SFSA – The independent voice of Scottish football supporters

SFSA to survey supporters and speak to SPFL in relation to league reconstruction

Date: 9th April 2020

In light of the SPFL decision asking clubs to vote on the termination of the Championship, League 1 and League 2, we have been inundated with messages from members proposing the best way forward.

The supporters are the key stakeholder for each of our 42 league clubs and we believe that they must have an input on the resolution to the crisis we are currently facing.

Therefore, in the coming days we will be writing to both the SFA and SPFL which we will share publicly.

In addition, we will act to give supporters a collective voice through formally surveying fans in relation to league reconstruction.

In the meantime, the following letter was sent into us by a member detailing their views on league reconstruction:

The Plan

The current structure has 42 teams in four divisions. The Premiership has 12 teams playing 38 games. The other three leagues have 10 teams playing 36 games. At the bottom of the pyramid are the Highland and Lowland leagues.

 

The four divisions should be reorganised into three leagues of 16 teams playing 36 games as follows:

 

  1. The Premiership (top tier) would consist of the current 12 teams plus the top four teams from the current Championship (currently Dundee United, Inverness Caledonian Thistle, Dundee, and Ayr United).
  2. The Championship (second tier) would consist of the bottom six teams in the current Championship plus the 10 teams that currently make up League One.
  3. The New Combination League (third tier) would comprise all of the teams currently in League Two plus the top three teams in the Highland and Lowland Leagues (currently Brora Rangers, Inverurie, Fraserburgh, Kelty Hearts, Bonnyrigg Rose, and East Stirlingshire).
  4. Each team in all three leagues would play home and away against each other giving 30 games.
  5. The clubs would play a further six seeded matches against the teams in their immediate group of four based on the previous season’s finishing positions. Thus the current top four in the Premiership (Celtic, Rangers, Motherwell, and Aberdeen) would play six matches against each other home and away. The same would apply to the next group of four (Livingstone, Hibernian, St Johnstone, and Kilmarnock) and so on.
  6. The additional six seeded matches could take place as the opening three matches and the closing three matches. This potentially could lead to an exciting finale to the league race in all three divisions. Clubs would also be competing during the season to finish as high up the leagues as they can to improve their seeded positions for the following season.

 

Finally, there is the very real possibility that the new season 2020/21 will require to be shortened as a result of the current crisis if football cannot restart until the late autumn (October/November). The revised league structure of 16 team leagues would enable the SPFL to introduce an abbreviated league season of only 30 matches if this was deemed appropriate in its inaugural season.

 

I hope the above revised league structure does merit serious consideration by the SPFL. As I stated at the outset it ensures that no club in the professional league will be disadvantaged and therefore stands a reasonable chance of obtaining widespread support amongst all of the clubs in the league.

 

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