Meetings to make one Division held.

[SkStu]

he said a success Reiteoir... ;)

[Tony Soprano]

In principle i see what you you are saying throughout but very idealistic, in particular the above comment, in reality, works out to be horsesh*te as mid table safety toward the latter half of a season equals a fraction of early season support...i have no idea of a working solution myself tbh, i just hate the current set up, 12 team division was marginally better, splitting the league was/will be a disaster - so 16 teams and trying and have every place in the league worth fighting for, eg significant jumps in prize money even between say 10th and 11th, play-off access to a competition (setanta cup or similar) for lower placed teams etc. just something that keeps clubs and fans motivated as their status is secured and if they are not in the championship/cup/relegation mix.

I think its important for a team to be winning - not easy to drum up support when you're losing all the time. i think its better to beat a 16th place team than draw or lose to a 8th place team. if you have the 8th best team in the country, in a 20 team league you would be winning games. in a 10 team league you hardly ever do. just my theory - i think it would help, no evidence to back it up. lets try it.

i agree about mid table meaningless games. but looking at England there isn't a huge variance in size of crowds a club gets during a season. maybe we can get to that stage too where crowds stay relatively constant. with a bit of stability maybe going to games becomes more of a habitual thing - not so dependent on how team is doing

some english divisions have 24 teams and only top 6 places mean anything - we would have top 4 qualifying for europe so it isn't a huge difference


Except for the SPL, the MLS and the A-League in Australia...

SPL is a terrible league - and the number of teams is one of the main problems IMO

MLS only started with 10 teams. it has 15 now and will have 18 soon. and it hasn't been an unqualified success - crowds haven't grown and most teams are losing money. interestingly the two healthiest teams are seattle and toronto who were expansion teams. we should be taking risks on new teams too

I doubt A-League would thrive for long if they stuck with 10 teams (new teams from melbourne and sydney will join soon) and most a-league teams have seen drops in attendance this year

[L.T.F.C.]

Handball isn't a real sport!:p


You could say that again.

its more of a sport than either of ye would be able for!

[Keen2win]

its more of a sport than either of ye would be able for!
Don't think Bluebeard was slagging you L.T.F.C., but I was... Handball, jeez!;)

[roinuj]

one 16 team league would be the way to go,
and do away with this first division peice of shyte,
most people in this country will never go out and pay to watch shytty 1st division.