The State Of Scottish Football (Scottish Premier League in General)

Member Name: StephenW2001

Product:	Scottish Premier League in General
Date:	04/10/02 (39 review reads)
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Ok, so here's my rant of the current state of Scottish Football. I am a Motherwell fan and also a season ticket holder at Fir Park, so I go every second week to the games. However, although I do support a poor football team before anyone starts, it's not only Motherwell that I see in that same sense.

We have the Old Firm, made up of Celtic and Rangers, who have and still do dominate the game up here, but it has been very well known that they want to leave Scotland and go to England. Some say it is a good idea because it would mean that the top league would be more competitive, however, the bad side to this is that there might be far less interest and also less income into the league because the teams are not as attractive. To be honest, I'm still not sure myself whether or not this would be a wise decision.

As you can see from the fact that Airdrieonians were put out of the game in May this year due to a chronic money problem, however, came back as Airdrie United only a couple of months later, and the fact that Motherwell were put into administration shows exactly how bad the financial situation in Scotland is. Even Glasgow Rangers have reported a debt of 50 million pounds. Celtic are also unable to splash the cash on big money players because they have a tight budget.

The national team is in terrible shape right now. When Berti Vogts was appointed, everyone expected great things from him right away and that was a mistake. No matter how good a manager is, he can only use the players he has available to him and right now, there are only a handful who are pretty good. The 2-2 draw with the Faroe Islands highlighted this to the extreme and I was disgusted to admit I actually watched the whole 90 minutes. Let's hope things improve against Iceland, but that's not going to be easy, seeing as how they are definitely a better team that the Faroes.

Therefore, you ask, what is the solution to the problem? Well, I believe

that seeing as how none of the clubs can really afford to spend much money, they should look to their youth systems instead of wasting their money on second-rate foreigners, a lot of whom are just there for the money anyway. We do have some good prospects coming through in the under-21 team, which can only be a good thing. Motherwell players, such as James McFadden, Stephen Pearson and Stevie Hammell are good players, as is Kevin McNaughton of Aberdeen and Lee Wilkie of Dundee.

In conclusion, if money from the SFA and the Scottish clubs is invested in top quality youth development programmes and facilities, this should hopefully be a solution to the problem and might make Berti's job a little easier... if he is still there, that is.

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