The last few years have seen a number of football clubs teetering on the brink of extinction, with York City just the latest example. Although it's a few years now since Aldershot collapsed in mid-season, the question of 'who will be next' is never too far away from the minds of supporters of many smaller Clubs.

With only the a few of the very top clubs trading at a profit, the start of the year saw the Football League announce that they would be launching a review of the structure and finance of the Football League. In making the announcement, Football League Chief Executive David Burns, who will lead the review with League Chairman Keith Harris, promised to "consider absolutely every possible option in the greatest of detail."

Making it clear that the review would be wide-ranging, Burns said, "This is a great opportunity for us to evaluate both where we are now and where we want to go in the next few years and decades. To do that effectively ... nothing will be ruled out until it has been properly considered and, if necessary we must be willing to change.

"We must also widen the debate beyond merely ourselves to all our stakeholders to find out what they want us to deliver, from broadcasters and commercial partners to, most importantly, football fans. Do they want to see regional divisions, four-up four-down, or any other possible changes? It is up to us to find out so that we can devise a blueprint that guarantees the future health and financing of the professional game in this country."

So what are the options? Regionalisation is one which is sure to be considered, but is it a step forward or backward? It's now about half a century since Division Three was split into north and south, with just one side gaining promotion from each. A step in that direction would certainly have to be carefully measured if the end-of-season interest associated with promotion and play-off places up for grabs is not to be lost.

That late season interest is perhaps one of three key issues that would need to be thrashed out before any structure changes could be considered. The teams in the lowest 'unregionalised' division would certainly have something to say on the subject too as, to keep that late season interest in the divisions below, this 'unified' division would have to have at least four relegation places - and therein lies one of the problems.

Another problem to be resolved with regionalisation is which divisions to merge. Do we revert to the old-style Division 3 North and South - although in these Premier League days it would now be Division Two North and South - or, as Ron Noades was suggesting recently a combination of the current Division Three and the Football Conference?

Noades' suggestion is an interesting one and would go some way to assuaging the 'closed shop' criticisms, which still hang over the Football League with the current one-in, one-out system. The issue it does not address, however, is that of facilities. It was only recently that Kidderminster were denied promotion to the League because their ground was not up to scratch, so there would have to be expensive work carried out at least a third of the Conference grounds before they were up to the required level.

One way round this might be to relax the facilities required for the lowest division, but that would only serve to push the 'minimum criteria line' higher up the League. If this happened, it would surely reduce interest and confuse the end of season picture of promotion to the 'unified' divisions.

If you assume that a solution to the facilities issue can be found, the next question to be addressed is where to draw the geographic lines which divide the division into its North and South sections?

Of course, wherever any arbitrary lines are drawn, a number of Clubs, such as Plymouth, Exeter, Torquay, Swansea, Carlisle and Darlington will gain, with reduced travelling, but a significant number of others would undoubtedly lose out. The line would obviously have to go through the Midlands so you could find Notts County having to go to Swansea but not 12 miles up the road to Chesterfield. The U's could face three trips to Devon, but none to Peterborough or Northampton, and there would be a number of similar geographical quirks.

Even if Divisions Two, Three and the Conference were merged into Division Two North, Central and South (or anything else for that matter), those quirks just keep reappearing. For example, travelling to Scunthorpe is easier for U's fans than getting to Brentford, but it would take some strangely defined areas to get Cambridge United and Scunthorpe in the same region!

Although the review will be wide-ranging, how seriously it considers the merits of part- or full-time football is open to debate. The financial implications of this are obvious enough but whether a move away from full-time football is something that could, or should, be imposed from above may be beyond the remit of even this review. It is far more likely that this decision would be left to the individual Clubs - and that's surely as it should be.

Perhaps the most obvious of the remaining options is the number of promotion/relegation places in each division, but that is surely the suggestion that would meet most resistance from the Clubs themselves - unless an idea to have fewer teams in more division raises its head!

Of course, there are no easy answers - and how relevant are any of these suggestions anyway? As a discussion document on an official Football Club website they form only a part of the equation. As David Burns suggested, when he announced the review, there are many more opinions to be taken into account - especially yours, the football supporter.

So what do you think? Why not log onto the Message Board to share your views?

Previous Main Features:
17Feb02  - U's Fans On Sky TV's Soccer AM
10Feb02  - U's Fans Feature On ITV Digital Quiz
02Feb02 - A Week In The Life of PR Manager Graham Eales
20Jan02  - U's Players Get Darth Vader Treatment
13Jan02  - Kit Carson Explains His 'Head of Talent Development' Role
05Jan02  - Dale Brooks Enjoying New Role
04Dec01 - U's Players Try Out Premiership Physio Machine
10Nov01 - U's Launch New Away Kit

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