Beating the Bin Men

 

Beating the Bin Men

I had one of those brief discussions Scottish football fans occasionally have online. It began when I posted a clip on social media of Henrik Larsson’s sublime chip over Stefan Klos in that memorable 6-2 victory over Rangers in August 2000. A fan of Manchester United, ironically from Dublin, commented ‘Good player but he was playing against bin men.’ I put him right about the Rangers team that day which consisted of 11 internationals but as is usual with the ‘my Nan’ brigade he wasn’t listening.

It strikes me as odd that some followers of English football have an almost pathological dislike of Scottish football and go out of their way to insult it whenever they can. You wonder if some German fans do this to the Swiss or Danish League or if Italians spend their time running down the Serbian or Croatian league. I somehow doubt it as they realise that you need to compare like with like to have a true comparison. Scotland has a population of 5.4 million people while England has over ten times more people with 56 million. It is obvious that England can support far more big clubs than Scotland can and the financial benefits of having such a huge potential TV audience are obvious. A fairer contrast would be between Scottish football and leagues such as those in Belgium, Austria, Sweden, Croatia or Denmark, countries with a similar population. Historically Scottish clubs have had far more success in Europe than such countries and their average top league attendance figures are far higher. Of Course Celtic and Rangers have a huge influence on the attendance figures in Scotland but are nonetheless part of the league.

The historical and current dominance of Celtic and Rangers is one of the factors used to run down Scottish football. In truth it must be hard for fans of other clubs to watch these two clubs waltz off with 106 titles while the rest share under 20 between them. Such dominance isn’t uncommon in smaller countries; in Portugal where the big three of Benfica, Sporting and FC Porto dominate only 2 titles have ever been won by teams outside that triumvirate. (Belenenses and Boavista) That is 2 out of 88 national championships.

Scottish football for all its’ built in flaws and clannishness holds most of the attendance records in Europe. Consider the following statistics…

Record attendance at a European game: 136,505  Celtic v Leeds United

Record attendance at a domestic cup tie 147,365  Celtic v Aberdeen

Record attendance at a league match: 118,567 Rangers v Celtic

Record attendance at an International match 149,415 Scotland v England

Of course these crowds occurred in the dim and distant past and the reduction of stadium capacities means the records will probably never be broken. They do indicate though the Scottish love affair with football which still continues.

The passing game the world knows today was invented in Scotland and a look at the early international record of games between Scotland and England demonstrates that it was the future of football. Scotland’s first 15 internationals with England saw the English win just twice as Scotland’s more scientific approach gave them a few footballing lessons in how the game should be played. Scottish victories included score lines such as 7-2, 6-1 and 5-1. Most top English club sides of the era were packed with Scots, indeed the English football league was founded in 1888 by William McGregor, a Scot.

Of course Scottish supporters today know that the lack of serious competition to the two big Glasgow clubs remains a difficult conundrum to solve. The financial disparity between them and the rest of the league is stark and driven by their huge fan bases. It is frustrating though to see teams like Motherwell, St Mirren or even St Johnstone take 20,000 supporters to a cup final and play to under a quarter of that in their home league matches. It is what it is though but the Scottish game does need to look for solutions to the financial problems it has. In days past home clubs shared the gate receipts 50-50 with the visiting side. Thus, as happened in the 1970s, St Johnstone played at Celtic Park in a vital league match for the home side in front of 60,000 fans and headed home with thousands of pounds in the kitty despite only bringing a few hundred fans. Those days will not return though so perhaps a more equitable share of TV money would help? Instead of gaining a share based on finishing position in the league, which reinforces the dominance of the big clubs, why not simply pool the money and give all clubs an equal share? Or more radically give the teams at the bottom more of the TV money to help them compete?

In America, the National Football League (NFL) has a draft system which sees clubs finishing lower down the leagues having first pick of the new talent emerging in the game. It infuses them with new blood and at least tries to balance the availability of good players across the league. That will never happen in football of course, as clubs who invest in youth will never cede ‘ownership’ of a player to the league but it does show some out of the box thinking. Could we envisage a limit on foreign players to reduce big club’s power to buy in talent from abroad? Or a salary cap to reduce wealthier club’s financial advantage? A bigger league might allow teams more space to attack and entertain?

All of this speculation can’t disguise the fact that Celtic and Rangers are too big for Scottish football but as yet have nowhere to go to maximise their potential. A Scottish game minus them would flourish as Aberdeen, Hibs, Hearts and others entered each new season with genuine hope of being champions. It wouldn’t, as some suggest, descend to league of Ireland status. How ironic the EPL fanboy I interacted with supports an English team as many in his native Ireland do. The domestic league in Ireland struggles to push average attendances above 2000 as hundreds of thousands of Irish folk follow the English game. That scenario may be linked to immigration patterns, Irish players playing in England or simply the sort of behaviour critics call glory hunting. For all the flaws of the Scottish game it isn’t forced to watch thousands of supporters head for England to watch Premiership sides each weekend. Our fans seem more loyal to the domestic game.

As youngsters most of us had a favourite team in England but it was a distinct second team which couldn’t compete with the affection we had for our team in Scotland. These days the English Premiership is packed with expensive foreign stars, up to 65% of players aren’t eligible to play for England, yet it leaves me cold and I have only a passing interest in it. The ‘my nan’ brigade will never detract from my enjoyment of the Scottish game. Sure it could be better and it has lacked inspirational leadership but it has an honest, raw passion about it which I love. It also has supporters who are second to none and get behind their teams.

When Celtic defeated Barcelona in 2012 an English reporter at the match commented..

‘Somewhere between madness and love, this fanaticism did for Barcelona on a night when the Celtic team and their disciples were indivisible. Money can’t buy you that.’