Dig, Dig, Dig, Dig, Dig, Dig, Dig, Dig :DQuote:
Originally Posted by galwayhoop
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Dig, Dig, Dig, Dig, Dig, Dig, Dig, Dig :DQuote:
Originally Posted by galwayhoop
also the fact is that the teams outside the top two in scotland have very little chance of regular silverware at the moment so the incentive of winning a trophy would also add to their interest IMO
True, cant remember Hibs or Hearts winning anything in recent memory!Quote:
Originally Posted by galwayhoop
Koh
Kilmarnock average about 4,000 for non Old Firm games. Goodness knows what they average on Monday nights against clubs they've never heard of.Quote:
Originally Posted by galwayhoop
There will be no other sponsors as the competition is run by the sponsor, if they pull out, there is no broadcastor, and without a broadcastor, there's no chance of a sponsor. Don't forget that from next season Setanta have English Premier League rights (and Conference!) to add to their Italian, French, German etc
Some people just need to get a dose of reality round here
some Hibs fan you are...Quote:
Originally Posted by DvB
Hibs won the league cup last week, and Heaarts won the Scottish cup last year
I'm sure that was far easier than DvB imagined. ;)Quote:
Originally Posted by Dodge
KOH
Grrrrr
:D ;)Quote:
Originally Posted by WeAreRovers
Totally against inviting any clubs from other countries. It totally defeats the purpose. For me the idea of Setanta is that its an All-Ireland competition in the absence of an All-Ireland League.
seriously lads the negativity on here is mind blowing. people don't even listen to suggestions without having the cons stacked up and ready to belt out!!
fair enough so, as per the title of the thread, setanta cup - the verdict?
obviously in yer eyes everything is rosey and perfect so leave well alone!
well, from my point of view, and i am a neutral (i.e. my team does not compete and i don't think we will for a good while anyway) i think for it's long-term survival it needs overhauling and expansion. i know many, many people who go to eL games and watch copious amounts on of sport on TV also but never, ever watch the setanta cup. viewing figures will inevitably drive the aganda and i suspect that they are not as high as setanta would have envisaged. and as pointed out above with their expanding repiteóir (sp?) the importance of the setanta cup will only diminish in setanta's eyes.
but fair enough lads, keep beating the no change drum, keep harping on about non-eL attending football fans being the scourge of the sport, keep bashing the GAA & IRFU (2 organisations who embrace change and development), keep the lot and forget about any change or improvements and, like the FAI, keep running the game into the ground!
Post a realistic solution and see what response you get. Post up rubbish and I'll say its rubbishQuote:
Originally Posted by galwayhoop
The point I'm making is that this is a competition run by a ****ing tv pcompany and no amount of internet ******ology will change their aims for itQuote:
obviously in yer eyes everything is rosey and perfect so leave well alone!
What makes you think that? Live Setanta games this year have all been tight and largely full of goals too.Quote:
viewing figures will inevitably drive the aganda and i suspect that they are not as high as setanta would have envisaged.
Go off on tangents much, do you? Forgetting about your laughable assertion that the GAA embraces change, **** off saying Irish football fans are anti change just because a few (mainly me...) posted out the flaws in your stupid, illogical, unworkable plan.Quote:
but fair enough lads, keep beating the no change drum, keep harping on about non-eL attending football fans being the scourge of the sport, keep bashing the GAA & IRFU (2 organisations who embrace change and development), keep the lot and forget about any change or improvements and, like the FAI, keep running the game into the ground!
imo it is a worthy suggestion that clubs from both wales and scotland being included in a celtic style cup competition would benefit all leagues concernedQuote:
Originally Posted by Dodge
ha, ha, what is that ****ology you are talking about then. you have been on this forum for 6 years and posted almost 7,500 times. you have achieved exactly what? i actually thought the point of a forum was to offer opinions and discuss things not to affect change. but with your 7,500 posts you surely know more than me and must have moved mountains at this stage :rolleyes:Quote:
The point I'm making is that this is a competition run by a ****ing tv pcompany and no amount of internet ******ology will change their aims for it
the setanta games on TV may have been tight and full of goals but what are the viewing figures. i hear that curling is a fascinating sport but i don't watch it and it's not on TV because damn all people do! fact is that very few neutrals watch setanta cup games on TV and the quality/tightness/amount of goals doesn't seem to alter this. as setanta's coverage of overseas leagues grows the need for the setanta cup will deminish or dissappear unless there is a market (i'e' people) to watch it.Quote:
What makes you think that? Live Setanta games this year have all been tight and largely full of goals too.
(change from a competition prespective / not talking idiolegy here) the GAA have adopted the 'back-door' in football and 'group system' in hurling to try and compensate the weaker provences and there is mutterings to incorporate the national league into the championship thereby reducing the importance of the provencial system. the IRFU have very succesifully developed the game to such a point that we are now one of the top nations in the world!Quote:
Go off on tangents much, do you? Forgetting about your laughable assertion that the GAA embraces change, **** off saying Irish football fans are anti change just because a few (mainly me...) posted out the flaws in your stupid, illogical, unworkable plan.
What are the viewing figures like for Setanta Cup games lads? I don't know any barstooler who would ever bother watching it, and I'd say its about 70/30 on here would watch it, so I can't imagine its doing all that well. Personally I don't think I've ever watched a Setanta Cup game, have no interest in having a competition for TV revenues sake.
The reports Pats got from Setanta were they were happy with the viewers. There's little other football on MOndaysQuote:
Originally Posted by jebus
Whats happy though? If they are not putting up too much prize money they're likely to be happy enough with pretty small viewing figures. Don't Sky sometimes show English League matches on Monday nights?Quote:
Originally Posted by Dodge
The televised game last night was very entertaining. It is a worry though that Portadown and Dungannon were so easily beaten. It may only be a short time before these teams begin to play reserve sides in the Setanta Cup (as they may feel they can't win anyway), finish bottom of their group and still take their cheque at the end of the day allowing them to save their number one players for the IL. There may be calls to refix the 50-50 entrants to something more like 75-25 although I don't see how they would get this to be accepted by the IFA. I really can't see how this 4 and 4 format can last for much longer though unfortunately...
GalwayHoop,
We all went through this debate about 2 months ago.
The bottom line is that the Setanta Cup isn't even working as an Ireland-only contest at the moment. Crowds for it are poor in the north, no better than normal in the south, and as last night's results showed - there is already a huge imbalance in the competition as it is.
Rather than get tied-up in misty-eyed dreams of running way ahead of ourselves, the Setanta Cup needs to be made a success first within Ireland before anyone should even dream of expanding it.
Even if that stage was reached - the Welsh clubs would add zero and detract a lot form the competition. They're on a par with our first division sides in terms of average playing skills, facilities and crowds. The average Welsh Premier crowd this season is a whopping 283 ! I kid you not ! The biggest crowd they've had all year is 1,0007 ! The highest Welsh Premier crowd this year is therefore lower than our current First Division average this year. Just think about that !!!
So come back down to earth dude. The Setanta needs to be made a success in Ireland first before there would be any hope of anyone else wanting or needing to get involved in it.
It may be in the contracst for participation in the tournament that a team has to put out their best side.Quote:
Originally Posted by holidaysong
If it isn't it should be, and if the above happened I imagine it would be.
No now, thats a fairly big crowd ;)Quote:
Originally Posted by dcfcsteve
Not if it's the single biggest attendance all-year in a Premier league in a country with a population of 3 million !Quote:
Originally Posted by jebus
Don't forget - the average attendance is only 283, and even that is up 5.7% on last season !!!
read the post again. i presume jebus was pointing out that you said the highest attendance was 10007 while i felt you meant 1007!! maybe the highest was over 10 thousand but from what you say i doubt it.Quote:
Originally Posted by dcfcsteve
Which would make 10007 a fairly big crowd?Quote:
Originally Posted by dcfcsteve
Mea culpa. An extra digit in there.Quote:
Originally Posted by galwayhoop
They'd have to be having some god-awful attendances and lock-outs to water a crowd of 10,007 down to an average of only 283.......! :D
This competition is only going to get bigger and bigger. Not being arrogent or anything but imagine us [Dundalk] won Division 1 and beat League cup finalist and qualified and got paired up with Linfield in a group, although im sure we would be tryed to be kept apart. 10,000 at least in each group games.
The only worry being the trouble, how would we or Linfield stop it.
I don't know where to start pulling this apart.Quote:
Originally Posted by mickdlk
So I'll just agree and save myself the bother....
Welsh Premier football is not well supported, mainly as the media focus is predominantly on teams playing in the English system. The top teams aren't too bad though in terms of football. The FAW Premier Cup which was mentioned before in this thread is actually a decent indicator of the strength. Cardiff don't take it seriously, but Wrexham and to a lesser extent Swansea (who need the cash, £100,000 for winning it) do. This year there were two Welsh Premier sides in the semis and TNS won it, the second Welsh Premier side to do so in its 10-year history.
I can't see them being invited to play in the Setanta Cup because attendances are poor and therefore the sponsors wouldn't be interested, but it would definitely be interesting to see how they got on against Irish sides.
And yeah 10,007 is a big crowd, pity the real attendace was 1,007 and Steve made a balls-up! :D
I've seen Swansea in this competition a few times and not once have they fielded a full team.Quote:
Originally Posted by Cymro
Barry Town when doing "well" and TNS and Llanelli are all rubbish
Quote:
Originally Posted by mickdlk
One - Due to security needs you wouldn't fit 10,000 into Oriel Park for the visit of Linfield FC.
Two - It is not 1979 anymore. Two days before the European Cup game in 1979 the IRA killed 18 British soliers in Warrenpoint and Lorn Mountbatten in Sligo. The tension at the game was unbelieveable. A game between the two clubs today, with proper security of course, wouldn't have anything like this level of hostility in the air.
Three - I do agree however that I don't think it is too far beyond the imagination to feel that we can win this division and a playoff against the League Cup winner. Setanta 2008 bring it on. :cool: :) ;)
It's true we don't field our full team, but it is always a strong side, or it was under Kenny Jackett. Remains to be seen how Martinez will treat it. But against Port Talbot this season we fielded Lee Trundle, Wales internationals Richard Duffy and Owain Tudur Jones, Cyprus international Tom Williams (born in England though) plus regular first teamers Willy Gueret, Ian Craney, Alan Tate, Steven Watt and Marcos Painter. We only fielded three players who weren't regulars and still lost 2-1.
Course it was away at Port Talbot and I think we'd have won if we'd played 'em at the Liberty. But I've popped down twice to see them since that game as they're not far from where I live. For £5 it's great value for money.
One thing you'd have to watch out for that I saw at the Drogs V Linfield game, is Celtic jersey clad, tricolour wrapped, green white and orange jester hat wearing n'er do wells turning up to whip up sectarian tension.
A bit off topic but how is the Setanta group decided if finishes even on points? Goal difference or results against one another? Thanks
AfaikQuote:
Originally Posted by micls
Quote:
When two teams finish the group stage on equal points and one of those teams is St Patrick's Athletic, the scenario most favourable to St Patrick's Athletic will prevail be that goal difference or head to head clashes between the two teams in question. Should neither of these scenarios be favourable to St. Patrick's Athletic the decision will be taken by the Organising Committee.
Could be wrong tho :D
kdjac
Portadown seemed to give it a shot in their first season, and got a couple of good away results, but last season the didn't even seem up for it against Dungannon, while this season......Quote:
Originally Posted by Jerry The Saint
Will be very interesting to see what happens if the League Cup winners are a team who are also likely to get a Setanta spot through league posiiton any way.Quote:
Originally Posted by holidaysong
Obviously they'd rather bank on it by winng a replay, but if the League Cup winner is a good few points clear of 4th place in the Premier by the time of this play-off, why would they give a sh!t about it ? It'd just be an unwelcome distraction for them, and I can't see their fans being bothered about it either.
Hence - the First Division club would stand an unnaturally good chance of winning it, regardless of who the teams involved were.
From the matches I've seen I would have to second that.Quote:
Originally Posted by Rogue Trader
Welsh Premier European results would also tend to third that.
Only on two occassions have Welsh Premier teams ever navigated past a round in Europe. And one of those was the absolute farce involving Longford, which was so freakish and absurd that it almost shouldn't count..... :eek:
One thing that no one is mentioning is that the competition is a good yard stick for clubs in IL and LOI to see how they fair up against teams from another league. Clubs from both leagues must definitely be learning from it, especially those who have been in it for two or plus more years. I think it gives clubs a mindset on how to approach European games, that has to be a plus point.
The play-off is likely to be after the end of the season so I'd imagine the league cup winner will know what position they've finished the league in.Quote:
Originally Posted by dcfcsteve
Just to put abit of input in this. Our season has been poor and we've struggled and recently the amount of injuries we've had and continue to have is unreal (less 7 first teamers for Portadown league game for example) so this hasn't helped and also last night was our 2nd most important game of the week and the squad has to be rotated as we're down to the bare bones and their getting shattered.
This season we've did alright in the Setanta and if we're in it next season I'm confident of us doing quite well as we're sure to have a better squad and come into it in better form.
So it's highly likely to be a meaningless fixture then.Quote:
Originally Posted by Schumi
Take last season - Derry won the League Cup (no change there...) and qualified for Setanta through the league.
The last thing our players, Board or fans would have been interested in would have been fulfilling a nonesense formality designed primarily to benefit First Divison clubs.
If the First Division winners were in a play-off with a team already in Setanta, would they get through regardless of the result or would it be solely if they won ? If the latter, it should be a cake-walk for them anyway so why bother in such a case ? Just put them straight through.
You've ground out a few cerdible results this year alright - which makes your drubbing last night all the more disappointing.Quote:
Originally Posted by SwiftsSupporter
But how realistic are your chances of qualifying for next year ? You're 5 points behind the current 4th place team, who also have a game in-hand.