Changes wanted in soccer

Press, 1 March 1989, Page 34

Changes wanted in soccer

The Canterbury Football Association’s pro-motion-relegation system needs a shake-up to provide a competition structure that has credibility, according to a Western club member, Tony Soutter.

At present a team can not be promoted from a lower division to a higher division if its parent club already has a team in the higher division.

Mr Soutter said teams winning their competitions by wide margins had become disillusioned with soccer when they could not progress up the grades. Some players had given up the game while others treated soccer as a social pastime rather than a serious sport, he claimed.

“Promotion should be on merit in all grades. Guys then have the incentive to get out there and win. At the moment it is like the English League saying to Arsenal that even though they won the first division they can’t have the title because Norwich is a smaller club and should be looked after.”

A local example oc-

curred in the C.F.A. division three competition last year when Western won by 16 points but could not be promoted because it already had a side in the second division.

The teams eligible for promotion were Burndale United and Lincoln College. Burndale finished 18 points behind Western in third place while Lincoln was 23 points behind in sixth spot.

“Western had more points after half the season than Lincoln had altogether,” said Mr Soutter. He claimed that most of the clubs supported a one up-one down system of promotion-relegation. At the annual general meeting of the C.F.A. this year a Western remit calling for a revamping of the system was turned over to the management committee which will look at any changes during the current season.

“The C.F.A. should get in contact with the players. Any player will laugh at the rules as they stand. Club administrators and the C.F.A. are out of touch on this matter,” said Mr Soutter.

He is angry that the bigger clubs like Western, Rangers and University are being made to suffer. “How can you have any sort of competition with credibility when teams are being promoted for convenience, expediency or political reasons.” He said protection for teams like Ashburton and the West Coast was unfair on the bigger clubs, which formed the backbone of Canterbury soccer. He feels the C.F.A. does a good job in most areas but its policy over pro-motion-relegation was a blindspot. “The lower grades have to be sorted out. They are the backbone of the national and southern leagues and the game can’t flourish without them being well organised.”

He said an example of how the present system can backfire was the Rangers division two side of last season, popularly known as the “Golden Oldies,” which included a bevy of former national league stars. It won its competition easily yet was relegated to the third division be-

cause of the reshuffling caused by its southern league division three side being relegated to C.F.A. division one.

The southern league side had finished seventh, but Kaiapoi (eighth), Burwood (ninth) and the West Coast (tenth) had exemptions from relegation.

The Rangers division two side won a lot of its games by 10-goal margins and the players are disappointed that they are being forced down a division. Several have indicated that they will go to another club or retire if they can not go up a division with Rangers. The chairman of the C.F.A., Colin Houston, said the one team per division policy was simple, effective and, he believes, better for the code in terms of strengthening the smaller centres and clubs. Having two teams in a division from one club could lead to three or four from one club and that could destroy the competition. “The clubs should try and sort out teams so that the best players are in the

higher divisions. It is up to the clubs to regulate that. If the clubs can not provide for the players they can go elsewhere so that the talent is being streamed through.” He acknowledged that the bigger clubs were most affected by the policy, but feels that is a small price to pay. "The policy is working. If we start making exceptions we open a can of worms.”

A proposal is being worked on for next year to incorporate two premier divisions for club first teams but details have still to be worked out.

Mr Houston said that some people forgot that the C.F.A. was providing soccer for a whole batch of clubs, and not just the bigger ones. “You can’t please all the clubs all of the time. The promotion-relegation system as it stands seems to be working better than anything we have had in the past even though it may be tough on some of the clubs like University, Western and Rangers that have a lot of teams.” GARY BIRKETT