Re: The death of Scottish football?
 

i agree totally i think rangers could be teh start of some big clubs going tothe wall and wages starting to become more in line wha thtey should be

Re: The death of Scottish football?
 

To be totally honest l think that Scottish football has been dead for years, and for simple reasons, If you take out Rangers and Celtic, you would not have Scottish football.

Tv money for example, we had Setanta, Sky and ESPN, they would only covers games that involved in the Old firm games, no dis -respect to Scottish football but who would pay subs to watch Arbroath play St Mirren for example - no one.

Clubs are taken over by rich owners, and then dumped. What has happened at Rangers FC could happen to any club in the UK, wages are far too high, and if people say it won't happen to Celtic, it can - no one is out of the question.

What has to happen is that we in the Premier League have to say is merge- there has to be a wage curb on wages, none of this silly money, such as £100.000 per week.

The Premier League MUST merge to save these clubs going bust. I would say the SPL has to be say The Championship and lower clubs then form a new Ist and 2nd Division and a third.

Ie PL is extended by 6 clubs, then a PL2, (The Championship) Ist Div (The Championship ) 2nd and a Third.

You cannot expect Rangers or Celtic joining the PL straight up as that would prove argument.

Most clubs fly to away games, and fans either drive or go by train anyway.

In fact if l am not wrong, one football fan travels from London each week and flies to Inverness to watch home games.

TV money will then flood in, and we could have the same games played each week, ie Sat, Sunday, Monday and Wednesday and Fridays, so nothing would change - this to me the only way forward for BRITISH football.

Re: The death of Scottish football?
 

i see you will be against scotland getting indepeance then arthur ;)

apart from mergin the sfl and efl together i agree with you on the rest and that the point i am makign if rangers go bust scottish football is dead because scottish football needs rangers adn celtic

but for football in generaly to survive a cap and accoutn management is needed, ony good thing for scotland is rangers might be forced to playing there youths meaning they get better and sold on to english teams and theng et better even more

Re: The death of Scottish football?
 

l somehow cannot see 6 more teams on the premiership as that means 12 more matches each season when we already have a fixture overload Arthur.

Re: The death of Scottish football?
 

The Scottish game has been declining for a while now, trapped in a catch 22 situation where the money isn't coming because the quality is declining as a result of the lack of money. The best highlight of this is the Old Firm derby, used to be a big game for people in England but now it barely gets a mention and isn't even that heavily promoted by Sky. The only time it warrants more than a passing mention of the score is if there has been some violence. This isn't helped by the moronic situation where they play each other 4 times in a season.

The decline in interest which started that spiral was probably a combination of the dominance of the Old Firm and the lack of large fan bases to support decent sized clubs around Scotland. It's a small league and simply doesn't get the attendances required. Meanwhile the other leagues around Europe have grown exponentially, increasing the disparty between them and Scotland. This was likely as a result of the aforementioned quality of league meaning it missed out on the influx of Sky money.

So then Celtic and Rangers no longer compete for the top players, quite soon after that they couldn't even compete for the decent Premiership quality players. It wasn't that long ago that the Old Firm would be a test for the top English sides, now the Championship sides would face them with confidence. It's been a remarkable and rapid decline.

---------- Post added at 21:00 ---------- Previous post was at 20:54 ----------

Rangers also overextended themselves with lavish wages and transfer fees which helped them to some titles. Fans are partly culpable for this for prioritising success over the long term health of the club. Too many fans are concerned only with glory rather than finances and need to be more vocal and attentive to how their club is run.

The Premier League has enough games. We can't make the league bigger unless we add another tier.

There are quite a few problems with taking Celtic and Rangers anyway, UEFA won't like it and the English teams have no need for them. Celtic and Rangers might want it but that doesn't mean the English clubs will allow it.

Re: The death of Scottish football?
 

to be hones i blame it partially on the spl, they had the chance to fix it but voted against it, the fans wanted a 16/18 top league no split ( the biggest turn off in football) and automatic relegation for 2 teams with a playoff for the 3rd one

but since they need 11-1 vote they other teams voted it out that would mean they likely get relegated so it didn't come

if rangers go completely bust which i really think they will, then i think sfa has to rop in the spl and sfl and say enough is enough we are taking control of scottish football if you the ones who wanted the breakway league dnt like it either give use your resignation or accept what we are going to do. and i dnt see them resignation now because they wont get there own deal with no rangers and only celtic

then make a top tier of 16/18 club switch 3 relegation spots one a play off,

second tier with 18 clubs with 2 automatic promotions and 4 teams in a playoff spot and 3 relegation spots and 1 play off again,

3rd tier the same as the 2nd,

a 4th tier with the same promotion credtianal as 2nd and 3rd, but has 4 relegation spot that are automatic with 1 into 4 leagues that would be east,west,south and north and thee would include junior teams and amateurs team etc giving them the chance to get into real football. to fill out the space in 3rd tier they could use c team of the bigger club ie there youth teams playing regular competitive football instead of youth matches

move to playing from febuary to November with winter break, change it so there is two cups the scottish cup and upper league cup and lower league cup maybe introducer a community cup winner of the top flight against scottish cup winner

this would make scottish football better

people thoughts?

Re: The death of Scottish football?
 

All fine but it doesn't address the core issue. They don't get the attendance. Scotland need to look to the Danish and Scandinavian leagues for inspiration but crucially they would need to accept that they will be a niche league and it's problematic with the Old Firm.

Re: The death of Scottish football?
 

yeah i totally agree but part of the reaosn for the attendances from people i know is the league split, it is unfair and boring, and the fact teh spl has rule that means teams liek falkirk never got promtoed i think on 4 occassion after winning the first divison make it boring, basically the spl became a elite laegue and noe o th teams where willing to give up the richs

apart fromt he above i think they need to put rules in place that say your outgoings can only be matched to your incoming include transfer fees, but head down the the youth route and train layer and sell them on (but that one might not work for long since epl and spanish leageu are about ready to burst) but they need to change the game form teh ground up and league restructing would be a big start and might sttract more peopel out thinkign the game oculd be mroe interesting and if the old firm are made to be not so big so other teams can win that would help to i mean with rules govern what team can do in scotland

Re: The death of Scottish football?
 

The sad part is that the SFA cannot do without Rangers and Celtic, BUT there has been so much trouble between these two clubs over the years, so therefore the fan base is declining and this is where clubs are losing revenue.

Scottish football needs money, and they won't get it from Sky or ESPN, already clubs play each other twice at home.

I was watching a Scottish game recently and the ground was nearly empty, this is why players leave to go south of the border.

It needs a big big shake up, and the sad thing is its Rangers that are paying the price, if l am not wrong they get deducted 10 points, therefore giving Celtic the title by default which to me is totally unfair.

Re: The death of Scottish football?
 

What astounds me is how these clubs, Ranger and Portsmouth, are allowed to rack up these big tax bills with HMRC? Surely after one or even two months of not paying it, you issue court proceedings to get it paid, not let it build to £75m in Rangers case.

Re: The death of Scottish football?
 

According to a tax expert on the radio, clubs make arrangements which allow so many days to pay it, then do it again if they cannot pay.

Its a loophole in the tax system used by accountants, and the HMRC only take this action when they know they cannot get it back.

Didn't the same thing happen with Plymouth (if l am wrong, l apologise to Plymouth FC)

Re: The death of Scottish football?
 

in our case it was the ebt scheme, which was legal at the time but the loophole was closed by hmrc, we and a quite a few other clubs used this scheme at the time, we got caught as did a few others but we're the main case though or test case as you will.

arsenal racked up 300 million which was owed to hmrc but they paid just 9m settlement or something along those lines, however they will be one of the clubs to face hmrc, wether their debt to hmrc has been paid in full remains to be seen.

Re: The death of Scottish football?
 

How is it unfair? Rangers are paying the price for their own mismanagement. Rangers' problems are not because of the league, it's because of their failure to adapt to their situation. Celtic have managed to break even after all. Celtic will win the league because they have budgeted better and been run better.

---------- Post added at 22:23 ---------- Previous post was at 22:17 ----------

That doesn't make any sense. HMRC can't retrospectively change the tax rules and go back to people and demand they more tax on former transactions to reflect new rules. Nor can Arsenal pay a settlement and then be dragged in to face HMRC because they have changed their minds. It sounds like Rangers continued to exploit loopholes that were closed.

I can't even find what case that is, only a couple of posts on Rangers forums.

Re: The death of Scottish football?
 

i'll see if i can hunt the article down, pretty sure it was from the guardian, they either paid or didn't and yes rangers (murray) did continue to use the loophole, how'd you think rangers managed to pay martin bain 500+k a year for doing next to sweet f a and buying a crap load of sun tan lotion, all board of directors got the same treatment then you have the dick advocaat era and his unlimited cheque book

Re: The death of Scottish football?
 

You do mean Championship, not Champions League don't you? ;)