Irish League football: A bright new era?

With Irish League football at yet another crossroads, Stuart McKinley wonders if fresh plans to spark the local game will work this time

Wednesday, May 07, 2008

We know who the identity of the vast majority of the clubs who will get the nod, but for two or three there is a nervous wait. The decision process won't be that difficult though as the 14 clubs who were granted a Domestic Licence became 13 when Portadown's application for the new league wasn't handed in on time and that means just one will miss the cut. Chairmen, managers and players alike may well be pacing floors like expectant fathers waiting for confirmation that they've got their wish.

Just as one season draws to a close a summer of discussion over a fresh campaign, what it brings and the hopes and aspirations for the future will be sparked once those dozen names are revealed.

The idea is that the Irish Football Association's Invitational League will herald a bright new dawn for the local game, similar to the introduction of the Premier League in England.

In the late 1980s the English game was struggling.

Stadiums were falling into disrepair, attendances were down and breathing new life into the game was proving difficult.

Even selling television rights for live top-flight games became a stumbling block and for a period screens were blank.

England's run to the semi-finals of the 1990 World Cup helped, but the shot in the arm football needed came a few months down the line when the idea of a Premier League was first floated.

There was plenty of opposition - mainly from clubs who were likely to miss out - and no shortage of detractors who ruled it out as pie in the sky.

The pie was served up in late summer 1992 with plenty of razzmatazz to go with it. The embryonic Sky Sports put their money where the mouths of those telling everyone that an exciting new dawn was about to break were and they also provided the dancers and fireworks to make every game an occasion.

They were criticised for moving kick-offs to Sunday afternoons, Monday nights and this season we even had a Thursday night fixture - much to the disdain of Chelsea.

Love or loathe Rupert Murdoch's play thing, Sky have played a massive part in making the English Premier League what it is today - an attractive, exciting and sexy product that is marketable to the entire planet - and beyond if they can ever get access to a television set and a satellite receiver.

Now nobody in Northern Ireland is getting carried away enough to think that something similar is going to happen here, but we've at least got a start with five Premier League games screened by Sky in the season just finished.

And the best thing about those five games? They were all good to watch and there wasn't a shortage of attractive football, quality goals and - certainly in the case of the most recent one between Glentoran and Cliftonville - excitement to the end.

You see, the product isn't as black as it's painted. It's not Serie A or La Liga or the English Premier League, but any comparison is completely unfair.

I'd argue this point though, there are as many poor games in any of those leagues as in our own, even though they are full of teams crammed with international stars and household names.

The Irish League doesn't have many household names. Some aren't even household names in their own household. That's what those behind the new league want though.

How do they achieve that? Well, it's not just Sky Sports who are responsible for making the Premier League the best in the world, being marketed as a product that was better than before helped.

It's like the new improved washing powder, the best ever kitchen cleaner or that new car that is so much better than the model it's just superceded.

The thing with those is that it's not back to the drawing board, it's the same thing with a few tweaks here and there - but it works.

Embarking on the formation of a new Irish Premier League is a lot like when the boring old rugby league became a Super League in the mid-1990s when the rebranding and repackaging of the game gave it a new lease of life, and if those marketing local football are looking for a model that is it.

There is a limited market in Super League. Mostly based in the north of England with its roots in working class areas, the similarities with Northern Ireland football are there to see - and it has 12 teams too.

And 12 seems to be the magic number to those planning the new structure - but why a dynamic dozen?

Remember we've had it before.

Way back in the 1980s when Carrick Rangers and Newry Town - before it became a city - were introduced to give us 14. That grew to 16 when Omagh Town and Ballyclare Comrades came on board a few years later, but it wasn't long before that was deemed to be too many.

Then, over a period of just eight years the league went from being cut in half to doubling again. A First Divison of eight clubs was too small, so was 10, so it was increased to 12 - that seemingly magic number.

The 2002-03 season wasn't particularly memorable, apart from Glentoran having points deducted in the Andrew Kilmartin affair, but that was the one year we had 12 teams. It wasn't thought to be workable so 12 months later there were 16 again.

Personally I agree with the school of thought that 16 clubs is too many for a small country like Northern Ireland to sustain in its top flight, but think of it like this £ with 16 teams more often than not there has been an exciting title race.

Remember 1994? Glenavon, Linfield and Portadown all going for the Gibson Cup on the final day!

Well, there were 16 clubs in that league.

Between then and 2001 not one Championship battle went to the wire. Indeed in 2000 and the following year Linfield were runaway winners.

In the five seasons of the current 16-team structure only twice has the destination of the title been totally beyond doubt before kick-off on the final day £ with one of those being Linfield's Grand Slam season which is a remarkable exception.

What we have may not be totally broken, but it does need fixing and if 12 teams can be made to work then great.

It better because the constant chopping and changing that went on from the mid-1990s to 2003 did nothing to help the game, and this may be the last chance to save it.