The Football Thread

[marlon]

Originally Posted by qwerty007

WOW!

BTW - the old 4th division, is that the Blue Square non-conf today?

Way off. Are you being serious? Is that a serious question? If it is, then..

No it's the 2nd division today.

Fact is stranger than fiction,

Old 1st division= Premiership

Old 2nd = Championship

Old 3rd = 1st division

Old 4th = 2nd division

you then below that you have the non-Football League

the Blue Square sponsored

Conference Premier

Conference North and Conference South

Go figure.

It's all about image, marketing and nothing to do with MONEY! Apparently.

[lovegod]

wELL done the tangerines.... Stan Mathews would have been proud of you

Blackpool... wot a venue for the Prem League fans...
wot a weekend !.... that's if any of the away fans have a chance
of getting into that tiny ground !
avge attendance 9000 !
still, a lot of fans will travel up there anyway just for
a wild weekend in Blackpool .

[qwerty007]

Originally Posted by marlon

Way off. Are you being serious? Is that a serious question? If it is, then..

No it's the 2nd division today.

Fact is stranger than fiction,

Old 1st division= Premiership

Old 2nd = Championship

Old 3rd = 1st division

Old 4th = 2nd division

you then below that you have the non-Football League

the Blue Square sponsored

Conference Premier

Conference North and Conference South

Go figure.

It's all about image, marketing and nothing to do with MONEY! Apparently.

Notice what he said;

in 2000-2001, the old 4th division...being a Canuck, I thought; Prem, Champ plus 4...which would be the north and south...in my rum soaked mind!

[Mal Hombre]

I notice the candidates for the labour leadership,trampling each other in the rush to distance themselves from the Iraq war,wasn't so long ago that if You objected to it , you were an appeaser or worse.How times change.

[marlon]

Originally Posted by Jeff Vader

Bloomfield Road has a capacity of 9,491 - difficult to get a ticket for away games so !

Originally Posted by lovegod

wELL done the tangerines.... Stan Mathews would have been proud of you

Blackpool... wot a venue for the Prem League fans...
wot a weekend !.... that's if any of the away fans have a chance
of getting into that tiny ground !
avge attendance 9000 !
still, a lot of fans will travel up there anyway just for
a wild weekend in Blackpool .

Current capacity is actually 12,555, though the ground did once hold just over 38,000!

A helluva lot more Blackpool fans were at Wembley yesterday than they get for their average home game,

Average attendences

2009-2010: 8,611 (Championship League - second lowest in the division!)
2008-2009: 7,843 (Championship League)
2007-2008: 8,861 (Championship League)
2006-2007: 6,877 (League One)

which suggests that when they have rebuilt the fourth side of the ground increasing the capacity to 16,000 there might be more away tickets than you think! You can just hear supporters up and down the country saying 'Lets make a weekend of it'..

Interestingly the highest Championship average attendence for 2009-10 was Newcastle United with 43,383 - which is more than Liverpool (42,863) and Chelsea (41,422) in the Premiership - and which would place Newcastle as fourth highest average attendence in the top league!

[snowy25]

Considering Blackpool were expected to be in the dogfight for relegation and they put a bonus clause into Holloway's contract in the hope he would keep them in the Championship, I think it's amazing they got promoted.

As I said before they may well lose every game, be relegated in record time, but they won the right to be in the Premier League and anyone saying there shouldn't be there is not really a football fan. This is what football is all about, smaller clubs getting the chance to face the big clubs, enabling their fans to visit the big grounds and to use the experience to build a stronger future, player wise and club wise.

I have no doubt they will come back down, they will probably be on the end of some record breaking scores, but in the end in terms of financial security, the promotion to the Premier League , will keep Blackpool alive for a very long time. In total, if they get relegated at the first opportunity, they will still make around £140 million over 5 years. Obviosuly the club, manager and fans want the team to stay up, but struggling in the Premier league and all the relegation benefits surely outweighs a possible struggle to keep the same form next season in the Championship as a lot of teams recently that fell at the final hurdle have struggled the following season.

[marlon]

Originally Posted by qwerty007

Notice what he said;

in 2000-2001, the old 4th division...being a Canuck, I thought; Prem, Champ plus 4...which would be the north and south...in my rum soaked mind!

Pardon me if my response seemed sarcastic - not intended.

It is even more complicated than I stated.

The Football League was formed in 1888 with 12 teams, over the years it expanded to 4 'divisions'. In 1992 the old first division teams broke away from the other three divisions and formed the ' FA Premier League (often referred to as 'The Premiership' - primarily to monopolise the TV revenue which had previously been shared between the 4 divisions more equally. This is where it gets complicated. A few years later the remaining Football League divisions - which had been renamed 1st, 2nd and 3rd divisions following the split - reformatted and were renamed as 'The Championship' (originally the 2nd division, then the 1st division when the Prem split), the 1st division (originally the 3rd division, then the 2nd division when the Prem split), and the 2nd division (originally the 4th division, then the 3rd division following the Prem split). See, it gets VERY complicated, but basically we still have four fully recognised divisions as before - simply put only the names of each division has changed!

We also have various 'non-league' levels - which are governed by the FA within the football 'pyramid' system - which over the years have become integrated into the league system with automatic promotion and relegation between each level. The Blue Square Conference is in effect the 5th division or 5th 'level'. The Conference North and Conference South make up the 6th level. Most Conference teams are professional.

Next down from the Football Conference there are three regional leagues, which are semi-professional leagues each associated with different geographical areas. They include the Northern Premier League (which covers the north of England and north Wales), Southern Football League (which covers southern England, the Midlands and south Wales) and the Isthmian League (which covers the south east). All of the leagues have a Premier Division (Level 7) with two parallel divisions below (Level 8).

Level 9 contains the top divisions of a large group of sub-regional leagues. Each of these leagues has a different divisional set up, but they all have one thing in common - there are yet more leagues below them! Each covering smaller and smaller geographical levels.

In all there are 11 'nationally recognised' levels of league. Each team in the top 10 levels compete for the FA Cup - hence some amateur (unpaid) teams - if successful in qualifying rounds - can end up playing the 'big' Football League and even the Premiership teams in the competition.

Below these levels are further levels which are organised on a regional and county basis.

In all there are more than 140 leagues, containing more than 480 divisions. The exact number of clubs varies from year to year as clubs join and leave leagues or fold altogether, but an estimated average of 15 clubs per division suggests that more than 7,000 clubs are members of a league in the English football league system, all governed by the FA.

These levels do not include reserve/2nd team leagues, school leagues, ladies leagues, etc.

Football is by far the biggest paticipatory sport in the country.

[jokerman]

Watching the England game.
Mexico can't defend set pieces. We can't defend full stop.
Have to say that Mexico have been the better team overall.
If this was a school report for England it would say "There's room for improvement".
Let's hope that we can play better in the second half.

[snowy25]

I only caught glimpses of the game as I was watching the Argentina against Canada game. From what i saw England will struggle against quality sides. Defending was out of sorts, luck played a part in the second goal, Milner was pushed off the ball too easily, other players has faster feet than brains and final balls are poor. The scoreline it seems will paper over the cracks but from what I saw if they play Spain, Brazil or someone else of that quality it could be a disaster.
The Argentina game was a good one, they looked a decent side, albeit against a weak side, but you still have to score and win. Lots of teams have played poor sides and looked poor themselves. The Argentines passed well, took their chances and didnt look like they missed Messi. I doubt they will get to the final, but they do have the players that if they click they can beat anyone on their day.

[haunted]

http://www.fifa.com/worldcup/index.html
Official site.