boli said:

Saw Castlemilk give Gartcosh a doing a few weeks ago but haven’t seen St Pats play for 3/4 months now, just keeping up to date with the scores

Seen they done Gartcosh again 1-5 during the week. Looks like it’s shaping up to be a right good cup final. Both teams also having semi finals next week which should be a good watch. 

[Ammy Footy Fan]

On 01/05/2024 at 12:20, Basile Boli said:

St Pats not beat a decent team for 2 months now, fancy Castlemilk for both league and cup.

Seen that St Pats captain was playing with Castlemilk recently too and turns out he had a fall out with the Pats manager and left. Certainly adds a bit of drama to the end of season run in.

Looks like you called it right with castlemilk winning 2-0. Was it a comfortable win? They have improved massively in the past few seasons since they brought in a new manager by the looks of it, no surprise in the result as they have a few in that Scotland squad

[dugman]

Again, how can Cupar Hearts not be the No 1 amateur club in the country mate?  I pointed out the anomaly ages ago but instead of going up to the top they go down in points, despite winning the national Cup again. Clearly your base assessment of the Kingdom League is too low and as a result Cupar's unbelievable record is undervalued. 

[Brad Bobley]

10 hours ago, dugman said:

Again, how can Cupar Hearts not be the No 1 amateur club in the country mate?  I pointed out the anomaly ages ago but instead of going up to the top they go down in points, despite winning the national Cup again. Clearly your base assessment of the Kingdom League is too low and as a result Cupar's unbelievable record is undervalued. 

The quality of teams that Cupar Hearts play, on the whole, is drastically lesser than the teams St Pat’s and Castlemilk play. I do take your point that they’re ‘probably’ the best in the country, as back to back Scottish Cup wins would suggest, but they’re naturally going to struggle to score points on this algorithm because they’re not playing great teams every week, whereas the SPAFA teams are, more often than not, playing top 20 teams most weeks.

[The Mantis]

Excuse my ignorance - never really been into the ammies, but been watching LEAFA and Forth & Endrick for a year or two as ICT have become almost unwatchable. I'm also a watcher of the Lewis & Harris League as I visit there regularly. Why isn't the F&E league in the list? 

[Brad Bobley]

39 minutes ago, The Mantis said:

Excuse my ignorance - never really been into the ammies, but been watching LEAFA and Forth & Endrick for a year or two as ICT have become almost unwatchable. I'm also a watcher of the Lewis & Harris League as I visit there regularly. Why isn't the F&E league in the list? 

https://scotscores.theroonba.com/clubrank/clubrankwel.html
 

You’ll find the Forth and Endrick league under the Welfare Rankings section. Not classed as a Saturday or Sunday amateur league, per se.

[The Mantis]

13 minutes ago, Brad Bobley said:

https://scotscores.theroonba.com/clubrank/clubrankwel.html
 

You’ll find the Forth and Endrick league under the Welfare Rankings section. Not classed as a Saturday or Sunday amateur league, per se.

Ah, cheers. Thought it was to do with Welfare but was too thick to find the index page.

Edit- If this is the work of @mcruic then well done - fantastic resource.

Edited May 26 by The Mantis

[Bonksy+HisChristianParade]

On 18/05/2024 at 23:41, dugman said:

Again, how can Cupar Hearts not be the No 1 amateur club in the country mate?  I pointed out the anomaly ages ago but instead of going up to the top they go down in points, despite winning the national Cup again. Clearly your base assessment of the Kingdom League is too low and as a result Cupar's unbelievable record is undervalued. 

Is there a reason Cupar Hearts haven’t joined the EoS league? I don’t know much about their set up but Cupar is bigger than a lot of places in Fife which have a team in the pyramid. Happy to be a big fish in a small pond?

[dugman]

1 hour ago, Bonksy+HisChristianParade said:

Is there a reason Cupar Hearts haven’t joined the EoS league? I don’t know much about their set up but Cupar is bigger than a lot of places in Fife which have a team in the pyramid. Happy to be a big fish in a small pond?

Cupar isn't big mate. Why would they want to join the EOS league? We are a wee toun club, play on a public park, havw an unlicenced pavilion with income only through pies at half time,have links with local youth clubs and draw the vast majority of our players from the immediate vicinity of Cupar. A few of the squad have played junior/eos and been attracted to Cupar precisely because we ARE NOT interested in the EoS league. I'd argue that clubs such as Leven, GPR and Balgonie are at least the equal of most of the clubs Cupar have beaten in the last 2 years in the Scottish. As ive stated the Kingdom League is undervalued and Cupar are an anomaly that skewes the algorithm.  

 

[Bonksy+HisChristianParade]

21 minutes ago, dugman said:

Cupar isn't big mate. Why would they want to join the EOS league? We are a wee toun club, play on a public park, havw an unlicenced pavilion with income only through pies at half time,have links with local youth clubs and draw the vast majority of our players from the immediate vicinity of Cupar. A few of the squad have played junior/eos and been attracted to Cupar precisely because we ARE NOT interested in the EoS league. I'd argue that clubs such as Leven, GPR and Balgonie are at least the equal of most of the clubs Cupar have beaten in the last 2 years in the Scottish. As ive stated the Kingdom League is undervalued and Cupar are an anomaly that skewes the algorithm.  

 

Maybe to challenge themselves at a higher level rather than win every single game they play? 

Cupar has just under 10,000 people and as far as I know only has one amateur team? For a town that size that’s quite surprising. Take Forfar for example - it has a population of around 15,000 yet has a league side, two Midlands league clubs, as well at least two amateur teams.

I was merely asking the question, it’s fair enough for the club to have no interest in progression. 
 

[scotscores]

The way the ranking works is based on results - the leagues are rated based on results also - I'm not assigning any values to leagues.  The Fife League was ranked as number 4 last season based on the average strength of its clubs, which I think is reasonable.  How many times had Fife teams won the Scottish Cup in the 20 seasons or so before 2022-23? 2000, 2007 and 2016 were the only  years a team from Fife reached the final.  In the last 3 seasons, 0 Fife teams reached the last 16 in 21-22, 2 in 22-23, and 3 in 23-24, with only Cupar managing to get past the quarters.  Cupar have been the exception rather than the rule in terms of Fife teams being strong in the Scottish. Central, Caledonian and Ayrshire teams did better.

Winning the scottish amateur cup does not guarantee you number 1 in the rankings, as it's only 6 or 7 matches over a whole season, and you don't always have to beat the best teams to win it.

It's the same in senior football - sometimes, teams like Hibs or Hearts might win the Scottish Cup, but it doesn't automatically make them the number 1 team.

Edited August 18 by scotscores

[Lubo]

On 18/08/2024 at 17:00, scotscores said:

The way the ranking works is based on results - the leagues are rated based on results also - I'm not assigning any values to leagues.  The Fife League was ranked as number 4 last season based on the average strength of its clubs, which I think is reasonable.  How many times had Fife teams won the Scottish Cup in the 20 seasons or so before 2022-23? 2000, 2007 and 2016 were the only  years a team from Fife reached the final.  In the last 3 seasons, 0 Fife teams reached the last 16 in 21-22, 2 in 22-23, and 3 in 23-24, with only Cupar managing to get past the quarters.  Cupar have been the exception rather than the rule in terms of Fife teams being strong in the Scottish. Central, Caledonian and Ayrshire teams did better.

Winning the scottish amateur cup does not guarantee you number 1 in the rankings, as it's only 6 or 7 matches over a whole season, and you don't always have to beat the best teams to win it.

It's the same in senior football - sometimes, teams like Hibs or Hearts might win the Scottish Cup, but it doesn't automatically make them the number 1 team.

Would you not say beating St Pats, Oban Saints, Tollcross, Cumnock, Steins twice, Greenock and Garrowhill are beating the better sides to win it? Also I think it was 9 ties and then 8 ties to win it back to back for Cupar Hearts. 

Edited August 20 by Lubo