The League Is A Joke

[Duggie]

lads as much as we would hate to say it the league is a joke. drogs going part time now - feck sake. cork almost going bust. how long will bohs and pats keep it going ? crap stadiums (apart from cork), stupid petty incidents like wexford youth v limerick still happening etc etc. practically every other club in dire money problems. either it will just fold or some proper solution will be needed. clubs merging makes sense to me. i dont know, ****es me of. how can we get it so wrong when u see a team from cyprus and bate borislov in champs league this season. there going forward but our league is going back.

[Dodge]

Simply put, they get people to go to the games, and people to invest in the teams. BATE also posed into this years Champions League, no dount at all that if Drogheda had their draw they'd have qualified.

Not sure why you need to start another thread on it mind, as there's tons already there

[garyderry]

lads as much as we would hate to say it the league is a joke. drogs going part time now - feck sake. cork almost going bust. how long will bohs and pats keep it going ? crap stadiums (apart from cork), stupid petty incidents like wexford youth v limerick still happening etc etc. practically every other club in dire money problems. either it will just fold or some proper solution will be needed. clubs merging makes sense to me. i dont know, ****es me of. how can we get it so wrong when u see a team from cyprus and bate borislov in champs league this season. there going forward but our league is going back.

Dont talk Crap, clubs merging WOULD be a nail in the coffin
would happen and only an idiot would suggest it.

Money pumped into facilities, marketing, long term an AIL,
there are lots of things wrong with the league and we all
know what needs done, but it takes investment,
and that isnt going to happen for a while

[Duggie]

Dont talk Crap, clubs merging WOULD be a nail in the coffin
would happen and only an idiot would suggest it.

Money pumped into facilities, marketing, long term an AIL,
there are lots of things wrong with the league and we all
know what needs done, but it takes investment,
and that isnt going to happen for a while

clubs merging makes perfect sense. drogs/dundalk cork/cobh maybe wexford/waterford etc. happened in AFL in australia. it makes business sense, more money and combined supporters. Tough for supporters but thats life. All your proposals are tired and old and will never happen.

[Ash]

If Athlone merge with Longford the new club name should take the Athlone from Athlone Town
and the Town from Longford Town and be called Athlone Town

We could use Flancare Park as a alternative pitch if Limerick refused to warm up on the training pitch
in Lissywollen and contact Freedom Finance or someone to consolidate all loans and debts into one
low monthly payment

[Dodge]

yeah but it'd play in Longford

[finnpark]

I think that its very clear that rural clubs need a much bigger catchment area.

2 clubs from Ireland's smallest county in the league doesn't make sense. Towns like Drogheda, Sligo, ballbofey, Cobh etc cannot support professional football teams on their own, they need to catch the imagination of a wider market.

[Salmon Coloured]

Barstooler + No Soul = Situation.

[don ramo]

i couldnt see many cobh fans goin to turners cross every other week, just as i wouldnt expect harps fans to go to derry or wexfordians go to waterford ETC ETC, wed all be the blowins from the country,

[Guitd]

the fai must have more control over the press who have brainwashed the irish sporting public into following english soccer and setting the standard with premiership .every paper in this country gives huge coverage to soccer across the irish sea while sometimes you would find it impossable to get eircom league results same as tv or radio headlines given to preimership games while the sometimes dont even give a mention about eircom league games until this changes the eircom league will never get any respect from so called soccer fans.

[Duggie]

i couldnt see many cobh fans goin to turners cross every other week, just as i wouldnt expect harps fans to go to derry or wexfordians go to waterford ETC ETC, wed all be the blowins from the country,

well if there was only 1 team in cork then you would support them. you would get used of it.

[John83]

I think that its very clear that rural clubs need a much bigger catchment area.

2 clubs from Ireland's smallest county in the league doesn't make sense. Towns like Drogheda, Sligo, ballbofey, Cobh etc cannot support professional football teams on their own, they need to catch the imagination of a wider market.

The size of the county means jack****. The population is the important bit.

If every club is run at its real level - no bad debt ruining the reputation of the club with every bank and business for miles around, no Pyrrhic success built on the sale of the club's only tangable asset, no empty promises from greedy builders - then if Sligo (for example) isn't big enough to support a good team, Sligo Rovers will naturally slip back behind bigger clubs. How pathetic is this league that a town of 5000 people can support a successful club? The problem isn't that club. It's the failures of the bigger ones.

[Louth4sam]

I think that its very clear that rural clubs need a much bigger catchment area.

2 clubs from Ireland's smallest county in the league doesn't make sense

Dundalk has 500,000 people living within a 30minute commute. Drogheda prob has closer to 1,000,000. How in the name of god are they not large catchment areas?

You obviously know nothing about football or rivalry to suggest something as ludicrous as merging. Why not merge Man Utd and Man City, Everton and Liverpool or Arsenal, West Ham, Spurs, Fulham, Chelsea and QPR they could call it London utd and it could dominate the champions league for years...

[don ramo]

well if there was only 1 team in cork then you would support them. you would get used of it.

well to be quiet honest why does it have to be cobh that step aside weve been around for 86 years while city have been around for 25, would you go to athlone if you clubs merged and played in ahtlone

[A face]

The size of the county means jack****. The population is the important bit.

Exactly, that is a valid point that clubs should be looking at in their own area. how big towns around them are.

If every club is run at its real level - no bad debt ruining the reputation of the club with every bank and business for miles around, no Pyrrhic success built on the sale of the club's only tangable asset, no empty promises from greedy builders

That calls for management with good policies and vision, who are building for success at a reasonable realistic pace.

How pathetic is this league that a town of 5000 people can support a successful club? The problem isn't that club. It's the failures of the bigger ones.

What town of 5000 are you on about, Sligo? I'm lost

The bigger ones definitely do more damage to reputation.

[jinxy lilywhite]

I think that its very clear that rural clubs need a much bigger catchment area.

2 clubs from Ireland's smallest county in the league doesn't make sense. Towns like Drogheda, Sligo, ballbofey, Cobh etc cannot support professional football teams on their own, they need to catch the imagination of a wider market.

Louth maybe the smallest county but their catchement area is higher than the population of Louth. Dundalk and Drogheda both have pops of 35,000 which is big enough to support a football team but you could argue that Drogs pull some support from east meath and we could pull some support from sth armagh and sth monaghan (Blayney and Carrick). I don't believe county models of football teams (Gaelic Intercounty) would work. The local rivalry and all that would be ruined and i don't believe it would capture the imagination of the general public. No Drog
When clubs get off the field activities right and stop making a joke of themselves then we can possibly plan ahead. otherwise I think franchise clubs are crap

[Duggie]

well to be quiet honest why does it have to be cobh that step aside weve been around for 86 years while city have been around for 25, would you go to athlone if you clubs merged and played in ahtlone

i never said cobh would step aside. just one team in cork and call it whatever u wanted. i just used cork as an example. as i say with one team the crowd that would or should be achievable 5000+.

[Dodge]

DO you think Cobh are the thing that is stopping Cork City get those crowds now?

[Duggie]

Dundalk has 500,000 people living within a 30minute commute. Drogheda prob has closer to 1,000,000. How in the name of god are they not large catchment areas?

You obviously know nothing about football or rivalry to suggest something as ludicrous as merging. Why not merge Man Utd and Man City, Everton and Liverpool or Arsenal, West Ham, Spurs, Fulham, Chelsea and QPR they could call it London utd and it could dominate the champions league for years...

maybe u dont know much about football man, this comparision is stupid. all these clubs have millions to spend they wouldnt need to merge would they.

[jinxy lilywhite]

maybe u dont know much about football man, this comparision is stupid. all these clubs have millions to spend they wouldnt need to merge would they.

No mate your comparison is crap. To say that Louth as the smallest county in the country that she should only have one football club is ludicrous. AS L4S pointed out the catchment areas of both clubs is massive. He used the english clubs proximity to each other to disprove your point. The people of Dundalk and Drogheda would never support a combined team and both towns would rather see their teams play in the LSL than have a louth franchise club. Rivalry is good for clubs. We always look out for their scores and vice versa. Actually I'll go as far as to say that football itself is built on local rivalry. All top clubs in the world have firece local rivals.

You need to stop looking at Louth as one place but look at it with a small area with a high population.
Leave the county teams to the GAA. Kildare County has already proven that County teams don't work.