Would Scottish football become better or worse without the old firm ?

[Ship of Hope]

The notion that tv money revenue would drop if OF left may not be as bad as some imagine. Correct me if I’m wrong but do the uglies not get 40% of existing deal between them with remaining 60% split between everyone else? My preference would be they stayed but to restructure / start again with top two divisions of 12 teams splitting 8/8/8.. top 8 title/europe, bottom 4 and top four fighting it out for relegation/promotion, third 8 playing to avoid relegation from second tier. All points returned to zero when leagues split and play home and away for prizes. All prize money split evenly in each pot (top 8 teams prize money is the same no matter whether finish 1st or 8th.) And of course an equal division of tv money. I personally enjoy the bigger games and the bile the old firm spout is just a stick to bash them with and makes beating them all the sweeter. Hopefully we get some new investment and can be more competitive against them more regularly. The clubs should be thinking now how to revise the tv deal as the time to make changes is before the next one is negotiated.

[GreenCastle]

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Of course. I'm realistic about the problems Celtic and Rangers leaving would present.

I just don't think there would be a catastrophic desertion by fans though. Fans through the gate in Scotland really isn't driven by the quality of football on show in the same way it is for a not insignificant percentage in England. We don't have all that many people paying top whack for the experience or to take a picture of an opposing player celebrating.

As I said previously in the thread if quality of football on show was the biggest driver of attendances in Scotland then most of us would have walked away a long, long time ago. I think the St Mirren figures above show that the quality of opposition is largely irrelevant as well; no fan of St Mirren (or Hibs for that matter) is more inclined to go to a game v Celtic or Rangers because they get to see Kyogo or Cantwell any more than they want to go to a game v Aberdeen to see Shinnie. I'm no more inclined to go to ER if it's one of those 2 in town, I'd go as far as to say I see it as more of a chore these days, particularly Rangers. A game against Aberdeen this weekend is far more appealing.

There is plenty to consider if Celtic and Rangers were to go, sadly including the loss of their travelling supports. I just don't think loss of support among the clubs own fanbases is one of those problems. Again to go back to what I said earlier my experience meeting younger guys at lower league and non league games is that supporting a local club is pretty cool again and it's jumping on the OF or EPL bandwagon that is seen as a bit naff.

100% agree.

I go to watch Hibs - I rarely who think maybe playing for the opposition unless it was Barca or Villa but the Old Firm players - zero interest.

Could even say I get more excited seeing an ex Hibs player come back than an old firm player.

[GreenCastle]

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I think we should all apply to join the English league. Playing every season with the prospect of promotion or relegation is an exciting prospect.

We’d probably bounce between leagues 1 and the championship, but we would become a far better investment prospect and would break the old firm tedium. Possibilities are greater than they are here imho.

Not sure the FA would accept us though and the antiquated ‘jobs for the boys‘ SFA would look to preserve itself.

Not the worst idea but few issues..

Chance of Europe ever happening again would be near impossible.

We could lose the Edinburgh Derby.

Some crazy long away trips = cost.

Club costs would go up as players would need to stay over night before most away games.

Finally playing lower English tier to then get promoted would take several years to get us anywhere remotely close to a decent level. It would be harder to get out these leagues than we realise.

[Eyrie]

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I think we should all apply to join the English league. Playing every season with the prospect of promotion or relegation is an exciting prospect.

We’d probably bounce between leagues 1 and the championship, but we would become a far better investment prospect and would break the old firm tedium. Possibilities are greater than they are here imho.

Not sure the FA would accept us though and the antiquated ‘jobs for the boys‘ SFA would look to preserve itself.

Gods, no.

We may start a season with the prospect of promotion or relegation but by Christmas it would be clear how our season is going, and that may well be the tedium of meaningless mid-table matches.

And given how cut throat the Championship is down south, it would require a massive investment to make any difference to our prospects compared to what would make a difference up here.

[Eyrie]

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The notion that tv money revenue would drop if OF left may not be as bad as some imagine. Correct me if I’m wrong but do the uglies not get 40% of existing deal between them with remaining 60% split between everyone else? My preference would be they stayed but to restructure / start again with top two divisions of 12 teams splitting 8/8/8.. top 8 title/europe, bottom 4 and top four fighting it out for relegation/promotion, third 8 playing to avoid relegation from second tier. All points returned to zero when leagues split and play home and away for prizes. All prize money split evenly in each pot (top 8 teams prize money is the same no matter whether finish 1st or 8th.) And of course an equal division of tv money. I personally enjoy the bigger games and the bile the old firm spout is just a stick to bash them with and makes beating them all the sweeter. Hopefully we get some new investment and can be more competitive against them more regularly. The clubs should be thinking now how to revise the tv deal as the time to make changes is before the next one is negotiated.

I've been in favour of a 12/12-8/8/8 format since the late 80s as it creates a far more fluid promotion/relegation situation so going down isn't the disaster it is at present. That in turn means we'd play more varied opposition over the course of 2-3 seasons than at present and the only teams we'd face four times (of which only two are at Easter Road) are the teams we'd be directly competing against which keeps it interesting.

I wouldn't reset the points entirely for the 8/8/8 but instead would start teams with one point for each win they had during the 12/12 against other teams in their 8/8/8.

I'd also keep higher prize money for higher placings, but without the big advantage to the top two places that we have at present.

Below the 12/12-8/8/8 I'd merge and regionalise the First and Second divisions to reduce travel costs. The winners of Division North and Division South get automatic promotion and the third promotion place goes to the winner of a play off following two 2nd vs 3rd semis.

[A Hi-Bee]

Get them both to **** out of Scotland the atillas can go to NornIrelend while the smellic can go south to Eire.
Simples, we can then watch football as it was meant to be.

[Yorkshire HFC]

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Get them both to **** out of Scotland the atillas can go to NornIrelend while the smellic can go south to Eire.
Simples, we can then watch football as it was meant to be.

I don't understand how getting rid of the two best teams will make Scottish football better.

Is it not the responsibility of the other teams to get better?

[Brightside]

I’m watching hearts v killie. It’s awful stuff. Anyone thinking we’d get any kind of tv deal for this dross is in dream land.

[cubehindthegoal]

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I don't understand how getting rid of the two best teams will make Scottish football better.

Is it not the responsibility of the other teams to get better?

I think your argument makes the case for better actually, as it’s completely impossible for other teams to get sufficiently better to win the league due to the stranglehold of the old firm, which has only grown since the eighties - when Aberdeen and Dundee Utd rose to the challenge for a few years, only for the rangers, then celtic following, to up the ante so it suppressed any (then) current and future uprising of the minions.

[Eyrie]

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I don't understand how getting rid of the two best teams will make Scottish football better.

Is it not the responsibility of the other teams to get better?

I understand how getting rid of the two bigot teams will make Scottish football better.

I understand how getting rid of the two mega spending teams will make Scottish football better.

It's the responsibility of the other teams to get rid of them.

[A Hi-Bee]

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I don't understand how getting rid of the two best teams will make Scottish football better.

Is it not the responsibility of the other teams to get better?

From the level playing field that is Scottish football, sorry but you dont know what you speak about.

[GreenCastle]

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I’m watching hearts v killie. It’s awful stuff. Anyone thinking we’d get any kind of tv deal for this dross is in dream land.

We don’t get many non old firm games anyway on TV so not much difference.

No one is saying Scottish would be amazing if old firm left but it would be more enjoyable and less of a dead rubber every season.

Do folk genuinely enjoy games against them getting beat more often than not.

Ok the odd occasion we have a Boyle hatrick game which are brilliant but they are rare sadly.

[Brightside]

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We don’t get many non old firm games anyway on TV so not much difference.

No one is saying Scottish would be amazing if old firm left but it would be more enjoyable and less of a dead rubber every season.

Do folk genuinely enjoy games against them getting beat more often than not.

Ok the odd occasion we have a Boyle hatrick game which are brilliant but they are rare sadly.

Yeh but our tv sales come from the old firm is my point. It’s a nice idea but I don’t see anything commercially sensible in removing the 2 biggest globally supported clubs from our league.

[cubehindthegoal]

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Yeh but our tv sales come from the old firm is my point. It’s a nice idea but I don’t see anything commercially sensible in removing the 2 biggest globally supported clubs from our league.

I don’t have the facts to hand, but I’m guessing the old firm get the majority of the tv money split over the 12 clubs … so if the sum remaining for the other ten clubs was compared to a new tv deal without the old firm … I wonder, would we get that much less per non-old firm club?

As I say I don’t have the facts n figures … but would be worth considering. And of course finances aside, I’ve been once away to the home grounds of each of these two, fair few years ago, and vowed never to return to each after each game. And I haven’t. That means more than money ever will, in my view.