Republic of Ireland V Sweden - Friday, 6th September 2013 - World Cup 2014 Qualifier

[ArdeeBhoy]

Aye, ironically the LOI heads who appear to be largely v.change when they're the ones crying out for a 'strong' domestic league.
Whatever that is...
(As had been said umpteen times before, they mainly need to be consistently financially solvent and have better facilities in some cases).

Stutts and Edmund seem to be at least suggesting a viable sort of alternative?

[Stuttgart88]

But isnt part of the sucess of the GAA compared with LoI (in terms of fanbase) the county vs county nature of the all-ireland competitions. Ditto Rugby and the provinces.

yes, the fans identify very closely with the brands, but a key difference is that those brands don't compete with anything else and they're also pretty close to the top of the tree in terms of standard. Munster rugby fans haven't also been fans of Leicester Tigers or Northampton Saints over the years, with both playing at a Champions League equivalent that is un obtainable for Munster.

You could create a Celtic League and it wouldn't get the buy in needed because it'd still be a poor relation to a European glamour league like the EPL and fans would continue to prefer Man U and the rest. This is my guess from a pure brand marketing perspective, but you've also got to factor in that any Celtic league creation would still struggle to match even League One in commercial terms. The Rabo League is maybe the 3rd biggest in the world. Its football equivalent might just about become the 4th biggest in UK and IRL. Would an inter county football league be sufficiently popular to generate much TV money?

I'm open to creative ideas but I don't see any merit in looking at GAA or rugby, though I do see a warning from rugby's current situation.

If UEFA was to rip up the traditional structure of European league football and have a pan-European system then I'd think creating a franchise club in Ireland could have merit, and I think the traditional national league structure and existing clubs could live underneath that. That ain't ever going to happen I reckon.

[paul_oshea]

That would definitely ruin the international game in Ireland if that franchise team existed in Ireland and did well.

[Closed Account 2]

yes, the fans identify very closely with the brands, but a key difference is that those brands don't compete with anything else and they're also pretty close to the top of the tree in terms of standard. Munster rugby fans haven't also been fans of Leicester Tigers or Northampton Saints over the years, with both playing at a Champions League equivalent that is un obtainable for Munster. You could create a Celtic League and it wouldn't get the buy in needed because it'd still be a poor relation to a European glamour league like the EPL and fans would continue to prefer Man U and the rest.

But perhaps there are Munster Rugby fans who also follow football (be it an LoI team or the likes of Man Utd, Chelsea etc) or other sports in general? A county* based football league wouldnt necessarily need to fear competition with Premier League orientated fans, indeed initially I think it would be unwise to try and go head-to-head (in terms of marketing) with the PL. While it isnt perhaps ideal, from the economic/marketing perspective you outline above couldnt a given/random fan support an LoI county team and also follow say Man Utd or Liverpool. There are some fans of LoI clubs who follow English teams and indeed there are fans of the Irish national team who also support an overseas club, even if it perhaps isn't ideal from some perpectives.

If the county approach was sucessful, the domestic league would probably pull in more of those EPL-oriented supporters. If say a fan from Limerick supported Limerick FC (hypothetically run as a nominally county club) and also supported Man Utd, over time if he saw that Limerick vs Cork matches had a certain dynamic (akin to All-Ireland matches) he might go to more Limerick matches and forgo the weekend trip(s) to Old Trafford.

[Stuttgart88]

Definitely, Paul?

[Stuttgart88]

But perhaps there are Munster Rugby fans who also follow football (be it an LoI team or the likes of Man Utd, Chelsea etc) or other sports in general? A county* based football league wouldnt necessarily need to fear competition with Premier League orientated fans, indeed initially I think it would be unwise to try and go head-to-head (in terms of marketing) with the PL. While it isnt perhaps ideal, from the economic/marketing perspective you outline above couldnt a given/random fan support an LoI county team and also follow say Man Utd or Liverpool. There are some fans of LoI clubs who follow English teams and indeed there are fans of the Irish national team who also support an overseas club, even if it perhaps isn't ideal from some perpectives.

If the county approach was sucessful, the domestic league would probably pull in more of those EPL-oriented supporters. If say a fan from Limerick supported Limerick FC (hypothetically run as a nominally county club) and also supported Man Utd, over time if he saw that Limerick vs Cork matches had a certain dynamic (akin to All-Ireland matches) he might go to more Limerick matches and forgo the weekend trip(s) to Old Trafford.

sorry, I just don't agree. Our rugby provinces are the elite of the game. The best clubs in England are close to the European elite in standard and probably are elite in terms of brand appeal. Football is a global product market in large respects and the Irish are just as much of the EPL audience as the Far East.

That said, a county-of-origin football tournament would be an interesting event to trial outside the LOI season. Given that many players aren't contracted to their clubs during the off-season, clubs might be powerless to object!

[Closed Account 2]

I think regionalising the Europa League is worth considering, giving guaranteed cross border football and a share of European wide TV and commercial revenue to peripheral countries. It'd be a difficult project to configure but I think the concept is valid. There could maybe be 8 European regions, each with a degree of local derby interest, with the regional winners going into a QFknock out round. Each region could have more than one group if its a big region. The number of games required might be an issue, requiring a shorter domestic season. I expect Charlie to come on and deconstruct the idea into a pile of horse manure but I think it has merit

The danger with regionalising the EL, is while it looks like a viable option here in Northern/Western Europe, it is not without problems in other parts of Europe. For instance at the moment UEFA have a special ruling that Armenian and Azeri national teams (and Russian and Georgian) cannot be paired with each other. This is due to conflict issues (in fact a few years ago Armenia and Azerbaijan were in the same qualification group but both matches were cancelled as neither FA could guarentee the saftey of the opposition players). Similarly when Partizan Belgrade played Zrinjski Mostar (a Bosnian team which is followed a lot by Croatians in Southern Bosnia) back in 2007 there were huge riots and Partizan were kicked out of the competition (I think they were later reinstated), I think there were other problems when a Serbian (or maybe Montenegran) team played an Albanian team a few years ago. Teams from these countries arent drawn against each other that often at the moment but with regionalisation it would become inevitable, and in the long run (with all the extra policing and potential bans from the competition) these games could get expensive for the hosts without having big financial benefits (in terms of prize money the CL dwarfs the EL).

The other problem is how do you carve up the map and leave each sub-region with a strong league (and so financially benefical tie). Most of the high profile leagues are in Western (or Central Europe). Why for instance would Estonian, Latvian and Lithuanian FAs want to be paired up with say Finland and Poland when it would probably mean missing out on a big tie against a Spanish, German, Italian or English team? Sure you could put them in with Russia or even (at a push) Ukraine, but once you take Zenit, CSKA, Spartak, Shakhtar out (as they would probably be in the CL) they could end up playing Kuban Krasnodar or Amkar Perm, which mightnt be a desirable tie.

[Charlie Darwin]

If the English and French get their way, our rugby superclubs could be goosed. Any cross border league arrangement in football would very likely face the same risks. I can't see any "Atlantic League" countries giving a hoot about the Irish. Only if an Irish club or franchise could bring huge crowds and TV money into the pot would any other country be interested. If rugby's European champion contenders can be kicked to touch by clubs with a bigger TV market Lord knows what fate would wait an Irish football club competing with Dutch, Belgian and Portuguese clubs.

I also think the scale of the inequality and absolute wealth of the big clubs needs to be assessed. You could 'merge' NI, Welsh, Scottish and Irish leagues, or even create a Celtic League of big city / regional franchises and the TV audience would still only be a small fraction of the size required to sustain a markedly better professional product, especially if the Old Firm headed south. If they didn't, the chances of any other "club" reaching Europe wouldn't be improved.

What other aggregations of countries likely to be bothered to include Ireland could create a TV market worth the risk?

The league is what it is. Of course it can become better. If osarusan is allowed to repeat himself, then so will I. We need a properly joined up game owned by an FAI able to control or ideally remove the various self interested factions. A joined up pyramid with an ethos of best practice coaching running through its veins would improve all levels of our game. If the bottom is better, the middle will be better. If the middle is connected to the top, the top will be better. If the top of the domestic game is better and all levels of the game are producing better players, the national teams will be better.

I think regionalising the Europa League is worth considering, giving guaranteed cross border football and a share of European wide TV and commercial revenue to peripheral countries. It'd be a difficult project to configure but I think the concept is valid. There could maybe be 8 European regions, each with a degree of local derby interest, with the regional winners going into a QFknock out round. Each region could have more than one group if its a big region. The number of games required might be an issue, requiring a shorter domestic season. I expect Charlie to come on and deconstruct the idea into a pile of horse manure but I think it has merit

No, I think you have a good grasp of the situation. People who've put forward this guileless Cetlic League idea inspired by the rugby would do well to take a look at how that's all panning out now and realise that Irish rugby's place at the pinnacle of the club games was probably always going to temporary, and fair play to the provinces for maximising the development potential so far.

I wouldn't overemphasise the need to develop a coherent top-down structure in the league. Yeah, it would be nice but there are so many competing interests at work that the status quo might actually be no worse than the effect of taking on so many vested interests. The system we have is far from ideal but it still produces reasonably good outcomes. That said, I'm all for positive initiatives and investment in the domestic game.

But isnt part of the sucess of the GAA compared with LoI (in terms of fanbase) the county vs county nature of the all-ireland competitions. Ditto Rugby and the provinces. It's all very well saying that anyone can set up a single county team, ignoring the trials and tribulations of getting into the LoI structure, but a county team (or province team) on it's own isn't going to be viable. If Kerry (county hurling team) played a series of matches against teams like St Martins (in Wexford) or Thurles Sarsfields you couldnt imagine it would be a massive draw. Similarly if Munster (rugby) played matches against Clontarf or Belfast Harlequins (even if they were of the same ability as Munster) it's not like for like, it doesnt have the same draw as Munster vs Ulster.

Eh, what "trials and tribulations"? GUFC are being frozen out as a punishment. Sporting Fingal and Dublin City had no problem getting into the league the moment they showed up at Montrose with a suitcase full of cash. Which is basically what people who propose these sort of grandiose plans want: they want a multi-millionaire to show up and risk his own money in order to achieve the unlikely outcome they have deemed to be ideal.

The GAA is the GAA - the inter-county rivalry is deeply-embedded in the structure of the game. It doesn't exist in rugby, let alone soccer or tiddlywinks, and you can't just impose it on top of a game 150 years in. Sorry, but your average soccer fan in Dublin couldn't give a **** if you're from Tipperary or Galway - you're from the country and that's it. Even within GAA, most Kerry football fans wouldn't be able to name you a county that's not on the road to Dublin, if even that. The ones who finished university might manage Mayo.

But perhaps there are Munster Rugby fans who also follow football (be it an LoI team or the likes of Man Utd, Chelsea etc) or other sports in general? A county* based football league wouldnt necessarily need to fear competition with Premier League orientated fans, indeed initially I think it would be unwise to try and go head-to-head (in terms of marketing) with the PL. While it isnt perhaps ideal, from the economic/marketing perspective you outline above couldnt a given/random fan support an LoI county team and also follow say Man Utd or Liverpool. There are some fans of LoI clubs who follow English teams and indeed there are fans of the Irish national team who also support an overseas club, even if it perhaps isn't ideal from some perpectives.

If the county approach was sucessful, the domestic league would probably pull in more of those EPL-oriented supporters. If say a fan from Limerick supported Limerick FC (hypothetically run as a nominally county club) and also supported Man Utd, over time if he saw that Limerick vs Cork matches had a certain dynamic (akin to All-Ireland matches) he might go to more Limerick matches and forgo the weekend trip(s) to Old Trafford.

Look, you have a computer, don't you? Type up a business plan. You're going to need a few million euro from somewhere but otherwise you've got all the tools. Go out and conduct a survey - what would it take to get people to attend football games in Ireland. Do some research. Find out the costs. Source some donors. I'm sure Niall O'Dowd or Chuck Feeney could be convinced to get on board, or Michael O'Leary or some ********.

You don't need to overhaul the entire structure of the league to try something out. What you do need, however, is a bit of support and unfortunately there aren't many people around who'll pay to watch a work in progress.

[Closed Account 2]

The GAA is the GAA - the inter-county rivalry is deeply-embedded in the structure of the game. It doesn't exist in rugby, let alone soccer or tiddlywinks, and you can't just impose it on top of a game 150 years in.

A county rivalry doesnt exist in Rugby because its played provincially (ie the 4 provinces, not 32 counties) the point is a geographic based rivalry does exist. Or do you think Munster v Leinster matches are not really rivalries.

You don't need to overhaul the entire structure of the league to try something out. What you do need, however, is a bit of support and unfortunately there aren't many people around who'll pay to watch a work in progress.

Exactly, you can't go halfway down a county league route with 2-3 county based teams and expect it to work - it has to be a centrally made decision by the FAI or forced out by some sort of Kerry Packer route (which is unlikely).

[Charlie Darwin]

A county rivalry doesnt exist in Rugby because its played provincially (ie the 4 provinces, not 32 counties) the point is a geographic based rivalry does exist. Or do you think Munster v Leinster matches are not really rivalries.

Well a country rivalry doesn't exist in rugby because it was a club-based sport without the critical mass for county teams, but even so the inter-pro games weren't even yearly events until the last few years. The GAA organised itself around counties early on due to an ingenious and well-managed system of hierarchy which lent itself to the amateur ethos. Football has always been a professional or semi-pro sport so there was never the appetite to represent larger geographical entities.

I'm sure the Leinster-Munster is a real rivalry for the people involved, but do you think non-rugby fans really identify with their province over the others? Even county divisions don't really have that much importance in everyday life.

Exactly, you can't go halfway down a county league route with 2-3 county based teams and expect it to work - it has to be a centrally made decision by the FAI or forced out by some sort of Kerry Packer route (which is unlikely).

Right, so the FAI pours millions into a hair-brained scheme with no guarantee of success rather than private individuals. Where's the incentive? Wouldn't this money be better spent on development rather than marketing schemes? We have a semi-professional game in this country. We can tear it all down and start again at massive cost for a small chance of success, or we can work with the structures we have an improve them.

The point is we have county-based teams. Some of them work (Sligo) and some have failed (Kildare). They're all based around county towns, but that's where the people are so duh. The ones that have succeeded have generally been because they have plenty of history and a real, long-term tradition of supporting local soccer (once again, Sligo) and those that have fallen by the wayside are those for whom the locals couldn't care a jot (once again, Kildare). The idea that this would somehow change if we reformed the structure of the league again is hopelessly naive.

[Stuttgart88]

I was at inter pro rugby games with 300 people at Donnybrook in the 80s. But sport is nothing without context. When Leinster and Munster are leading contenders to be Europe's best pro rugby franchises / clubs people care. I'm not sure football is capable of crossing the gap between representing your local audience and being of sufficiently high quality to be seen as something to attach to in a 'Basking in Reflected Glory' kind of way. Or rather, I'd be pretty sure it's not. I think the Irish need external validation for that.

And earlier I was thinking the same as CD. Football is run on a county or county town basis for all intents and purposes. There may be a couple of Dublin clubs not really standing for much, but most LOI clubs have a very identifiable catchment area that no amount of renaming or repositioning would do much to improve attachment.

[Closed Account 2]

It's not that simple though, for instance are Bray a county Wicklow team? The town is inside Wicklow county (and the stadium is just) but would someone from say Arklow feel a connection to them in the same way they might think Wicklow GAA represents them? Are Kerry, Mayo/Castlebar, and Clare that well served by LoI teams? Can Galway fans feel that much of an attachment to any team, when the traditional one (Galway United) has been disbanded and two recent, in LoI terms, teams have been ham-fisted into the league (Salthill and Mervue).

Some teams like Sligo and perhaps Limerick appear like county teams (more by accident rather than design) but I dont think you can compare them to the organisation and catchment of the GAA-County system.

[Charlie Darwin]

No, Bray is in Dublin in all but name. It's arguable whether Wicklow GAA even represents the entire county - in terms of the bigger counties in Ireland, they're probably the only one that's never even threatened to win a provincial title. Wicklow is, and always has been, a satellite of Dublin.

Sligo might be a county team by accident but they nevertheless are a soccer team that started in a town and spread out to the environs. The fact they have never had a hierarchical county structure like in the GAA hardly delegitimises that, nor would scrapping Sligo Rovers and setting up a Sligo County club instead do anything to make them more of a county side.

You're missing the point. I'm not comparing any pan-county club to a GAA county. I'm saying they are fundamentally different and applying the GAA county mentality to soccer is futile.

[peadar1987]

No, Bray is in Dublin in all but name. It's arguable whether Wicklow GAA even represents the entire county - in terms of the bigger counties in Ireland, they're probably the only one that's never even threatened to win a provincial title. Wicklow is, and always has been, a satellite of Dublin.

Sligo might be a county team by accident but they nevertheless are a soccer team that started in a town and spread out to the environs. The fact they have never had a hierarchical county structure like in the GAA hardly delegitimises that, nor would scrapping Sligo Rovers and setting up a Sligo County club instead do anything to make them more of a county side.

You're missing the point. I'm not comparing any pan-county club to a GAA county. I'm saying they are fundamentally different and applying the GAA county mentality to soccer is futile.

Ah here now! You Shams fans are just fixing to be the biggest team in Wicklow. We're onto you! Now away back to Tallaght or we'll drop another wall on ye!

[geysir]

The Europa league could be fine tuned.
One fine tuning aspect relates to the current format in the EL qual rounds where there is currently nothing to legislate against a small club from the westernmost parts of Europe being paired with a club close to Outer Mongolia.
Pats had to travel to Kazakhstan, an amateur club in Iceland had also to travel there, about a 24 hour round trip that has to be organised with very little notice.
The Uefa prize money is a pittance compared to that expense of a trip like that and the real sting in the tail is for the loser.

As it stands, the EL format could be more geographically gentler in the qual rounds, allowing clubs to at least make a handy profit in each round to pay other bills.

[osarusan]

The league is what it is. Of course it can become better. If osarusan is allowed to repeat himself, then so will I. We need a properly joined up game owned by an FAI able to control or ideally remove the various self interested factions. A joined up pyramid with an ethos of best practice coaching running through its veins would improve all levels of our game. If the bottom is better, the middle will be better. If the middle is connected to the top, the top will be better. If the top of the domestic game is better and all levels of the game are producing better players, the national teams will be better.

Of course this is what we need. And we can read a lot recently about leagues around europe who have invested the time and effort to make this happen.

But in Ireland? Nah, we couldn't be bothered, and we don't want to wait, so set up a new league for us please.

[Charlie Darwin]

We should do what they do in America and just invent a new league and sink hundreds of millions of taxpayers' money into it every couple of decades. We should be heartened by the fact they've finally got it semi-right at the 19th time of trying. This is a sustainable model in my opinion.

[Closed Account 2]

Yeah roll on another 20-30 years of an under-attended and under-achieving league that's stuck in a rut. I mean lets not consider making any major changes wouldnt want to rock the boat.

[osarusan]

Yeah roll on another 20-30 years of an under-attended and under-achieving league that's stuck in a rut. I mean lets not consider making any major changes wouldnt want to rock the boat.

Weak weak strawman post.

Domestic football needs change at pretty much all levels, and a strong FAI to force it. I'm all for the major changes the I quoted from Stuttgart's post earlier. So is every other LOI fan. One of the great misrepresentations of LOI supporters is that they are happy with the league the way it is, and don't want changes/improvements.

But all of this can be done (and should be done, in my opinion) without what I think are fastasy notions of Celtic leagues or teams in the EPL, which are a short-term and short-sighted idea that don't address any of the underlying problems with domestic football.

[Charlie Darwin]

Yeah roll on another 20-30 years of an under-attended and under-achieving league that's stuck in a rut. I mean lets not consider making any major changes wouldnt want to rock the boat.

Do you think nobody wants to make changes? Or do you think anything less than dumping the entire infrastructure and starting afresh regardless of the good work already being done counts as a change? Shamrock Rovers qualified for the Europa League a couple of years ago. Drogheda United got the width of a crossbar away a few years ago. Pats routinely go on European runs. Football in this country isn't in great shape but there is something there to work with. The idea that it's Munster Red Devils and Leinster Lions or bust is complete bunkum and disregards all of the achievements this league has made against considerable odds in recent years.