***Official*** English Football Season 2019-20

[Pothas]

League to league the gap is massive. There are clubs in the conference that would have no business saying efl never mind playing in it.

But generally the top bunch in the conference would settle comfortably in League Two. I don't think anyone has ever gone straight back which tells its own story. That was a terrible Macc side by football league standards last year. Still don't know how they beat us to the title the year before. And yet they stayed up. So yeah 3 and 3 seems right.

Yeah this was the impression I got from how promoted teams from the conference have done in recent years. You have to work pretty hard to be relegated from League Two. The standard is probably better than it was when we were down there though.

Gap between Championship and League One is pretty big now.

 

[flibbertyjibber]

Cancelling the season, whilst not ideal, is a considerably better outcome though.

I agree, my personal view is all football should be binned now and it only comes back when it is safe however long that may be. Tough luck on Liverpool, Leeds, Leicester etc... but this virus is far more important than football.

 

[sledger]

Yeah, my view has always been that voiding the season is not a good solution, but it is the least bad solution, and definitely the least unfair.

 

[Pothas]

I rather doubt you would have been saying that if this had happened a couple of seasons ago.

There are quite obviously no good solutions but I don't see how pretending this season never happened is any better than ending it based on PPG or whatever. Both seen pretty bad, still think finishing it when you can and then sorting out what to do about next season is a lot better.

 

[sledger]

I rather doubt you would have been saying that if this had happened a couple of seasons ago.

There are quite obviously no good solutions but I don't see how pretending this season never happened is any better than ending it based on PPG or whatever. Both seen pretty bad, still think finishing it when you can and then sorting out what to do about next season is a lot better.

Haha maybe.

And yes, certainly finishing the season in one form or another is the most preferable option.

I don't even really have an issue with determining winners/promotion on the basis of PPG or something similar, but relegation determined on this basis just feels really egregious to me, for all sorts of reasons.

I think for me, if we were to say fairness lies on a scale/spectrum, let's say from -10 to 10, annulling the season would be somewhere around 0 (i.e. a lack of fairness), whereas relegating teams based on predictions etc. would be in the minus somewhere (i.e. not just lacking in fairness, but actively unfair), if that makes sense.

 

[Furball]

It'll be interesting to see how the EFL (indeed all football) comes out of this. There was an Athletic article that painted a fairly apocalyptic picture, the wage expenditure alone in the EFL is ****ing insane.

 

[sledger]

Going to get ugly.

I saw something the other day suggesting the only way the EFL would be able to continue to exist without a huge bailout from somewhere or other is if Prem B teams are allowed to enter it.

 

[Pothas]

Oh that would be so dire.

 

[Furball]

Gap between Championship and League One is pretty big now.

Could you see a scenario where the Championship clubs might prefer to be the second tier of the Premier League rather than the top tier of the Football League?

 

[Furball]

Going to get ugly.

I saw something the other day suggesting the only way the EFL would be able to continue to exist without a huge bailout from somewhere or other is if Prem B teams are allowed to enter it.

Dunno about official B teams but a team like Tranmere might get a bailout from Liverpool or Everton in exchange for taking a bunch of loanees.

 

[sledger]

Oh that would be so dire.

Yeah just looked it up. Was suggested by the Brighton technical director. Lots of corporate language used. E.g. "partnerships" and "sustainability"

 

[sledger]

Dunno about official B teams but a team like Tranmere might get a bailout from Liverpool or Everton in exchange for taking a bunch of loanees.

Yeah that would be another way of achieving a similar result perhaps, but there is a much greater incentive (i.e. financial) for Prem Clubs to go for the B team route. Just a case if they can convince the rest of the EFL to swallow it.

 

[sledger]

Apparently there are also a large number of players (including big names) who have put their clubs on notice that they will not be taking part in any "project restart" of the season as well. So that could be interesting.

 

[Pothas]

Could you see a scenario where the Championship clubs might prefer to be the second tier of the Premier League rather than the top tier of the Football League?

Oh definitely. There was already some grumblings about the latest TV deal. There are so many clubs desperate to get back in the Premier League and a lot of them are in a pretty bad place financially. Then there is a pretty small band of clubs that kind of fall between the Championship and League One.

Don't like the idea myself. There was some talk of north/south leagues from League One downx think that would be a disaster. Would mean a huge gulf from the Championship

 

[Matteh]

I guess it exists all across Europe so it's not exactly a new idea. But there's always been something good about England (UK as a whole really) that it's managed to support so many independent teams for locals for a century or more. It's rare for a club to go completely out of business whilst in the EFL despite some near misses over the years.

But you can pretty much achieve the same thing by having more official local feeder clubs, something that sort of happens already, but with closer ties.

 

[Pothas]

Haha maybe.

Was actually aimed at Flibberty.

Arsenal could surley just end any season whenever these days...

 

[Matteh]

Don't like the idea myself. There was some talk of north/south leagues from League One downx think that would be a disaster. Would mean a huge gulf from the Championship

That's going back in time 60 years and effectively 'non-leaguing' the lower divisions. Used to only have 1 promotion spot each for North/South so only the well-off teams would end up progressing back up the leagues.

 

[Pothas]

Yeah just looked it up. Was suggested by the Brighton technical director. Lots of corporate language used. E.g. "partnerships" and "sustainability"

I mean our Brentford 'B' team has been hugely successful but I would hate the idea if them playing in League two or whatever. Think the vast majority of our fans would as well. Random friendly matches against Bayern Munich u23s or whatever is way more fun anyway.

 

[Furball]

Oh definitely. There was already some grumblings about the latest TV deal. There are so many clubs desperate to get back in the Premier League and a lot of them are in a pretty bad place financially. Then there is a pretty small band of clubs that kind of fall between the Championship and League One.

Don't like the idea myself. There was some talk of north/south leagues from League One downx think that would be a disaster. Would mean a huge gulf from the Championship

Yeah I'm not necessarily saying it's a good idea, but the Championship seems to have settled down where you've got a lot of historically big clubs like Leeds, Forest etc; you don't really seem to get many of the smaller more local clubs making much of an impact at that level without getting bankrolled.

 

[Pothas]

That's going back in time 60 years and effectively 'non-leaguing' the lower divisions. Used to only have 1 promotion spot each for North/South so only the well-off teams would end up progressing back up the leagues.

Yep and again makes it a lot more like Europe. Spain has the top two divisions and then 4 regional ones below that it something. The depth of English football is the greatest thing about it, would hate to lose that.