Yesterday, the SPFL slammed the door firmly shut on one of the worst policy ideas in recent years: the suggestion that we should expand the SPFL to 14 or 16 teams.
Now, I know this is an idea that has a lot of support out there. I know a lot of people have gotten behind it. But for me, it would have been a disaster. I’ve looked at it from every angle, and none of them look even remotely credible—except the one where the league splits into two groups of seven, and that’s a mess on all its own.
Expansion of the top flight is dead.
And as far as I’m concerned, this is an idea that should never have reared its ugly head in the first place. We need to be playing fewer games. We don’t need to be inventing other problems for ourselves and complicating this league more than it already is, because this is a stupidly complicated league—with the split one of the most farcical things going on anywhere in European football.
I have no way of knowing how Celtic voted on this. There are conflicting reports. Some suggest that Celtic were in favour of an expanded league, others that we were in favour of a 10-team top flight. What I do know is that we certainly didn’t want things to remain the way they are.
It’s an atrocious situation we’re in, and that’s the only thing everyone agrees on.
Yet we can’t agree on a way forward.
Managers of every shame and stripe, including our own, have come out and called for the league to be extended.
That’s because managers, by and large, are bored playing the same teams so many times in a season. They like a bit of variance and variation. But our board has to think beyond that—towards what is commercially viable and towards what the TV companies are willing to pay for.
I don’t believe there’s any scenario under which the TV companies would have preferred a 14 or 16-team top flight in Scotland, even if you found a way to guarantee that the Glasgow derbies would still be played every year.
That’s something a lot of people say is a critical part of the TV contracts—but quite how they would enforce that in circumstances where, say, another Ibrox club crashed and burned again and weren’t in the league, I do not know. Sporting integrity itself dictates that such a clause is virtually impossible to defend, and it’s a dereliction of duty for any governing body to sign a deal like that.
But the derby matches aren’t the issue, and they’ve never been the issue. Nobody wants to watch the team in 8th place play the team in 9th place when there’s nothing at stake in that game. It’s a simple fact.
Which TV company is going to shell out for that? Which television company would be mad enough to put a game like that on the air?
You couldn’t even get the fans of those two clubs interested in that tie if it was the dog-end of a season when nothing else was going on.
By its very nature, the 10-team league creates jeopardy.
It creates jeopardy at the top, in the middle, and at the bottom. The teams at the top are supposedly fighting for the title—well, that would be us, winning it comfortably—but it does create jeopardy in the middle.
The teams that are there are probably playing for Europe. Those that aren’t playing for European places are concerned that they might fall into the relegation zone.
And the relegation zone itself? Well, hell, that turns into a free-for-all… and that makes for dramatic events. Dramatic events make good television.
And that’s what lands the big deals.
A 10-team league will be no guarantee of a better TV contract. But a 14 or 16-team league would certainly go some way towards guaranteeing a smaller one. The 12-team league just isn’t working. TV companies don’t want to shell out for it, and there are far too many games. The split makes us a backwater—and that’s the last thing we should ever be getting sold as. The SPFL top flight is a joke.
It’s good that this proposal has been defeated—this particular proposal anyway. But there will be others. There will be other crazy proposals as time goes by, because everybody knows that what we have here in the game is completely unsustainable.
It is not working. And the mess we’re in is certainly partly of our own making, because we’ve allowed a bad situation to develop over far too long, and we’ve propped up some of the worst people working in football.
Celtic is not to blame for every problem in the game or for everything that hasn’t been fixed. But we are the strongest club in the country. We are the last standing superpower. And had we led a reform agenda years back, we could have made it work. In the aftermath of 2012, the door to reform was wide open—and nobody wanted to push it. So here we are, in a bad situation, which is getting worse.
There was no realistic prospect of top-flight reform in this cycle. Those pushing for a larger league were never going to get their way.
Those pushing for a smaller one weren’t either.
There’ll be a lot of bickering, bitching and moaning in the days to come—I’ve no doubt about that—and there may even be some finger-pointing in our direction. In the end, it doesn’t really matter whose fault it is. We are where we are. Scottish football has gotten itself into a bad place and there’s no end in sight.
It’s funny if they didn’t give Sevco what Sevco demanded and give it to them the day before tomorrow at that…
Then again – It’s the club’s that voted and not the bent and corrupt SFA / SPFL I suppose !
It doesn’t matter how many teams are in the league, it’s a one horse race. There is no restructure that will make the league more competitive. No-one other than Celtic fans is tuning in to watch us routinely beating teams 4 or 5 nil.
TV companies don’t care about relegation battles in Scotland that’s why there isn’t a single bottom 6 game being shown by SKY before the season ends.
There are far too many clubs in our league set up, a league that calls itself professional and yet over half the teams are part-time lol.
It could become very much more competitive if Gate money was split on 50:50 basis after policing, stewarding costs etc were deducted…
But wheather Celtic and Sevco would be up for that plan is altogether another thing indeed…
I simply couldn’t see it happening but it would certainly make things more competitive as they were before home teams kept all !
Clach, that used to be the case(not sure of how it was split but think it was 50:50 after costs) but this stopped late seventies/early eighties. IMO, when the smaller clubs got a reasonable income they could afford better players and made the league a bit more interesting. That said, I want Celtic to have as big an icome as possible to allow us to buy better players. A two edged sword I think and not one that is easily solved.
Indeed, indeed Incorparation !
If we have to pander to TV. Companies then we are on a loser. What we need is bums on seats, to encourage people to attend games and not to restrict tickets to the larger fan bases. Would this allow more money into the coffers of the lesser teams? Would it allow players to play against the better sides if league was expanded to say 18 teams and would it allow Celtic for instance to blood some of our younger lads either against or on loan to the lesser sides in the league rather than have them play in Lowland League.
Fans and players are becoming bored with the current set up and either fail in the case of the former to attend or move on in the case of the latter. Fans are being fleeced too with some of the pricing, especially when parents want to introduce their youngsters to the game, no longer the lifting over that got my boys and come to think of it even myself into going to the football. Something needs to change and those at the top or owners of clubs need to get the business head on or the situation will deteriorate further.
There are plenty of bums on seats at Celtic Park and a long waiting list ready to replace them, so it is not an issue for Celtic. As regards the rest of the Clubs, I don’t really give a monkees, they would rather have empty seats than fill them with travelling Celtic fans, so they can go and do one.
We are stuck with the league as it is, there is no choice.
Have to disagree, I don’t think it’s fair to say fans of teams have no care about a game near the end of the season. Does that mean nobody cares about any of our remaining games for the season because the title is won. Should we just start ending seasons once positions are mathematically set.
Most people I know will watch any game of football if it’s on TV because it’s a match to watch.
I was for the expanded league. I think 16 teams would have been perfect. 30 Domestic league games a season. Plus cup fixtures. would see us have a massive reduction in fixture congestion.
Again with the TV deals you make a valid point but the only way to build the revenue back up is to change the status quo.
Instead of just signing off to joe bloggs tv deal, actually compile a deal where only one subscription is needed for all league games. Why not propose to the likes of Prime. Celtic should be contacting Prime to get eyes on the club & Scottish football as a whole but that’s not the mentality of anyone in this country. Don’t let any outsiders in. If this Rangers takeover happens it’s the sort of things these American investors will push for to build revenue.
Look at Wrexham, yes it’s easier to push a club in England when they are looking to reach the premier league but the coverage has brought them on field success being the first team in english football league history to have 3 consecutive promotions.
Scotland is a dinosaur nation & even the progressive thinkers are dinosaurs themselves.
As I said when this was previously covered I don’t believe I would watch the league if it was reduced to 10 teams. Watching us do exactly what we are doing now but with less teams just sounds shit. One step closer to the end of scottish football.
Jay – before you get battered by the Welsh, Wrexham isn’t in England!
I actually think the 12 team League is about the best we can hope for, 14,16 or 18 would result in too many dead rubber games. A 10 team League would probably work but with 11 votes from 12 needed to push this through it won’t happen anytime soon.
Per head of population Scotland have the most fans attending games anywhere in Europe,
The problem for our League is the shxt TV contract and that is because the EPL syphons all TV money in the UK into their coffers. With around 8% of the UK population Scottish Football should get 8% of the money from the subscriptions Sky receives, but as in other areas of the economy, we are part of the UK only when it suits the powers that be.
The only long term answer for Scottish Football, is a European Pyramid League system sometime in the distant future. UEFA’s new format of European tournaments could be the early beginnings of such a set up, but expect some pushback from the so called super clubs of Europe as they would want to protect their elite status.
50/50 gate money could help the competitiveness in the SPFL but it would dilute even further the quality, as Celtic and The Rangers would be poorer and could be brought down to the level of Aberdeen, Hibs or Hearts. In fact Celtic and The Rangers supporters would be subsidising Scottish Football even more than they do now.
The two teams in Scotland’s Capitol City along with a one City team like Aberdeen should be better supported, they shouldn’t rely on the two giant clubs in the West of Scotland to subsidise them.