For or Against the Split?

[IcyTea]

Are you for or against the split?

At this moment in time (after the Livi game) I am against it, but if we had won the match and the Don's hadn't beaten Hibees I'm sure I would have been raving about it!!

My thoughts are:

For

- It was an exciting day for 3 sets of supporters this week and last.

- It stops match congestion with 12 teams in the league.

Against

- An uneven number of home/away fixtures

- Fans/Clubs unable to plan ahead for post-split matches as fixtures are decided after the last pre-split game.

[+Gringo]

100% against it. Totally unecessary and a pain in the erse. Nobody is able to organise their trips to games with transport or accomodation etc.

[Caley Fish]

I'm against it. Fair enough it gave us some excitement for the last few weeks but now the seasons effectively over and we're also getting ripped off by having more away games than home, although considering our recent home form maybe that isn't such a bad thing.

[Yngwie]

Totally in favour. Gives the mid table teams something to aim for. Creates more "6 pointers" in the last 5 games.

[DJS]

Each team should play each other 4 times - it's just the SPL forelock tugging to the Old Firm just in case they do have a run in Europe. If the lower leagues in England can play about 46 league games why can't we?

[Guest ICT]

100% for. The second half of our season would have been almost meaningless without the split.

As for those who complain about the odd extra home or away game against a particular team, remember prior to 1994 the old first and second divisions had 14 teams in each league and played each other 3 times a season. Don't remember too many complaints about that at the time.

I liked the 4 leagues of 10 we had about 5 years ago. Very neat. Get rid of County & Elgin and we could be back to that structure!

[Bridge_Ender]

Definitely for, the last few games would have been meaningless without it.

Take on board the point about travel plans, etc, though. That is an almighty pain in the *** when arranging around work/looking for cheap fares to games.

[Interthenet Jnr]

My solutions would be two things. You could go the way of the English Premiership and have division of 20 teams. I think this would help the Scottish game develop although it would be hard to know if Scotland has the qaulity and amount of teams to kick start a system that would then after run itself.

Or you could keep the split but allow that after the split has taken place teams from the bottom ca still over take the top. This means teams like Aberdeen this year would get the money from the big games but give way to a higher position in the league as almost certainly us or Motherwell would over take them.

[+The_Sponge]

Load of nonsense, any league where the team in 7th place can end up with more points than the one above them is a joke.

[Alex MacLeod]

Totally against. The split was brought in so the big boys could make more cash at the end of the season. We should have a sixteen team league where each plays the others twice. And a winter break to get away from mid week football.

[Stoneybridge]

I would also prefer a 16-18 team league. It might even give teams outside the OF a better chance of challenging for the championship if everyone only played the OF twice (less points to drop against them).

I can however see that the race for the split has made things exciting in the middle of the table which would obviously be a problem with a bigger league.

[Guest kingkojak]

am for the split in terms of mid table enertainment but its mickey mouse idea born purely from the OF dominance of the league.

more teams in the league = less OF fixtures per club = bigger incentive for smaller clubs to pull a cup shock style performance over the big two = more competetive league. IMO

[kencar]

The split did get us all excited for a few weeks I will admit that but now we are left with little to play for :(

There is also the loss of revenue from home ties against Hibs & Celtic coupled with the fact that we play an uneven number of home and away games

A bigger league would seem to be the sensible alternative which of course makes it unlikely to happen

[Mee]

I'm against it just now but ask me again this time next season :)

[Guest hm_murdock]

I am dead against it. I reckon if there was no split we may have been in with a chance of pushing for the intertoto even with the last couple of results. With the split our season is practically over.

[moraywanderer]

totally against the split.

message to SPL: get it sorted out sooner rather than later!!!!

[Beatonio]

76.2% against it, but Im not sure...

I say have a larger league of around 18-20 teams who play each other twice.

[Guest Murchie1]

You have to be against any system that financially discriminates against the bottom 6 clubs. We may have lost out on approx. £300,000+ .

[kaiser]

It's a load of bull, generates a ridiculous frenzy over one single place in the league - and what in effect is at stake - the prospect of getting to play the OF / Hearts again ( possibly at home ) and getting a financial reward.

It's also a bit cr@p that we will be away to Livi again in a matter of weeks, how exciting is that!? :?

[shawn_sheep]

The split has effectively ended our season 5 games from the end (again) but it could also be argued that without it our season would hav finished even earlier. Probably does result in a drop in revenue from crowds etc but would we have had a full home section vs aberdeen had it been a run of the mill 6th vs 7th clash? i, like a lot of people it seems, am split down the middle on it

[Guest stigofthedump]

My solutions would be two things. You could go the way of the English Premiership and have division of 20 teams. I think this would help the Scottish game develop although it would be hard to know if Scotland has the qaulity and amount of teams to kick start a system that would then after run itself.

Scotland doesn't have the fanbase (should that be homebase) to support 20 team topflight. We'd have a few part-time teams cropping up now and again. We're a big enough laughing stock as it is. (ie Alloa 0 OF scum 12, etc)

Or you could keep the split but allow that after the split has taken place teams from the bottom ca still over take the top. This means teams like Aberdeen this year would get the money from the big games but give way to a higher position in the league as almost certainly us or Motherwell would over take them.

So we'd have been aining to finish 7th 2 weeks ago? 5 games against lower league teams to qualify fo Europe? Are we really turning into self serving team/support? NO! Get real and keep it real.

[EWS]

It's a load of bull, generates a ridiculous frenzy over one single place in the league - and what in effect is at stake - the prospect of getting to play the OF / Hearts again ( possibly at home ) and getting a financial reward.

It's also a bit cr@p that we will be away to Livi again in a matter of weeks, how exciting is that!? :?

Might not be very exciting, but I will be there supporting ICT until the end. I can understand why the split was introduced, however other methods could have been taken against it. Increasing the number in the league is a bad idea, we just don't have enough teams at the moment, who would benefit from it. Do you really want to hear about the destruction of some poor small team (Airdrie, Forfar etc...) every week by the old firm. In the very long term it might increase the quality of these teams, but I think it would do more damage then good, and could possibly force the smaller clubs to go out of business.

Fans of teams like us (at the moment) are against the split because of our current position. The season has effectivly ended for us, and we have no goal (apart from 7th). What would you say about the supporters of Livingston or Dunfermline? Both clearly in the relegation area, and playing teams from the lower half, teams that they are more likely to beat. It would definatly set up a fantasticly entertaining battle for who gets relegated. We moan because of where we are, not because of the split itself.

What if we were to have a great season, then they get rid of the split and try to "forecase" where each team would finish and place us quite highly. We then have Rangers, Hearts, Hibs, Aberdeen and Celtic amongst the last games of our season. Yet we become poor, and are deep in the relegation battle. The SPL, thinking that an exciting end would increase revenue, put Dunfermline against St Mirren, Falkirk, Motherwell, Kilmarnock and Dundee Utd. Without the split, we go down, Dunfermline stay up. With the split, it is a much more evened and fair ending to the season.

[Mrs Pauliebee]

100% against - what a farce!

Agree with 16 team league. Would be good to get a regular Highland Derby back.

None of this p*sh either with relegation being decided in the law courts - keep it on the feckin pitch!

If you win the league you go up, if yer p*sh you go down - end off!

[Alex MacLeod]

With five games to go 7th is as high as we can get, even if we amass more points than teams above so we will get a payout for 7th place. We are prevented from gaining further places, thus gaining a bigger share of the cash because of the split. The split came about to guarantee a bigger share for the top teams at the expense of the lower ones. Tell me thats a fair way of running the league.

[Guest InvernessC***y THISTLE]

100% against

Last season one point seperated us from top 6 with the result that we could not be relegated but missed top 6 leaving us with no reason to play

OK we used the last few games to test out players but still seemed a farce

This year we miss out on top 6 with a mathematical ending of best 7th worst 8th so again what is there to play for

As suggested a larger league would solve everything and get rid of this farce