View Full Version : League to revert back to 12 teams in 2005
Personally i think its a mistake.
http://breakingnews.iol.ie/sport/story.asp?j=97560728&p=9756y434&t=soccer
What do others think?
The play-offs were great! Now there gone!
brendy_éire
13/03/2004, 2:51 PM
Originally posted by eoinh
The play-offs were great! Now there gone!
Great when we win them, aye. :D Not great for your mental health though.
I'm for the 12 team Premier, the 10 team one wasn't really working, it was creating a far too big Dublin bias. We need more regional teams in the Premier.
Who were the 8 clubs that supported the 10 team Premier? And will it be teams playing each other 3 times a season, like with the First? I'd rather see it 4 times a season, 3 is just awkward.
Another idea might be to create a 12 team First Division. Kerry and Mayo would be contenders, already being in the Leauge Cup.
adamcarr
13/03/2004, 3:13 PM
Are the Playoffs not back for the end of the 2005 season? i'd say Dublin City will go down and Bray, Harps and UCD will be up. I thought the ten team was much better and probaly easier to organise!
TommyT
13/03/2004, 4:20 PM
Originally posted by brendy_éire
I'm for the 12 team Premier, the 10 team one wasn't really working, it was creating a far too big Dublin bias. We need more regional teams in the Premier.
.
******. The bias has nothing to do with the ten team league and everything to do with how crap the culchies are. Bray and UCD will probably win two of the promotion places.
pineapple stu
13/03/2004, 4:47 PM
That's great news, I think (and not just because it makes things easier for us). Closing off the Premier to the likes of Monaghan, Kilkenny, Athlone, etc. can't do tham any good and will only expand the gap between First and Premier. Plus playing teams four times a season was too much - maybe three times isn't great, but it has to be better. UEFA licencing's going to be fun next year though - it's hard enough to find 10 teams to get an A licence, never mind 12...
The likes of Harps will certainly survive in a 12-team Premier and will benefit from a couple of years there. More money for the provincial teams basically - what's the harm in that?
The league could do worse than try and get two new teams for the First Division though, like Kerry and Mayo mentioned.
Great timing from the league as usual though...:rolleyes: Even if they had to abandon their AGM a couple of times.
I presume the play-offs will be back for next season though? They're a huge money-spinner for the clubs, if nothing else.
Slash/ED
13/03/2004, 5:04 PM
It'll mean we have to play eachother three times a season I think, which is a completley stupid system and gives far to big an advantage to the title challanging side who gets the two home games over their rivals. Also, the chances of Dublin and UCD now both being premier teams, not to mention Bray, is now very high, so the league will only be further based around the Dublin area and the areas around Dublin.
Thats fuucking disastrous. Thbe play off kept the 1st division interesting. Now we are just going to see Bray, UCD and Harps promoted.
Playing each other 3 times is stupid as well. Christ sake, i really do wonder why i bother with this stupid league. Its run by a bunch of ****s.
A face
13/03/2004, 9:22 PM
I have to say i am gutted about this.
What a stupid move, that has to be said ... Last year, both league for the first time ever were great, good competition and football was getting better.
info@fai.ie
Eircom League
80 Merrion Square
Dublin 2
Phone: 01 7037575
Fax: 01 6768096
eircomleague@fai.ie
Very poor decision ..... and things seemed to be going in the right direction.
Dr.Nightdub
14/03/2004, 7:56 PM
Can't say I'm particularly upset about this. While playing eleven other clubs three times a season is daft, it's better than the monotony of playing nine others four times.
As for the Dublin bias of the Premier Division, the sooner the culchies start focussing on merit rather than geography the better. If you're not good enough, you're not good enough - regardless of whether you're from Dublin or from the bog.
The 12-team Premier seems to have been re-introduced largely at the behest of culchie teams. But say for the sake of argument that Bray, Harps and UCD are promoted and Waterford go down, then 66% of the Premier will be from greater Dublin (I'm including Drogheda now there's a decent road to it). That's supposed to represent less Dublin bias than the current 60%? Well done culchies, another master stroke. No doubt they'll be back with another whinge before the 2005 season...:rolleyes:
A face
14/03/2004, 10:04 PM
Ultimately Dr. Nightdub is right, although i wouldn't have worded it like that. Clubs need to improve on the pitch to advance, there is no getting away from that. Actually clubs like Bray coming up with 22 team league stuff are really no doing us any good. No matter how much we tinker with the league, if they want ot advance they have to improve, simple as.
Martinho II
14/03/2004, 10:08 PM
I would agree with the twelve team division- there were no spark to a lot of the dublin derby games plus there were too many draws.
It would allow a few of the clubs that havent been in the top division a long while to come back up but i am dying to find out the way promotion is sorted out in 2006-will the playoffs come back or not?
I would agree on the earlier comment on two new teams being elected into the league-we need new blood badly.
A face
14/03/2004, 10:24 PM
I know it is not top flight but the first division was great last year. Seriously, it was a good competition and i think attendences were up overall. The play offs were great (Harps and Derry would always have that though)
I wouldn't give out about the first at all.
The premier .... the quality was good and it was tight .... Derry who are normally up at the top lagged a bit and nearly dropped. In my opinion this is bad because it wouldn't be good to lose them. But everyone has to admit .... the competion was good, every point was vital.
Maybe there were a few too many draws but the football did and would continue to improve and thats what you need, thats what the league needs. (could i even say a successful future depends on it).
There is argument for the 10 being repeative four games etc. but 12 is unbalanced ... that is worse in my opinion. If it were to get bigger then it should be 16 or 18, nothing else. I think it is changing for the sake of it.
If a team comes up from the first ... they should be able to compete and not by the whipping boys, so changing from 10 to 12 might solve the problem or teams not getting into top flight ... but is it solving the problem. I dont think so.
corkharps
14/03/2004, 10:58 PM
Originally posted by Gary
Thats fuucking disastrous. Thbe play off kept the 1st division interesting. Now we are just going to see Bray, UCD and Harps promoted.
Playing each other 3 times is stupid as well. Christ sake, i really do wonder why i bother with this stupid league. Its run by a bunch of ****s.
I wish I had your confidence,I think the First Division will throw up a few surprises this year.
And I'll repeat only one club has ever won the league playing 17 away and 16 home games. It automatically gives 6 teams an advantage...
Originally posted by Dr.Nightdub
Can't say I'm particularly upset about this. While playing eleven other clubs three times a season is daft, it's better than the monotony of playing nine others four times.
As for the Dublin bias of the Premier Division, the sooner the culchies start focussing on merit rather than geography the better. If you're not good enough, you're not good enough - regardless of whether you're from Dublin or from the bog.
Apart from the word "culchie" I agree with ya there Doc. I think the best way forward would be a 16 team premier where teams play each other twice and have a first deivison split into northern and southern sections.
liamon
15/03/2004, 10:36 AM
If we have 16 teams i nthe top flgiht, then where do we get enough teams for the first division?
Éanna
15/03/2004, 11:01 AM
That could easily be achieved by bringing in teams like tralee dynamoes and st michaels- teams from counties not represented at the moment.
Mullingar are still knocking around, and signing players. A cousin of the missus has been signed for them after returning from England. IMO 16 team premier, with the 1st would be 2 divisions of 10 split on a regional basis would be the best bet. However whether there are enough teams willing to sacrifice intermediate/ junior success for the 1st is debatable.....
Bald Student
15/03/2004, 11:38 AM
I don't like being negative lads, but I think we need to get licenses for the current league teams before introducing more teams.
When the league has at least 12 'A' and 10 'B' licenses, only then can we look at increasing the total number of teams.
Dodge
15/03/2004, 12:19 PM
If a team wants to enter the league and can achieve the kicence then they should be added straight away.
Not likely to happen though...
paudie
15/03/2004, 12:34 PM
I think its a good idea.
if the FAI are trying to get first div teams to improve their grounds to get a licences its not much encouragement when their chances of actually playing in the Premier are practically nil.
Take Kilkenny, who have concentrated on their grounds development for a few years. With a 10 team Premier they have no hope of getting in.
At least with a 12 team Premier they could aim to start putting together a squad that could win promotion in a year or two.
to liven up the first div they should look for applications for 2 new teams, licences permitting of course.
yur man
15/03/2004, 7:50 PM
3 games is crap. we will always have an advantage/disadvantage arguement to the fixtures
tiktok
15/03/2004, 8:07 PM
how will licencing affect this?
personally i think it's a poor stop while heading in the right direction. playing teams three times is daft, the points against it have been made already, but it's obviously unfair.
Everyone seems to think that next year,the league will be mostly Dublin Teams.I amnt so sure. I fancy Dublin City to be relegated, while Harps will definitely go up. Kildare County are also putting together a good squad and should have realistic aims of going up,with either Bray or UCD joining them.That would be a Dublin team going down with 2 from the country goin up! We'll soon see i suppose:cool:
A face
16/03/2004, 1:21 PM
The first could get turned on its head with three cert places to go up. It could be a right pitch battle towards the end.
A unbelievably stupid & short sighted decision by the clubs - can't blame the FAI as the clubs vote on this!!!
- eL clubs couldn't even stay with their 2-3 year experiment i.e. tried for 1 season & ditched as usual.
- making a decision on league size cos too many from 1 region is stupid. If non-pale teams good enough they will be promoted.
- 3 rounds of fixtures again :( :(
- If we barely get 1 team a Premier licence this year we now have to licence 11 as opposed to 9 with Premier licence next year!
- There is not enough quality for 12 teams! Every year that I can remember whe 12 teams was a team (e.g. Monaghan, Kilkenny, Cobh etc...) who was odds on for rlegation before mid-season!
- The league can barely support 22 teams so any talk of an extra couple of clubs is idiotic!
IMO the 10 team league while a bit repetitive really seemed to up the standard of traditional yoyo (no offence) clubs such as Drogs & Waterford such that they not considered automatic relegation battlers anymore. I think the 10 team Premier ensured that a better qualkity team emerged from the 1st division & therefore good chance at staying in the Premier that year. As an onlooker the 1st division seemed to be much more competitive in recent years too...?
A face
16/03/2004, 2:08 PM
Agree with all of that ... when we went to ten team league it was greed that 3 year trial was on the cards. It is knida of a joke that it didn't happen !!
Schumi
16/03/2004, 2:22 PM
Originally posted by A face
Agree with all of that ... when we went to ten team league it was greed that 3 year trial was on the cards. It is knida of a joke that it didn't happen !! Next season is the third season isn't it?!
Whats is really stupid is that it was supposed to be a three season experiment but in my opinion they have only given it one years grace. The first season was a transition year because of the changeover to summer football. They decided then at the end of the second season (and the first proper length season) to change back before the experiment is finished.
Surely with an experiment you dont annouce the results until the experiment is finished?
They shouldnt have decided to change back until the end of this season!
Bald Student
16/03/2004, 3:30 PM
Originally posted by eoinh
They shouldnt have decided to change back until the end of this season!
You can't do that. Teams have to know how many promotion / relegation places there are before the league starts. If that was decided after the league finished each team would only vote for a system that benefited their own league position. e.g. the top three teams in division one would vote for automatic promotion for themselves, the next few would vote for playoffs.
my main problem with the 12 team league is that teams play each other 3 teams. its stupid. Its unfair and it looks totally ridiculous
Originally posted by Éanna
my main problem with the 12 team league is that teams play each other 3 teams. its stupid. Its unfair and it looks totally ridiculous
The only way around that would be to split the Premier division after 22 games into & then have another 10 games in each section to even out the matches. I#m no famn of the split league crap either though.
Whether you agree with 10 or 12 team Premier i think the fact they eL couldn't stick with their original trial period decision for the time they specified is the biggest criticism.
There is so much that needs to be fixed in the eL besides the size of the division - does anyone believe people make their decision to go to a game on the size of the division :(
like Eanna say its the difference between home and away games that you can play against individual teams thats silly.
Just wanted to resurrect this thread.
Are peoples opinions the same now as what they were in march?
I still think that a 12 team league with 3 series of games is utterly retarded. It should either be left at a 10 team, or expanded to a 16 team league where there are 2 series. The first Division can be topped up by the likes of Kerry District/Mayo District/Mullingar/Thurles Town.
Slash/ED
10/10/2004, 6:23 PM
I still think that a 12 team league with 3 series of games is utterly retarded. It should either be left at a 10 team, or expanded to a 16 team league where there are 2 series. The first Division can be topped up by the likes of Kerry District/Mayo District/Mullingar/Thurles Town.
I agree. It's absolutley stupid.
TommyT
10/10/2004, 7:26 PM
Just wanted to resurrect this thread.
Are peoples opinions the same now as what they were in march?
No, playing teams every two months is getting tiresome.
Just wanted to resurrect this thread.
Are peoples opinions the same now as what they were in march?
I still think that a 12 team league with 3 series of games is utterly retarded. It should either be left at a 10 team, or expanded to a 16 team league where there are 2 series. The first Division can be topped up by the likes of Kerry District/Mayo District/Mullingar/Thurles Town.
I agree totally as well!
Poor Student
10/10/2004, 7:40 PM
As regards to the three games a season with two home, one away contraversy you only need to look at UCD's fixture list this season to see how unkind this can be to you. If you look at the other 5 teams in the top half of the table with us Finn Harps, Bray, Kildare, Galway and Dundalk apart from Galway we play the other four teams twice away and once at home. It puts us at a fair disadvantage I'm afraid and if something similar happened to us in the Premier next year (provided we don't mess up this year) it could be detrimental to us.
exiled_gufc_fan
10/10/2004, 8:13 PM
i would be of the impression that there are currently too many senior clubs at 22 - economically that number are not really viable...
we would be better off with a 16 team single division ... fewer clubs should ultimately raise standards. also the fixtures quandry mentionned above re 3 rounds of 11 games would not be an issue.
the resources that are possible for eircom league football would be distributed across a smaller number of clubs, and ultimately this is what is required to achieve consistently good performances in europe each year.
the fai and the clubs should focus on creating a higher quality product .... perhaps when they make a success of this they could later look at increasing numbers perhaps to 18 ...
i would retain a play-off structure though rather than re-election - i.e. playoffs between the winners of the muster, leinster, ulster and connacht senior leagues, along with the bottom placed club - although the minimum A licence requirements would be necessary to enter the playoffs.
Slash/ED
10/10/2004, 8:21 PM
The problem with one league is that halfway through the season half or more of the clubs end up with absolutley nothing to play for so interest and crowds dropped.
As you said, a play off system would need to be introduced, some kind of relegation system anyway, otherwise it just would not work. If there was some kind of relegation involved it could work.
we would be better off with a 16 team single division ... fewer clubs should ultimately raise standards. also the fixtures quandry mentionned above re 3 rounds of 11 games would not be an issue.
The one division league was the absolute ruination of the LOI in the past. It has only been with the introduction of promotion and relegation that it has slowly improved.
No other country in europe has only one league. It simply doesnt work
exiled_gufc_fan
10/10/2004, 9:40 PM
The one division league was the absolute ruination of the LOI in the past. It has only been with the introduction of promotion and relegation that it has slowly improved.
No other country in europe has only one league. It simply doesnt work
but not too many other countries have a population of only 4 million and such an array of competing sports.
as long as there was a system where clubs could get demoted to one of the four senior leagues, it should be workable. after all even the bottom club in Coca Cola League gets demoted to the conference in England.
the current situation re the bottom clubs in the first division of the eL is a joke - "re-election"!!!
I still think that a 12 team league with 3 series of games is utterly retarded.
No, playing teams every two months is getting tiresome.
both true. so whats the solution? IMO, 16 team premier and either two 10 team regional first divisions or promotion from the existing senior leagues.
exiled_gufc_fan
10/10/2004, 9:50 PM
in my former username on this site, i put forward the idea of franchising (in 2001). I was told it was daft ... there was some agreement that there were too many teams... and not that we have had a couple of seasons of summer football and the 10 team league...
agree with jim. it should be looked at, but it would have to be very carefully considered and checked out before deciding on anything. look at 10-team league and summer footy as examples of deciding on things without proper planning.
http://foot.ie/showthread.php?t=1905
... why can't we have some real debate?
NY Hoop
14/10/2004, 4:09 PM
I stand to be corrected but arent we the only league that plays an odd number of games (33). Also I think we are all agreed that playing each other 3 times is, as GWA says "retarded"!!
Firstly there are too many teams in the league and bringing in more is absurd. Bit harsh but if we get rid of dublin city and monaghan we will have 20 teams. Then there should be 2 divisions of 10 teams for 36 games. 1 up and 1 down with the second team in the first playing the 9th placed team in the premier.
The 12 team league never worked. With the 10 team EVERY game is crucial. Talk to any player and they will tell you there is nothing worse than playing meaningless games which is what you get with the 12 team league.
16 team league is the worst idea. You would have about 4 or 5 teams challenging, 6 to 7 teams too good to go down and the rest fighting to stay up. In effect you would have 3 leagues in 1 division. With the 10 team league a team who wins 2 to 3 games on the trot can shoot up the table.
But until, we the fans, have a voice on the decision making these idiotic decisions will just go on. Registration problems , licensing problems, games being postponed at the drop of a hat, derry going back to thursday night etc etc etc etc. :mad:
KOH
gufcfan
14/10/2004, 4:55 PM
I don't like being negative lads, but I think we need to get licenses for the current league teams before introducing more teams.
When the league has at least 12 'A' and 10 'B' licenses, only then can we look at increasing the total number of teams.
Couldnt have said it better myself.
A larger Premier in theory is good in that it gives more teams the chance to gather more revenue, obviously from larger attendances, sponsorship... but it mean a less competive 1st division.
This would make the gap between the bigger and smaller clubs larger.
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