16 Team Premier Division / Winter Season from 2012/13 TODAY'S DAILY MAIL

[BohsPartisan]

I don't recall postponements being a major issue before. When was the last winter as hard as last year? And anyway, with less games there'd be more midweeks free for rearrangements.

Buckley Park was a regular for postponed games back in the day. Obviously that particular venue won't be an issue now but it will happen elsewhere.

[Dillonman]

Every club resorting to astroturf and no more giving out about Oriel! Get in there!

[Real ale Madrid]

Not to go on but I will... 16 would be ideal for 4 groups of 4 in the league Cup as well.

14 would be way too short for the top level, I would see that being ok for intermediate leagues.

But why would it be too short? Because its the done thing everywhere else?

At the moment we have 18 home league games at the top level, add in Setanta and the domestic cups - its too much - always has been, 13 home games per season would give the clubs a better chance to market the games better and possibly increase season ticket sales. Each game becomes automatically more important and if you can create a competitive division with bottom 4 and top 6 all rewarded / relegated or at least involved in some sort of end of season play-offs then I think you have a much better chance of getting people to go to games regularly.


As I said earlier - its really difficult to get a floating supporter to come to so many games.

Also we need to truncate the season. 8 months should be more than enough to run a full league and cup programme. The A league in Australia runs from August to February - and they play 30 league games! Weather is less of an issue there but we don't get enough of a chance to push our product as we are competing with too many other sports. We need to shorten up our season, to give the games more importance, which can push them up the ladder at the sportsdesk.

The changes mooted in OP will only have minimum effects.

All the biggest crowds at Turners Cross for games I ever went to was due to the importance of the game at hand, not the weather, the pitch, the facilities or the time of year. The problem the FAI have is making the league and the games relevant - adjusting the season and the number of teams will change nothing.

[passerrby]

I dont care what they do as long as they dont decide to start the league in say march have a two week break in july and finish in Nov ,now that would be silly.

[Macy]

Buckley Park was a regular for postponed games back in the day. Obviously that particular venue won't be an issue now but it will happen elsewhere.

We weren't without postponements ourselves, but I don't recall it being that much worse than the start or end of the season now.

As I suggested earlier, I don't think it's about justifying the change back anymore, it's about justifying the continuation of the experiment of summer football. It won't be the silver bullet to move back to a winter season, but if it got us back to where we were it would be a start.

Crowds are down, especially during the height of summer when the weather is best.
European progress has been minimal and can be tied to other factors, and there are no tangible benefits for the league anyway.
Has the football really been better, especially since economic realities have kicked in and budgets have gone down?
Is the leagues competition really the UK leagues or is it other leisure/ sporting activities which are more prevalent in the summer? Attendances suggest the latter.

[legendz]

But why would it be too short? Because its the done thing everywhere else?

At the moment we have 18 home league games at the top level, add in Setanta and the domestic cups - its too much - always has been, 13 home games per season would give the clubs a better chance to market the games better and possibly increase season ticket sales. Each game becomes automatically more important and if you can create a competitive division with bottom 4 and top 6 all rewarded / relegated or at least involved in some sort of end of season play-offs then I think you have a much better chance of getting people to go to games regularly.


As I said earlier - its really difficult to get a floating supporter to come to so many games.

Also we need to truncate the season. 8 months should be more than enough to run a full league and cup programme. The A league in Australia runs from August to February - and they play 30 league games! Weather is less of an issue there but we don't get enough of a chance to push our product as we are competing with too many other sports. We need to shorten up our season, to give the games more importance, which can push them up the ladder at the sportsdesk.

The changes mooted in OP will only have minimum effects.

All the biggest crowds at Turners Cross for games I ever went to was due to the importance of the game at hand, not the weather, the pitch, the facilities or the time of year. The problem the FAI have is making the league and the games relevant - adjusting the season and the number of teams will change nothing.

For a league at the highest level, I think 30 games would be about right. Not all sides will be involved in the Setanta Cup and all the other cups for all the rounds of them. Anything less than 30 is more Intermediate/Junior level.

[Real ale Madrid]

For a league at the highest level, I think 30 games would be about right. Not all sides will be involved in the Setanta Cup and all the other cups for all the rounds of them. Anything less than 30 is more Intermediate/Junior level.

WHY ? Still haven't told us why ?

I've never understood why the season is so long.

[passinginterest]

Clubs find it hard to generate any revenue during the off season, the longer the off season the more chance there is for people to take in interest in something else and not bother coming back too. The structure of the league, the length of the season and whether it's Winter or Summer are all miles down on the list of serious issues. If clubs don't sort out facilities and continue to work on becoming community centred then they'll all just struggle on as before regardless.

[Cymro]

If I could add a word on the proposals for the size of the league. This year, you may have heard the Welsh Premier switched to a 12-team format. I've watched a few games in my local area when there's been no clash with Swansea or I have a free night. I've also watched many games from before, when the Welsh Premier had 18 teams. My early opinion of the change is that it's resulted in a much higher standard of football.

I've seen a few games this year, and most of them have been excellent by WPL standards. I've watched games like Neath v TNS and Neath v Bala Town, Port Talbot v Aberystwyth and Llanelli v Neath. The standard has been better because you don't have so many small teams who are realistically not going to qualify for Europe and so take no financial risks and sign lower quality players. This season has been great so far, also crowds at Neath have been much higher than before (upwards of 800 on average) although that isn't repeated across the league and probably has something to do with the fact that lots of SCFC fans have gone down to watch Lee Trundle (who's still absolutely brilliant to watch in a game and is definitely worth the entrance fee of £7).

I remember games in the past when I'd go and watch absolutely dire affairs between Afan Lido and Welshpool Town and wonder what I was doing there when I could have been sitting at home watching Sky Sports or whatever. So far, I've not seen any poor games. If it keeps this up, the switch to a smaller league will definitely have been a good thing for the Welsh Premier.

[Real ale Madrid]

Clubs find it hard to generate any revenue during the off season, the longer the off season the more chance there is for people to take in interest in something else and not bother coming back too.

Clubs shouldn't be able to generate any revenue during the off-season, clubs need to find a way to become sustainable by generating revenues, during the season to sustain them during the off season.

I'm arguing that clubs have a better chance of doing that year on year if the season is shorter. The amount of games we have at the moment is draining interest in the league - not increasing it. If, for example, a club can sell 500 season tickets for a 13 games league season - thats better than 250 season tickets for an 18 /20 games season. Bit of a simple way of looking at it, but the general point still stands. Make the games more important and more people will take an interest.

[Macy]

If I could add a word on the proposals for the size of the league. This year, you may have heard the Welsh Premier switched to a 12-team format. I've watched a few games in my local area when there's been no clash with Swansea or I have a free night. I've also watched many games from before, when the Welsh Premier had 18 teams. My early opinion of the change is that it's resulted in a much higher standard of football.

That was the logic that was used to justify the 10 team league here. Not sure it's followed through to better football. Also, the top of the first would be pretty competitive in the premier imo.

[Lim till i die]

A lot of people mentioning Limerick as part of their sixteen in here ie there's an awful lot of Premier Division fans who haven't been to Jackman Park!!

Despite having everything nice and rosy off the pitch, we are in no fit state to be entering an expanded Premier should it happen imo. Personally I'd much rather see us stay down in a rubbish First Division for a year and win that while sorting a ground out, build up a bit of momentum.

Summer football definitely kills us at times, if the weather is fine of a weekend half our fanbase tend to take off to Kilkee. Having said that I remember manys the wonderful traditional winter afternoon watching Tarzan O'Brien or Andy Myler put three or four past us infront of 100 cold souls.

I think Europe and the pitches are red herrings. Most of the "progress" in Europe was achieved by clubs who were spending beyond their means. Shamrock Rovers are duking it out for the Premier Division title playing a brand of football which seems to involve as little contact with the pitch as possible.

Some off the top of my head suggestions to make a 16 team league interesting (feel free to shoot down):

Have your winter break from November to Febuary but have two sets of derby fixtures around Stephens Day and New Years.

Top get champions league, second get Europa, third to sixth playoff to decide second Europa spot.

Bottom get relegated, 12th to 15th playoff to decide who will end up in playoff with second team in First Division.

That should keep most teams with something to play for up to the end.

[Macy]

Bottom get relegated, 12th to 15th playoff to decide who will end up in playoff with second team in First Division.

That should keep most teams with something to play for up to the end.

Wouldn't have disagreed too much up to here - there should be more movement between the leagues. Part of the problem is it's so hard to get out of the first. This leads to clubs spending too much to survive in the premier and spending too much to attempt to get out. Should be at least 3 down from a 16 team premier, imo, to avoid clubs feeling the need to overspend too much. Could still have survival play off's for the final place though to keep the interest.

[Lim till i die]

Even Better.

Bottom two go down, 11th to 14th playoff to decided playoff place!!

As a Limerick fan, I HEAR you about the difficulty of getting out of the First, but the only issue here is could you justify two definite and potentially three teams coming up from a (lets be honest pretty p!ss poor) ten team first division, which is what the first division would be for the forseeable if this went ahead*



*Say first year for arguments sake:

Limerick
Longford
Athlone
Wexford
Salthill
Mervue
Tralee Dynamos
Cobh Ramblers
FC Carlow??
Castlebar??

[Dodge]

You left out the demoted Bohs

[Lim till i die]

I genuinely think they'll be alright if its a sixteen (and possibly if its a ten if they win the league.)

Of the six current First Division clubs mentioned there I don't think any of them would be a better bet than even an FC Bohemian of Dublin 2010 Rovers to be honest.

[dfx-]

Buckley Park was a regular for postponed games back in the day. Obviously that particular venue won't be an issue now but it will happen elsewhere.

Any scheduled fixture between November and March was a maybe if you were to play at Ballybofey. Even halfway in Monaghan on teh day, you could never be certain, drizzle could call the game off..

[Macy]

As a Limerick fan, I HEAR you about the difficulty of getting out of the First, but the only issue here is could you justify two definite and potentially three teams coming up from a (lets be honest pretty p!ss poor) ten team first division, which is what the first division would be for the forseeable if this went ahead

Part of what makes it p!ss poor is that most teams could pretty much write off the season before it started as they had no hope of promotion. I know it kind of goes against my theory of not overspending to get out, but clubs can also go the opposite if they don't see a realistic chance at the start of the season. Certainly it contributes to the dismal crowds. 6th probably wouldn't get through the play off's, but it's enough to have that chance to generate interest and generate crowds, which then feeds into the team.

[bennocelt]

Crowds are down, especially during the height of summer when the weather is best.
European progress has been minimal and can be tied to other factors, and there are no tangible benefits for the league anyway.
Has the football really been better, especially since economic realities have kicked in and budgets have gone down?
Is the leagues competition really the UK leagues or is it other leisure/ sporting activities which are more prevalent in the summer? Attendances suggest the latter.

Maybe one reason crowds are down this season are all the games held on a Monday evening, the few on a Tuesday and some even on a Thursday.

In Europe our co effieicents have jumped from the placings of 50's into now the 30's, thats some improvement, and at least LOI teams now get past the first round (longford withstanding)

As for summer activities. Well if you are prepared to give up a LOI game and go and watch rubbish gah or stupid concerts then what the hell do we care. Im sure a cold winters evening would also be a no-no for the same type of person. Excuses excuses excuses, changing to winter football wont see a huge jump in crowds.

I think a 16 team prem is great though

[Schumi]

if you are prepared to give up a LOI game and go and watch rubbish gah or stupid concerts then what the hell do we care.

Seriously?