2nd leg latest

[Ceirtlis]

I dont think it will be particularly easy for rovers to get promoted next season if the current format prevails. they were dreadful towards the end of the season and the current team would not get promoted. galway united should be gearing towards a promotion push next season and harps will be up there too. they deserved to be relegated and i think they overestimate there importance some what, in my 11 years of watching league of ireland they have never been anything special.

[Conor H]

Very good point.Rovers won't find it easy to go straight up.I mean they lost to Dublin who we comfortably hammered 2 times this year and if only for a bad start would have finished ahead of them.Then aswell as us Harps and Shams there is Kilkenny,Limerick,Dundalk and cobh....so it's gonna be atough year next year......can't wait though...finally 2 away supports in Terryland!

[sfc red]

They will bring nothing - repeat, NOTHING to the Premiership.

We've swopped one Homeless Dublin-based club run by fans and with decent support for another homeless Dublin-based club run by a delusional **** and with absurdly little support. I challenge any Dublin City fan to tell me how that is good for the Premier division. You are the Milton Keynes Dons of Ireland - unloved, unwanted, and unlikely to survive beyond the short-to-medium term.

If a chain is only as strong as its weakest link, then the Premier Division of the Eircom League just got a whole lot weaker...

On the positive side, I suspect this will be the base-line Year Zero for Rovers. Things can only get better from here. Finish Tallaght and get out of the graveyard league asap.

A bad day for our league...

Absolute bóllox. Clubs get promoted, win relegation, win leagues, qualify for Europe ON GAMES WON AND POINTS WON - therefore Dublin City do deserve to be in the top flight. If you had your way, the top 12 supported clubs would be there and there would be no point in playing football every year.

[chippie0001]

As a football fan I am torn. Its a great laugh that Rovers are down, but on the negative side looking for those fixtures when they come out was always number 1. If the format stays the same then we won't have 3 derbies against them, instead against Dublin City, and thats almost a pain worse than death. However as a fan to see your biggest rivals go down is amusing.

In a way I think its fair also. Rovers while not the current board, but the club have gained from spending money they never had. Pats recently did a deal with the revenue and will have to repay all their liability, my club probably the same. Rovers get a chance to restart and if it works for them they will be better off in the long run. And before anyone says it was the old board thats how football the world works, it was the leeds/Napoli/Marseile/Swindon/Fiorentia boards but the fans suffer. When it happens to us, and it will, we will suffer.

I agree that DC offer nothing to the league, although I do admire Seery who has not stopped trying. His devotion to the cause is a lesson to us all and he has achieved this almost on his own. Also times change what were big clubs no longer are. Look at the UK, anyone want to argue that Burnley or Blackpool are bigger than Chelsea cause they won more in the past? Rovers could not win even one of the games so on the pitch they went down.

[chippie0001]

Next year is going to be a reall ya hard year to get of the First division you will have Harps, Galway, Dundalk, Limerick Cobh, Kilkenny( Scully going or Staying will have a big say in their chances ) ! It will be tight to get out but i think we may see a return to the 2 up and 1 playoff place next year !

I doubt it rumours are they want to go back to 10 teams for the 2007 season so if its stays 12 teams this year it could be 3 down and 1 up. Although they may go to 22 teams for next season and the top 10 making the 2007 season. Only in Ireland could they not have decided the league for next year yet

[Dodge]

Was at the game witha few pats fans. Bohs and shels fans either side of it. No trouble and all wanting the same thing. A great day for irish football when that happens...

Absolutely terrible game. Neither side deserved to be in the premier.

Lets just hope DC are relagated next year and replaced by Harps, Limerick, Galway, Athlone or Cobh.

[BohDiddley]

Dublin City are there ON MERIT.
We can all safely bring our loved ones to Dublin City games.

Maybe you can.
Mine refuse point blank to waste good Nintendo time on CHF, and I will only be going as penance.

[sullanefc]

I think all teams in the Premier Division have lost a big fixture in their calender for next season. It's sad to see Rovers going down, especially when it's that joke of a club coming up in their place. From a Cork City perspective Cork City Vs Dublin City won't attract the same crowd as Cork City Vs Shamrock Rovers would have. That is how it will affect every single club in the premier Division.

But on a positive note, I think Rovers will add to the First Division next year.

Our league would be pretty boring if we knew who was going down every year. No club should be untouchable and think they are above relegation. I think it is time for Rovers to take stock, iron things out, and put everything into getting back into the premier (without bankrupting the club that is).

[bluemovie]

Congratulaions to Dublin City and especially to Ben Whelehan - a very good player who the Blues would have liked to have kept had it not been for work commitments. I saw Rocky yesterday afternoon and wished him luck. That must've been what swung it for them!

I think ambivalent is the word that describes how I felt. Rovers offer more to the Premier, they're one of our biggest home gates and it would have been good for supporter-power if the 400 Club had kept them up. On the other hand, DC won fair and square, it'll be great for the First Division in terms of bigger gates and media interest and I don't rememeber too many Rovers fans shedding tears when we were relegated - or Dundalk or Shels for that matter.

The vultures will be circling now. Barry Murphy is too good for the First Division. Will Molloy, Shelley, Rutherford, McDonagh, McDonnell leave? Where will Rovers play next year? Santry?

I feel sorry for genuine Rovers fans. Their season was a lot like ours with every kind of sh*t thrown at them. Thank God we had Pat Dolan not Roddy Collins. Keep the heads up and build on the good work done off the field this year.

[bigmac]

Yeah, I agree with Bluemovie for the most part, and all those people going around saying it's bad for the league, FFS they're still in the league! The league doesn't stop after the 12th team in the premier you know. They failed to stay up on the pitch and to be perfectly frank, once we were safe I don't give a toss who goes down.

[dcfcsteve]

Absolute bóllox. Clubs get promoted, win relegation, win leagues, qualify for Europe ON GAMES WON AND POINTS WON - therefore Dublin City do deserve to be in the top flight. If you had your way, the top 12 supported clubs would be there and there would be no point in playing football every year.

I said Dublin City deserved to be there on merit.

But let me put it this way - imagine Dublin City didn't currently exist, and a team decided to drop out of the EL. Then imagine there were 2 candidates to replace that team - one being Dublin City, with no history or historical support at all, no hinterland from which to attempt to generate such support, no ground of their own and no plans to evn get one. Then imagine the oteh team was - well, pretty much ANYONE ! Even other Dublin clubs like Bellevue (who have access rights to Tolka). Given the choice between adding a Dublin City to our league, or pretty much any other club - what do you think the EL/FAI would decide to do ? If we're being honest with ourselves, we know the answer. And that says it all to me really - literally ANy other team would be considered to contribute more to Irish football in particular, and the Premier Division in general, than Dublin City.

If only Seery hadn't 'bought' the Home Farm franchise and stopped the EL/FAI from making the obvious choice outlined above....

[dcfcsteve]

Yeah, I agree with Bluemovie for the most part, and all those people going around saying it's bad for the league, FFS they're still in the league! The league doesn't stop after the 12th team in the premier you know. They failed to stay up on the pitch and to be perfectly frank, once we were safe I don't give a toss who goes down.

But the league is only as strong as its weakest club. Dublin City weren't the weakest team on the pitch - Rovers were. But off it, I'd say they are by far the weakest team to play in the Premier. No history, no fans, no hinterland, no ground, and no plans to get one. Could it contribute any less....?

[Dodge]

But the league is only as strong as its weakest club. Dublin City weren't the weakest team on the pitch - Rovers were. But off it, I'd say they are by far the weakest team to play in the Premier.

No outstanding debts, forward thinking board, good young squad... Its all relative steve. IMO opinion they've as much claim to be a premier club as UCD.

[A face]

No outstanding debts, forward thinking board, good young squad... Its all relative steve. IMO opinion they've as much claim to be a premier club as UCD.

Worms ... Open .... Can !!

[Rebal Boy]

Lads Dublin City are promated because they deserve to be. If they didn't deserve it they wouldn't be there. We'll just have to take it. one of the main reasons people aren't happy that Dublin City are up is because they don't have too many fans. Thats no bodys fault. Its just people don't come to games and no one can forse a person to do so. Us fans go to cheer on our beloved teams wheather its Cork City, Shelbourne, St. Pats, Bohs and so on, because we want to support our local team. Most of Irelands soccer supporters cheer on a Premiership club I do myself or a Scottish Club. We can't changed people opians on what they think of the LOI. People are giving out about Dublin City only having crowds of about 50-100. Its not their fault. Its happening to U.C.D too. So theirs no point of giving out about Dublin City being in the Premier Division because its not going to change anything.
Am I right with all the above???

[Sheridan]

And that says it all to me really - literally ANy other team would be considered to contribute more to Irish football in particular, and the Premier Division in general, than Dublin City.

I think this particular monument to idiocy speaks eloquently enough for itself without further comment on my part.

The comparison with MK Dons is a telling one. Essentially a parallel is being drawn with a scenario whereby a club from an allegedly over-represented captial city, with negligible support and no fixed abode - nothing, in fact, save for a modicum of success on the field - was deposed in favour of a club with a wide, untapped catchment area, ambitious, well-resourced owners and well-advanced plans to construct a modern stadium. Basically the wet dream of every dribbling buffoon who recites the same hoary rhetoric in indictment of Dublin City. Congratulations, you just became inextricably trapped in your own logic to an extent that I never considered possible.

It's also intriguing to note that the imbeciles who bleat incessantly about "franchises" are invariably the same morons who wish to preserve in aspic some alleged optimal configuration of clubs for all eternity (the very epitome of the American franchise concept.)

I'm also deriving considerable amusement from this notion that Dublin City FC have gatecrashed some sacrosanct, inviolate entity known as the eircom League. The eircom League is a shambles. It's a shambles because those who have exercised dominion over it (i.e., the "big" clubs) have allowed it to degenerate into a shambles. If any supporter of Shamrock Rovers, Derry City or whomever wishes to point fingers at those who have trailed the name of domestic football through the mud, all I can say is that I hope they have in their possession a serviceable mirror.

Speaking of which, the FAI and Setanta Sports were by all accounts dumbfounded at the extent and professionalism of the co-operation in staging and televising the game at such exiguously short notice afforded them by Dublin City. Which begs the question, what have the rest of you been doing to them all season, and what kind of impression have you left?

[pineapple stu]

Wait for the obvious High Court challenge over the 8 point deduction.

Let them. The High Court will impose the correct UEFA Licence punishment which was to be refused a licence to play in the league in the first place. There'll be no appeal. Had Rovers won the play-off, though, there's no doubt Seery would have whined, as he did the last time when he held up the Longford-Harps play-off by about a week.

[Speranza]

If any supporter of Shamrock Rovers, Derry City or whomever wishes to point fingers at those who have trailed the name of domestic football through the mud, all I can say is that I hope they have in their possession a serviceable mirror.

True, every day I aspire for my club to reach the level of professionalism and plans for the future that Dublin City have. Between plans for the building of a stadium and attaining a sustainable amount of fans, how will we ever get to the same level as the Dinosaur of Irish football that is Seery's ego trip!

[mypost]

What a rubbish game between 2 terrible teams.

Absolutely terrible game. Neither side deserved to be in the premier.

From 23/11:

if you like to watch bad players, long ball football, midfield cul-de-sacs, and very few chances, never mind goals, then tune in. But you have been warned. It will be ugly, boring at times, and almost unwatchable. Home Farm-Rovers will certainly not be sexy football.

Pay attention in future!

[Rory H]

when i see shams in the 1st division section it doesnt seem right!