Fans overwhelmingly favour bigger spl

[rbr 1,266]

To be honest I felt it was a very very poor survey , almost amateruish at best and as already pointed out is not representative

[calscot 0]

With regards a winter break, I lean towards an empty February where there are no scheduled fixtures. However, if the weather is ok, any postponed games from previous months can be played during the break. That covers quite a few scenarios of bad weather over the winter.

 

Starting earlier is a must, not only to fit in the break but to get our teams up and running before the European qualifiers start. Non-OF Scottish teams have been terrible in Europe for a long time and the OF have often suffered from playing CL qualifiers as their first games of the season.

 

Play-offs have generated end of season interest and revenue in England for years, we've really been missing a trick for a long time there. A trip to Hampden could really stimulate fans of the lesser clubs, especially if you make it cheap for kids - 20,000 spectators at an average of �£15 a ticket brings in a gross �£300k which could be an excellent windfall for the teams in the final.

 

Two up and down seems obvious and is only not there to provide middling clubs in the SPL with a bit of a comfort zone - which supposedly brings less conservative football and more chance of developing youngsters. To see that we'd need a bigger league.

 

Having feeder teams with free movement between them would certainly help with youth development as the reserve league is a dead duck.

 

The trouble with getting rid of playing four times is that it decreases interest - would you rather swap two OF games for a couple with Partick Thistle? And a couple of Hearts games with Dundee? I think a 14 team league with a split after playing everyone home and away would be best. Split for a top 6 and bottom 8, meaning the better teams play 36 games leaving more room for European ties, and the lesser teams have 40 games to balance some of the revenue. It keeps the interest of the split but gets rid of the anomalies and unfairness.

[BrahimHemdani 1]

What percentage of SPL club supporters want an expanded SPL? It's obvious that supporters outside the SPL would want an enlarged SPL, but they are in the minority.

 

I'd suggest that of the people that attend senior games that only 20% attend non-SPL games, which suggests that the response is unrepresentative. SD should be doing such analysis in their press releases.

 

Fair questions Bluedell.

 

Support for a 16 or 18 team league was only marginally lower amongst SPL supporters than SFL supporters:

 

16 Team - 48% (SPL) v 54% (SFL)

18 Team - 25% (SPL)v 29% (SFL)

 

Overall 73% of SPL supporters would prefer a 16 or 18 team league with only around one in ten wanting a 10 team league (11%)

 

You are correct that based on average attendances, 20% of fans support SFL teams whereas 38% of those who took part in the survey fall into that category, so it is arguable that it is unrepresentative from that point of view but given that that there is not much difference in the views expressed I'd say that that is not terribly significant.

 

If you weight the results based on the proportion of respondents that support SPL compared with SFL Clubs then I think the overall support for 16/18 comes down from 77% to about 74% or 75%. I am not an expert at statistical methodology so I would stand to be corrected and I don't know if it would be statistically accurate to adjust the figures based on average attendances but I will find out!

 

The Press Release necessarilly had to focus on the main conclusions, the full detail was given to all the journalists, clubs and administrators.

Edited January 5, 2011 by BrahimHemdani
Error in statistics, sorry, your 20% is correct.

[rbr 1,266]

The notion that you would improve an already poor product by further diluting it is absolute bonkers , if fans wont turn out just now , the thought of going to see cowdenbeath or Raith rovers or even Q of the S is just plain stupid .

[BrahimHemdani 1]

The notion that you would improve an already poor product by further diluting it is absolute bonkers , if fans wont turn out just now , the thought of going to see cowdenbeath or Raith rovers or even Q of the S is just plain stupid .

 

RBR, we don't agree on this, but over the past 5 years the average attendance at an SPL game is down 11%, the current model is broken and needs to be fixed; that much we can surely agree with the Clubs.

 

Personally I'd rather see and visit the likes of Dunfermlline, Falkirk, Partick Thistle, Dundee or Livingston (when they get back on their feet) once a season than see and visit Hamilton, St Mirren, St Johnstone, twice.

 

JMHO

[Zappa 0]

With the seemingly most popular 16 team league it wouldn't really be getting diluted anyway, just enlarged. It would mean that we'll hopefully never again have to play a few teams 5 or 6 times in the season like we did last year. Who on earth wants us to have to play St.Mirren 6 times in a season??

[metlika 0]

Or Hamilton the season before think we played them 7 times the max in a season iirc.

[rbr 1,266]

RBR, we don't agree on this, but over the past 5 years the average attendance at an SPL game is down 11%, the current model is broken and needs to be fixed; that much we can surely agree with the Clubs.

 

Personally I'd rather see and visit the likes of Dunfermlline, Falkirk, Partick Thistle, Dundee or Livingston (when they get back on their feet) once a season than see and visit Hamilton, St Mirren, St Johnstone, twice.

 

JMHO

 

So instead of Celtic , hearts Dundee Utd twice a season at Ibrox , you think crowds will increase to see Raith Rovers once a season , the only way to fix our game I agree is to get the teams in the league below stronger , the teams in the 2nd and 3rd sorry they are at the Juvenile level of football anyway .

 

All you would do is drive people who matter namely SKY out of our game , what are we left with the BBC , bang goes your major sponsors and before you know it we are at the level of the conference in England , I will say this again Supporters Direct should bugger off somewhere else as they have absolutely no idea about fixing our game and their silly wee primary school survey's should go with them

[rbr 1,266]

With the seemingly most popular 16 team league it wouldn't really be getting diluted anyway, just enlarged. It would mean that we'll hopefully never again have to play a few teams 5 or 6 times in the season like we did last year. Who on earth wants us to have to play St.Mirren 6 times in a season??

 

So how many games would we play in a 16 team league , we need to play everyone home and away , there's 30 games 8 less than at present so how do you make that up as the clubs couldn't lose that amount of revenue or are you prepared to pay the same for less games against inferior opposition.

[Guest Mac]

...The trouble with getting rid of playing four times is that it decreases interest - would you rather swap two OF games for a couple with Partick Thistle? And a couple of Hearts games with Dundee? I think a 14 team league with a split after playing everyone home and away would be best. Split for a top 6 and bottom 8, meaning the better teams play 36 games leaving more room for European ties, and the lesser teams have 40 games to balance some of the revenue. It keeps the interest of the split but gets rid of the anomalies and unfairness.

 

Although I feel a 16 league is best, I would settle for this 14 team plan (splitting into 6 & 8) as a compromise.

 

We are told how little TV money is offered to our league compared to others, yet some of our clubs seem prepared to wreck OUR whole footballing system by going to a ten team league, just so some chairmen can recieve a bigger piece of a tiny pie!