The SPL clubs and their chairmen are trying to protect their own interests and want more games against the bigger clubs - this isn't about reconstruction it is about how big the pie is and how many people are going to get a slice of it ...

That is the sole reason why league reconstruction that the fans want has never got off the ground - it is self preservation that is holding us back.

What is the alternatives? Promote Rangers to the second tier by jumping them ahead of 8 other teams? Delay the change until the next season? That would make all of next seasons div 3 games meaningless from the start so nothing gained there.
If we are moving to less divisions, these things have to happen
This does nothing to delay Rangers return to the top league so I really don't see the disadvantage.

The disadvantages are that Rangers built a squad to win that division - they paid handsomely for that and could find that they could have got 11 boys from the youth squad to achieve the very same thing by finishing last ... promotion.

TV rights were sold on these being competitive games - that doesn't seem to have been the case.

If you were a season ticket holder and found out you had spunked out thousands of your hard earned cash believing you were watching a competitive match only to find out that they were in fact just a serious of bounce games - how would you feel??

Do you agree with these league reconstruction plans btw and why aren't fans being given a say in all of this when they were invited to decide the fate of one of their members not so long ago?? Do you think the chairmen will be holding meetings to find out what the preferred route they want in this reconstruction process or will they just do as they please??

Have you seen McCoists comments from today? fair to say you want to be fast tracked up the leagues.

Cheers, mate! Made me laugh anyway

I agree that reconstruction is needed. I am afraid in this instance the fans are not right. An 18 team top league is not sustainable with Scotlands current finances.
12, 12, 18 might not be the perfect answer but it is not a reason to chuck the toys and threaten to quit either.

If this gets voted in, it would be better if started 2014/15 season as everyone would know where they stand & it would've made the last 5 months of league football worthwhile.

It's self-preservation that's driving the movement for league expansion. It's an incredibly popular idea among fans of teams like Kilmarnock who are afraid of relegation and fans of clubs in the First Division who want to shoehorn their way into the SPL.

Rather than saying that, of course, they'll justify it with fluffy nonsense about youth development and argue that playing one team four times a season is a fate worse than death (when actually everything we know about football fans suggests they'd rather watch their team play bigger sides than the likes of Cowdenbeath).

Is it really better that the whole div three season in 2013/14 is played out as a load of meaningless games? At least if it comes in next season, this season up to now will have had competitive action. Better 3 months of meaningless matches than a full season surely.

Surely there should be a system of playoffs though to decide who gets into the championship next season though.

This would mean there is a chance for the teams of division 3, to playoff into the championship. They wouldn't jump ahead of anyone in division 2 though, they would have to playoff against them!

Something like this:

Match 1: Playoff winners Division 3 v 7th Division 2
Match 2: Champions Division 3 v 8th Division 2

Match 3: Winners Match 1 v 5th Division 2
Match 4: Winners Match 2 v 6th Division 2

Match 5: Winners Match 3 v 4th Division 2
Match 6: Winners Match 4 v 3rd Division 2

Match 7: Winners match 5 v 2nd Division 2
Match 8: Winners Match 6 v 10th Division 1

or something like this!

It gives the teams in division 3, teams in division 2, even the team relegated from division 1 a chance to get into the championship.

Would sevco be moaning if reconstruction meant they were fast tracked to the top division? Of course not!! They expected change but thought it would see them fast tracked. Green probably told his secret investors that the newco would be in the top division next season.

Not to mention Ian Black & Co who have been boasting to their 'mates' that they would be in Scotland's premier division next season

Why? To borrow a phrase from Charles Green, what other league in Europe has a mechanism to allow teams from the fourth tier to jump two divisions?

They are still going to get back to the SPL in the same timespan although ESPN likely quitting Scottish Football maybe significant in how this pans out

Agree another six teams below the standard of Dundee would not solve any problems

First home win of the season for Dumbarton. You never know we might just escape the drop. Three points adrift , but we games in hand

Ian Murray seems to be doing a good job at The Rock.


I was going to go to the Arbroath v Alloa game today, it was postponed 10 minutes after I got on the train after passing an earlier pitch inspection. Only found out at the ground at 5 to 3. £20 down the drain.

Don't know if you guys know, but a Rangers fan died today at the game. Apprently of a heart attack.

Very sad.

Just saw that. Terribly sad

Sad news. RIP to the fan.

good result for dumbarton,

the mighty ton are back on top of the league after beating falkirk

I thought ESPN had denied they would quit?

It seems that Green was promised a hand up the leagues with reconstruction, this is what he promised players that were signed, investors and meant he could confidentaly predict that the new club would never play in the SPL.

It seems that these promises meant nothing

Terribly sad news, what makes it worse is, it seems his father died the day previous.

I hope his family can take some small comfort that he died doing something he loved, watching football at Ibrox.

I can't seem to find anywhere that gives proper detail of the split.

Will those in the top and bottom splits keep their points totals from the first part of the season. What happens in the middle split? Surely they won't re-set to 0 because that would be incredibly unfair on the league leaders.

With them losing the EPL I think it's pretty much sat in stone they will give up the SPL