Dont understand why they suggest 16-10-16 ?
I havent read too much on it other than the summaries, but I assume the 16 team leagues would be 1H/1A for a total of 30 games? and the 10 league would be 2H/2A for a total of 36? Bit of a nightmare to manage fixtures there, especially if you wanted to establish another cup or something to add a few more games to bring it back up to the same sort of total as there is now.
Why not just go for 16-16-16 (or 16-16 + 8-8 north/south regional for bottom tier) and invite in 6 ambitious clubs from the juniors or other leagues? Lets face it, with the exception of Gretna, every team added in the last 18 years has done pretty well, especially ICT and County, and even those that havent reached our heights have done at the very least, no worse than some of the perpetual bottom feeders that have been around for 100+ years !
However, for me, the crucial thing is not the league setup itself, but how we manage the entire game.
We need a single governing body. I dont care if its the SFL, SPL or SFA, but they need to merge or two of them need to go. The SFA would be a logical choice for this role as they are the defined governing body for Scotland with both FIFA and UEFA.
We need a proper pricing policy for tickets, perhaps with the governing body setting a maximum ticket price for each division. Dwindling crowds and higher prices are both cause and effect for each other. Lower crowds mean higher prices to break even for clubs, but higher prices mean lower crowds .... if we dont reverse that spiral, anything else is irrelevant.
We do need to pay heed to UEFA club licensing so we do need to keep certain stadium (and other) criteria, but internally we should be a bit more lenient with clubs. If clubs want terracing in the lower leagues, great, no problem. If they want it in the higher leagues then that should be allowed too, and for those in European competition, that would have to be safe standing areas. Lets encourage clubs to develop their infrastructure, and lets remove the barriers currently in place that mean those aspiring to the SPL have to rush to develop their ground before they have even won D1 .... Give them a full season in the SPL (or equivalent) and allow them to use the increased revenue to help offset that cost.
Youth development has to be one of the cornerstones of any new administrative structure. I would not go as far as to say clubs must list 'X' number of U21s in their squad, but every club should have some form of youth development as a clearly defined requirement.
For smaller, lower league clubs, it may be something as simple as the club having a tie-in with local schools or youth groups and sending players to coaching sessions or holding them after school. As many players would be part-time, perhaps this could be tied in with the players themselves getting monetary or qualification credits towards recognised coaching credentials as an incentive. For more senior teams, they should have a more organised structure, perhaps their own youth team(s) playing against other club teams (in their area), and for the top tier teams, they should have a fully developed youth structure with multiple teams and ultimately it would be nice for all to have an Academy but that may be a leap.
Rather than have the youth teams play and travel at weird days and times, perhaps they could also be scheduled to have a game against the same opposition as the senior side, on the same day and maybe even at the same stadium either before or after the senior match (provided its not a night game and timing is an issue). Not only would this reduce costs for separate travel, but perhaps it would increase the value for money for fans who could watch the youths play included in the price of their ticket, and would also give the youths experience of playing in proper stadia in front of fans instead of at training grounds or local parks. To pay for increased focus on youth, clubs should perhaps consider diverting a percentage of transfer income to this, and the league itself should establish a youth fund to be distributed to clubs on a yearly basis for defined projects in youth development (like establishing an academy). Eventually, the youth setup would be self financing for some clubs as good young players would emerge and be sold on, with some of the money going back into the coffers to develop the next set of youths ....
My final suggestion is likely to get a torrent of derision .... but perhaps the league should also consider a salary cap ??? Clubs in each division would have a ceiling they could not go above, and have to manage their squad within that ceiling. Clubs who wish to go above the cap (eg Celtic and Rangers no doubt) would be allowed to do so (within reason) but would have to divert an additional fee equivalent to a significant percentage of that overspend directly to the league. that money would be used to help fund the aforementioned youth development as well as distributed to other clubs as "equalisation" payments ..... levelling the playing field a little bit as it were.
My last two suggestions (Youth Development and Salary) come almost directly from MLS. A league which imploded once already and which, this time round, decided to control growth to a slow and steady pace by managing costs and trying to ensure no teams were able to outspend each other to become a dominant force (although LA and NY seem to be allowed to do whatever they want, but thats another story).
In MLS you must have an academy or you dont get in. Toronto FC had 6 academy graduates in their squad last year with 2 or 3 of them winning international caps or junior international caps and those same 2 or 3 being regulars in the side on merit. Although player contracts in MLS are owned by the league not the clubs, if these players are ever sold to a team outside MLS, TFC will retain a significant portion of the fee but must use a lot of it for youth development or infrastructure improvements..... Rangers actually paid for TFC to rip up the original artificial turf at BMO Stadium and replace it with grass ... all from the proceeds of the sale of Maurice Edu to them ! In terms of salary, the MLS system is hard to fathom, but there is a cap and you cannot go above that. you can sign up to three 'designated players' above the cap with only $350,000 counting towards your cap and the rest being paid by the club (Beckham and Thierry Henry both get about $5m for example and even Barry Robson got $600K for half a season) but if you do sign a third DP, then you also have to pay a substantial fee to the league that is distributed to clubs where the owners may not be so rich and cannot afford to pay for high salary DPs ... an equalisation payment in other words. Seems to work here, so with a bit of tinkering, perhaps it could be one of the checks and balances Scottish Football could use to get itself back on its feet again ?