Le'us Alone!

I had planned to do an article last week on referee’s assistants from the opposite sex, which are gradually creeping into the local game. In the light of what happened nationally, maybe it was good thing that I got drunk instead and didn’t write that article. So to my lecture from my soap box for this week and it concerns the decision by our esteemed officials at I.F.A. headquarters to review the structure of our leagues. Association managing director Howard Wells said on National TV, that they had no plans as such to reduce the number of teams in the Premier league to 12 or 10. What a load of bullshit he spouted tonight, saying things like we need to get sponsors on board and maybe if we can get the set-up correct, we can get more money from the government. It all comes down to money in the end and Wells & Co are just jumping through the ‘hoops’ held by Belfast’s big two, who are looking for at least one more ‘big gate’ each, in a reduced Premier league. Certain criteria while have to be in place in order for clubs to participate in the new set-up, but what this entails is anybody’s guess. No doubt it’ll be whatever the ‘big two’ tell them, because they can do nothing without their say so. Linfield and Glentoran are the teams with pull and they are exerting it now and if it’s at the expense of one or two clubs they don’t give a hoot. I’m all for progress but going back to a 10 or 12 team league is not progress in my book. In fact it would be a backward step, didn’t we have a 12 team league before and it didn’t work, so why need we switch to one now, that is not progress no matter which way you look at it. At the moment we have three or four teams who tend to dominate our league, that will not change with the advent of a 10 or 12 team league, in fact they will still dominate and the result will be apathy from the other teams, whose fans will pick and choose which matches to attend. As the old saying goes, ‘if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it’, throw the Blues and Glens a bone, introduce a Belfast cup or something and maybe they’ll leave the rest of us to get on with our lives. Leave the league as it is and instead of streamlining it try and encourage more people to attend games and don’t undermine those who do!