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Much better I think than playing loads of group games.

https://www.sheffieldsteelers.co.uk/new ... at-agreed/

Might as well put Belfast in the semi finals now.

The cream will always rise to the top regardless of the seedings.

Looking at the last 2 seasons league results how did anyone apart from Belfast think that this was a good idea.

In 2022/3 season position 2-7 are in one group and 1,8,9,10 in the other.

Nothing about who gets to host the final. If, however it's on points % then we won't be getting one for a while.

Disgusting

mark wrote: ↑

Mon May 13, 2024 7:22 pm

Might as well put Belfast in the semi finals now.

Ah, I didn’t spot that. Cardiff should have been in that group if it’s done for travelling logistics.

I was too excited realising that we don’t play 60 games against Nottingham and Manchester, where at least a few of those are dead rubbers.

Certainly easy for Belfast to get straight to the semi final.

I'm pretty sure that despite my extensive supply of EIHL based sarcasm that this was conceptualised and agreed upon by representatives from all 10 clubs and Mr Hicks and not a randomly selected bunch of chickens, wildebeest and the odd piece of garden furniture.

The mind boggles to how a group of people can come up with these ideas then nod their heads at each other and say, 'yeah, this will be good!'

They've basically locked themselves in a room, tried to design a Horse and come up with a Camel.

There still remain some important questions to be answered, but in terms of the group format, there are some positives and negatives.

The positives are:

- A bit more variety in the teams we play
- No quarter finals, meaning it will be harder to qualify and therefore each game becomes more meaningful

Negatives are:

- A complete imbalance in the two groups, meaning Belfast are almost certain to make the semi-finals, whilst our group is likely to be a real tough scrap

I think it would be better if one of Sheffield or Cardiff were in the other group with the top two qualifying. Geographically Sheffield are probably best placed to be in the Scottish group, but obviously there would be the commercial hit from the Nottingham game. Cardiff on the other hand would still probably sell-out if they were in the other group, but would have a lot of additional travelling.

On balance though, I think Cardiff in that group would have been better, with maybe the league agreeing to pay some of their additional travel expenses.

In terms of the important questions still to be answered:

- When is the final due to take place? If it's before Christmas, that would be a positive move in my opinion.
- How is the venue to be determined? I think this is an important decision for a lot of supporters, because if it's based on the group stages then Belfast have a huge advantage which will annoy a lot of people, myself included. Not only are they likely to get to pick their semi opponent, but also have home advantage if they get through.

I guess two legs would be slightly better, but it still means one teams supporters get to celebrate and how is the 2nd leg venue determined?

A one off final at a neutral venue would have to be at the weekend, otherwise the arena is likely to be less than half full unless it's at the home of one of the teams making the final. That would probably mean the day of the final being kept clear of games, which is likely to hit teams commercially. There is also the question of whether it would be a 'neutral' venue. The venue would have to be chosen in advance, so if it's Nottingham for example, should they make it through they'd have home advantage.

I personally like the idea of a one off final at one of the two finalists venue of choice, but I don't think it should be determined by the percentage win at the group stages. I'd probably prefer a coin toss (50/50 chance for both teams) or the team with the best aggregate semi-final win.

I'm sure it's not beyond the wit of the EIHL to come up with something better than win percentage from the group stages.

Regards

Doom

It's not an improvement, or a downgrade, it's just not very good still.

It is getting to the point where travel costs shouldn't be used as an excuse. I'm not saying it's cheap but this is just making the league look daft. Massive advantage for Belfast unless Clan finally get their act together.

An alternate plan…
1…choose a venue with hotels and a decent capacity Belfast , Notts, Sheffield, Glasgow, Cardiff. (This can be rotated around the clubs each year)
2… on a date chosen the top 8 teams in the league at that point convene, either by random draw or current seedings, four games played on Friday to get a final four, two games played Saturday, then a cup final on Sunday. Call it the Challenge cup/ festival of hockey, more fans with teams to support than the playoffs, and no third place dead rubber game. Good for local economies and media exposure for the league.
3. The extra games now available to the clubs by having the challenge cup done and dusted in one weekend, frees up space if the proposed new team/s joins the league.

ginger wrote: ↑

Tue May 14, 2024 8:06 am

It is getting to the point where travel costs shouldn't be used as an excuse. I'm not saying it's cheap but this is just making the league look daft. Massive advantage for Belfast unless Clan finally get their act together.

The EIHL can't crow on one hand about all the "booming" attendances from the season past, yet at the same time plead poverty over the potential of slightly more expensive travel for a Cup format that would suck much less than this mess that requires a math doctorate to comprehend.

People are fed-up playing "rivals" all the time. If it were for finally having a proper play-off format, that would be something, but alas no change in that competition. For our group, it's 12 games just for the 1st stage, a play-out match if you don't win the group, then the 2 legs of Semi final and a one-off Final. So could be as much as 16 games, then your 54 league games, and up to 4 games of play-offs, so 74 competitive matches potentially on the table, and at least 4 pre-season matches. That's an insane amount of games to be playing at this level of hockey, particularly with the new signing limitations.

They really should have found a way to make the Cup straight up randomly drawn knockout, throw in the top 2 NIHL National sides from last season, and use "play-ins" to make it work. Then save the round-robin format for the 1st round of the play-offs instead, not the most ideal way I'd like it, but it would at least be refreshing.