Warrenpoint & PIL Restructure

So following on from the Warrenpoint saga - although they lost their appeal - in some ways they won (or at least punishment wasn't as severe) as they are now just being relegated to the Premier Intermediate League (i.e. just being relegated one division) rather than out of the NIFL structures altogether.

The club seems to be reasonably well run (despite their tax issue!) so you'd expect them to be challenging for promotion back to the Championship right away.

This has led to the following changes for playoffs etc.

Premiership/Championship Dungannon v Annagh

Championship/PiL Ballymacash v Knockbreda (Knockbreda saved from automatic relegation and Institute safe in Championship)

I also saw talk that the PiL would be expanded and instead of PSNI going into a playoff that two teams would join to bring it to 14 teams - I guess this would be if there was to be any legal challenge from PSNI saying that Warrenpoint should have been expelled altogether.

If this is the case where do those teams come from?

Going off Wikipedia it seems like it would be two from the winners of the Ballymena & Provincial League, Mid-Ulster Football League, Northern Amateur League & Northern Ireland Intermediate League.

In Ballymena & Provincial it's looking like Coagh or Donegal Celtic. Crewe United look to have all but wrapped up the Mid Ulster League. As has been mentioned on another thread the Northern Amateur League has been won by Rathfriland Rangers and Newbuildings United appear to have won the Northern Ireland Intermediate League.

I don't know would these sides playoff or would some of them not meet the required standard of PiL membership.

Not sure what the requirements are for promotion, but far as I know, Newbuildings ground is just a pitch with a fence around it at a community centre just outside Derry.

I don't think many of the NI Intermediate League clubs are setup for promotion, in terms of facilities, bar maybe Strabane Athletic.

I presume these are in effect 4 "Regional" leagues.

Looking at the teams in that NI Intermediate League they just seem to be Northwest clubs. The Mid-Ulster League seems to be... well teams from Mid-Ulster... around Portadown and Craigavon. The Amateur League seems to have some Belfast clubs and those to the east - Larne, Newtonards etc. then the Ballymena league also appears to have Belfast clubs (obviously DC are Belfast) along with those to the north of the province.

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Originally Posted by JC_GUFC

In Ballymena & Provincial it's looking like Coagh or Donegal Celtic. Crewe United look to have all but wrapped up the Mid Ulster League. As has been mentioned on another thread the Northern Amateur League has been won by Rathfriland Rangers and Newbuildings United appear to have won the Northern Ireland Intermediate League.

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I'm pretty sure Coagh have now won their league (website not yet updated?), along with Rathfriland and Crewe Utd in their respectful leagues. Neither Newbuildings or any other NI Intermediate League team will be eligible/in contention for a promotion to the PIL.

Meaning it's looking like a 3-way play-off between the other three for a place in the PIL, which would then increase to 14 teams to accommodate Warrenpoint dropping down and a reprieve from relegation for PSNI.

Though none of this looks to have been confirmed officially as yet, rather it seems to be coming from leaks to the news media etc.

EDIT: A recent game between Bourneview and Crewe had to be abandoned after 83 mins (injured player), with Bourneview leading 3-2. In those circumstances, it looks as if rules say that the result stands should a game have passed the 60 minute mark. If that is so, then those dropped points for Crewe would mean Oxford would still have enough games to to catch Crewe on GD, meaning Crewe's participation in the 3-team play-off is not yet certain. I think.
Meanwhile, the only NI Intermediate team who could have qualified for a licence to play in the PIL were Maiden City, but they failed to win their league.

Thanks EG - so just for clarity these are effectively the 4 Divisions below the PIL and somewhat regional (as I've outlined above).

This is very much going into that other discussion about the Pyramid system!

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Originally Posted by JC_GUFC

Thanks EG - so just for clarity these are effectively the 4 Divisions below the PIL and somewhat regional (as I've outlined above).

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Yes, though with only 7 teams, the NI Intermediate League (Derry and NW) is currently very much the poor relation of the four.

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Originally Posted by JC_GUFC

This is very much going into that other discussion about the Pyramid system!

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Indeed, but I'll say nothing about that on this thread (Everyone stop cheering so loudly!), other than to leave you this:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northe..._league_system
(Specific details such as league numbers aren't reliable/up-to-date, but the broader picture re structure is still ok)

So Dungannon beat Annagh in the Promotion Relegation playoff so next season in the Prem it's just Loughgall replacing Portadown.

In the Championship relegation playoff Knockbreda beat Ballymacash, so the Championship have lost Loughgall (promoted) and Warrenpoint (demoted) and gained Portadown and Bangor (promoted from PiL).

In the Premier Intermediate League they have gained Warrenpoint while Bangor were promoted. It will be expanded to 14 teams because of the Warrenpoint situation - so PSNI have been saved relegation and there is a 3-way playoff on going between 3 of the 4 winners of the 4 regional intermediate leagues. Newbuildings United, champions of the NI Intermediate League weren't eligible for promotion. So Rathfriland Rangers (champions of the Northern Amateur League), Coagh United (champions of the Ballymena & Provincial League) and Oxford Sunnyside (champions of the Mid Ulster League) will play a round robin tournament with the top 2 promoted to the PiL.

Rathfriland Rangers 3 Coagh United 0

Tonight: Oxford Sunnyside v Rathfriland Rangers

Monday: Coagh United v Oxford Sunnyside

I was VERY bored in work today and looked at the representatives by county in the top 3 tiers...

If Coagh United get promoted they'd only be the third team from Tyrone in the top 3 tiers (Dungannon & Dergview being the other two). I know GAA is pretty strong in Tyrone and a lot of it is rural but towns like Strabane and Omagh surely could sustain a club. I'm struggling to even find what level the best team in Omagh plays at!

So I've looked at the 6 Northern counties and Belfast

Antrim: 6 clubs (3 Prem, 1 Champ, 2 PiL)
Armagh: 5 clubs (2 Prem, 2 Champ, 1 PiL)
Belfast: 10 clubs (4 Prem, 4 Champ, 2 PiL)
Derry: 6 clubs (1 Prem, 1 Champ, 4 PiL)
Down: 6 clubs (1 Prem, 2 Champ, 3 PiL)
Fermanagh: 1 club (1 Champ)
Tyrone: 2 clubs (1 Prem, 1 Champ)


Rathfriland are Down, Oxford Sunnyside are from Armagh and Coagh from Tyrone.

I think bar Tyrone that's kind of an accurate split population-wise (excluding Derry City from Derry), maybe you'd get another Fermanagh team.

I don't really know if this proved anything to me other than what county Moyola Park and Tobermore United played in! :D

I remember Julian not that long ago that Omagh Town used to be in the NI league. cant remember exact reason could be bankruptcy or year!

There's no interest for a football team in Omagh. The long and short of it really. They were awfully badly supported when they were in the league.

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Originally Posted by Martinho II

I remember Julian not that long ago that Omagh Town used to be in the NI league. cant remember exact reason could be bankruptcy or year!

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Omagh left the league and folded after relegation of the 2004/05 season. They had a fundraiser game against Man U in 1999 and I think there may have been some questions around where some of the money from that game went so they possibly lost a lot of support from the town on the back of that.

It looks like a club called Omagh United was formed in 2007 but then folded in 2010. It seems they got promoted a couple of years in a row up to the equivalent of Premier Intermediate League now.

Now it seems a club called Strathroy Harps are the main club in Omagh. They play in the Fermanagh & Western League.

It's not like other NI clubs have huge support so surely just because of it being a population centre they'd have enough players to have a half decent team.

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Originally Posted by JC_GUFC

So Rathfriland Rangers (champions of the Northern Amateur League), Coagh United (champions of the Ballymena & Provincial League) and Oxford Sunnyside (champions of the Mid Ulster League) will play a round robin tournament with the top 2 promoted to the PiL.

Rathfriland Rangers 3 Coagh United 0

Tonight: Oxford Sunnyside v Rathfriland Rangers

Monday: Coagh United v Oxford Sunnyside

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Rathfriland beat Oxford S (Lurgan team) 2-1 last night, to seal promotion. And with GD now counting in their favour, Oxford only need a draw at Coagh on Monday to go up, while Coagh need to win (obv).

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Originally Posted by JC_GUFC

If Coagh United get promoted they'd only be the third team from Tyrone in the top 3 tiers (Dungannon & Dergview being the other two). I know GAA is pretty strong in Tyrone and a lot of it is rural but towns like Strabane and Omagh surely could sustain a club. I'm struggling to even find what level the best team in Omagh plays at!

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You might think that Omagh (pop.20k) could support a Senior/IL team, but as others have noted, it has never really been a traditional football town. This is despite actually having had an IL team for a period, but in truth, it had always struggled. And it wasn't just in terms of supporters through the turnstiles, few though they were, but also in terms of administrators and volunteers etc. Worse still their (ahem) bookkeeping wasn't always of the highest order, as others have alluded to. :eek:

It is the same with Strabane. For although Athletic are doing quite well at Intermediate level at the moment, there has never been a strong footballing tradition in the town. This is in contrast eg to Dungannon, a town of 15k. Both GAA and Rugby have always been prominent there due, I expect, to the presence of St.Patricks Academy and the Royal School respectively as "feeders". Yet the town also manages to support a Senior football club, Swifts, which holds its own at that level. Youth football is also especially strong in Dungannon, much of it due to the sterling efforts of Joe & Carol McAree, and latterly their son Rodney, just appointed manager of Swifts:
https://www.irishnews.com/sport/foot...wifts-2650194/

More widely, Omagh and Strabane stand in contrast to other border, Nationalist-majority towns like Derry and Newry, both of which have long had strong footballing traditions. While Castlederg, a reasonably mixed border town of just 3k, has always had a reasonably strong presence in the game, too. And it's the same on "the other side of the divide", where for whatever reason, Unionist-majority towns in more central locations like eg Banbridge and Antrim have no great tradition of Senior football either.

Otoh, Enniskillen, with a small Nationalist majority in its 15k population, might seem to be another footballing backwater, since it has never supported a Senior club. But the problem there is not a lack of interest in the game. On the contrary, the town actually has six separate Junior football clubs, all of whom fight like crazy to be "Top Dog" in the Fermanagh & Western League. (By contrast, Enniskillen only has one GAA club and one Rugby club, despite the presence of two strong boys' grammar schools, St Michaels/GAA and Portora/Rugby.). Should any of them ever emerge from out of the crowd, I have no doubt the town could support Senior football, but sadly there is no real sign of it happening.

All of which, I think, supports my theory that if you want to develop the game, you need to start where football is already strong and buiild outwards, rather than just landing on some new spot which has never had much interest in the game and trying to helicopter in a big, new club from scratch.

Either way, it will be interesting to see how Rathfriland and Warrenpoint get on next season flying the flag for football in South Down in the Premier Intermediate League, goodness knows the league could do with a boost.

Interesting thanks for that EG! Always wondered what the story was with some of those decent sized towns. Hopefully one day they'll have proper senior team set ups.

Au contraire, in regards Strabane, I'd argue it's a potentially big football hotbed, and were Athletic ever to get up the ladder a bit, I'd say they'd attract a decent bit of support. There's a large support for Harps and Derry around Strabane, and I'd wager a lot of that would poke their nose in on a Saturday afternoon to watch a Strabane side at senior level if they get that far.

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Originally Posted by nigel-harps1954

Au contraire, in regards Strabane, I'd argue it's a potentially big football hotbed, and were Athletic ever to get up the ladder a bit, I'd say they'd attract a decent bit of support.

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The key words being "potentially", "were" and "ever". I mean, there are a number of other towns, North and South, about which you could say exactly the same, yet they have never sustained a Senior club, and maybe never will. You have to ask why this should be so, or how are Strabane any different.

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Originally Posted by nigel-harps1954

There's a large support for Harps and Derry around Strabane, and I'd wager a lot of that would poke their nose in on a Saturday afternoon to watch a Strabane side at senior level if they get that far.

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No doubt, but there's FAR more to establishing a club in Senior football over the long term than that. For example, you need volunteers and solid "club men" (and women!) to keep pushing the club forward, even (esp?) when results on the field are going against you.

You need financial backing, ideally of the sort provided eg by Bruce/Larne, Fisher/Ballinamallard, Gray & McGreevy/Warrenpoint or O'Doherty/DCFC.

Alternatively, you need other sources of income, such as a Social Club (quite common in NI), plus solid backing from the local business community, for sponsorship and corporate etc.

Above all, you need physical resources - stadium, training ground etc - to provide collateral for the investment and borrowing needed to grow and sustain a club. etc. (See eg the amazing work of the McArees at Dungannon in that link I provided earlier).

So that while I have absolutely nothing against Strabane Athletic, indeed would wish them well, so long as they are operating out of a Council Leisure Centre, I really cannot see them unlocking whatever potential a GAA town of 15k population may have any time soon.

P.S. You are doubtless more familiar with Strabane than me, and I respect that. But quite honestly, there are another 8 or 10 comparable towns (minimum) in NI who have the same potential, in theory at least. Yet I don't see any of them energing any time soon, either. And that's despite the fact that Senior and Intermediate football in NI generally has been on a decided, if modest, growth pattern over the last decade or two.

Strabane Athletic have plans submitted, this last two years or so, for a major facility development that would be as good as anything on the island, to be fair to them.

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Originally Posted by nigel-harps1954

Strabane Athletic have plans submitted, this last two years or so, for a major facility development that would be as good as anything on the island, to be fair to them.

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Aye, certainly looks good.

Except that the plans were called in by the Department of Infrastructure in February last year:
“The call-in direction issued to Derry City and Strabane District Council on January 5, 2022 and the planning application file was subsequently received by the department on January 14, 2022," a DfI spokesperson said.

"The department gave the direction in view of the proposed developments potential conflict with the local development plan for the area (Strabane Area Plan 1986-2001), the effective implementation of the plan led system and regional planning policy which is contained within the Strategic Planning Policy Statement and PPS 3.

"It is considered that the regional and sub regional issues would, therefore, benefit from further scrutiny by the department."

I'm not sure what the problem was, but it seems to be something to do with access from the Bypass round the town?

Re Strabane Athletic, otoh they've appointed Raymond Foy as their new manager, in succession to Rory Patterson:
https://twitter.com/strabaneafc/stat...CxhY2KyIcuAAAA

Oto, the Northern Ireland Intermediate League could be in jeopardy, since it is thought Newtowne are rejoining the Ballymena Intermediate league next season, with rumours that Newbuildings may join them. While it seems Dungiven Celtic may be dropping down to Junior football.

Dunno where that would leave the remaining few stalwarts - Strabane Ath, Maiden City, Trojans and Ardstraw?

I read somewhere that the USL and the Intermediate League were to have a meeting in relation to some kind of merger,the USL is done and they we’re looking for an alternative,
I’m pretty sure the meeting came to nothing though and the clubs are going go back into to the Donegal and Inishowen leagues….