League format may prove contentious

National League A.g.m.: With FAI chief executive Fran Rooney having written to clubs this week to tell them it's business as usual come next Thursday night, starting with the First Division game between Dundalk and Sligo Rovers, the format of next year's Eircom league may prove to be the most contentious aspect of the National League's a.g.m. in Dublin's city centre this morning.

With many clubs unhappy with the way the licensing scheme has been parked in order to preserve the current 10 and 12-team divisions, almost all are wary of anything that might prompt further uncertainty just a week ahead of the new campaign's kick-off. It is almost certain delegates will, however reluctantly, seek to press ahead with the fixtures as agreed by 21 of the clubs a couple of weeks back.

The first real indication of the mood of the meeting will be provided by the election of the league's chairman. Former Dublin City official and acting chairman Declan O'Luanaigh, widely perceived as being the candidate the FAI and the bigger clubs prefer, is to be opposed by Galway's John Byrne who has been prominent in Merrion Square for many years and was a key opponent, with Brendan Menton and John Delaney, of the Eircom Park project.

If Byrne, who has warned of the potential for the present line on licensing to come back to haunt the association, wins it would suggest there will be rumblings later in the day but O'Luanaigh is expected to prevail, albeit by a narrow margin.

Some club representatives expressed surprise yesterday over the content of Rooney's letter in which he states all of "the necessary provisions" are now in place for the league to proceed on the same basis as last year.

Elsewhere in the letter Rooney claims support for this approach from the chairman of the licensing committee, Ken Robinson, but subsequently observes that the committee itself decided the structure of the league lies outside of their remit.

The FAI's nod, however, is likely to be enough to prompt a majority of clubs to vote in favour of pressing ahead with the first round of games when the situation is considered at this afternoon's first meeting of the league's management committee.

The approach will buy time but defers a problem that will become all the more complicated if the rule book is set to one side on this occasion.

Before that, however, the structure of next year's league will have to be decided and it is here that the smaller clubs may manage to make their collective voice heard.

The current structure of a 10-team Premier Division and 12-team First Division was adopted two years ago on a three-year trial basis and this morning's meeting must decide whether to abandon the experiment for the 2005 season as the number of clubs to be promoted and relegated in November will have to be adjusted to achieve the required numbers for next year.

A term of the decision to proceed with the trial period was that a two-thirds majority would still be required to make the change permanent and while one club official observed yesterday that "Turkeys voting for Christmas would be nothing new in this league", it is hard to see how the support of 15 clubs could be secure for maintaining a system that has dismayed may of the First Division outfits.

Shelbourne, Bohemians and Derry City would be expected to mount a vigorous defence of the 10-team Premier Division although relations, particularly between officials at Shelbourne and Derry, are not quite what they had been before the handing out of licences in recent weeks. This may undermine the sense of unity among the bigger clubs.