I like Royal League, and think it is an excellent idea! But what about the idea of an even more ambitious project, to make Royal League a Scandinavian "Superleague" played in season where the best teams of Sweden, Denmark and Norway participate. The best teams would leave their domestic national league to play in this league and the best placed teams in the three domestic leagues will qualify and replace the relegated teams from the Superleague. The places for Champions League and UEFA Cup will be awarded to the best teams in the Super League. The advantages: - A much better league compared to the domestic ones will improve Scandinavian football The disadvantages: - The domestic leagues may lose a lot of status and interest when the best teams don´t play in it anymore - Long and expensive travels - difficulties getting UEFA to accept a cross-country-league with UEFA-cup and Champions League-places Well, maybe the disadvantages are too many, but still a Scandinavian league with clubs like Malmö FF, IFK Göteborg, Djurgården, Brann, Rosenborg, Vålerengen, Bröndby and FC Köpenhamn sounds really interesting...
I think it is a great idea. But practically it would be complicated, especially when dealing with relegations. What if the three worst teams were all from the same country?
If you have a second division for every country with one team promoting, you have at least 1 team from every country in the top flight every year. But this would mean 4 relegating teams a year, which may be a bit much (that is, if you leave Faroe Islands and Iceland out, who may want to be in as well if it is a Nordic League... Nordic = not necessarily mainland Scandinavia)
I don't like the idea of a Scandinavian SuperLeague. To me, the Veikkausliiga is ours (Finland). I would like to play more teams, but I don't want them to join a league. More friendlies!
To be honest I don't think Finland would be invited either since the standards are much lower compared to Sweden, Denmark and Norway. Not slagging finnish football off that's just a fact. I'm totally against a nordic league by the way. Sure it's great when we would meet Bröndby, FCK and Rosenborg...but the likes of Tromsö or Esbjerg away on a monday, that would be just awful. I'd much rather have us play against the swedish teams who wouldn't qualify for such a league as rivals Hammarby and AIK etc.
Uninteresting. It's OK to meet them during winter since it beats playing 3rd level teams in pointless trainingmatches, but it's not THAT interesting meeting teams from Sweden and Denmark that I would care watching them during a regular season.
It's not that we are under-acheiving, it's that it's just a lack of resources. Lack of money and a population. Things are sticky when you have 5 million inhabitants and half of them would rather watch hockey.
Such a league would destroy the national leagues completely - and make the difference between "top clubs" and the others even larger than it already is. It would also remove several of the classic derby matches and most likely lower the attendances at stadiums, especially at the clubs not in such a league. All against it. Don't touch the national leagues. Ever.
For similar reasons I hate the Champions League and boycot it as long as non-champions are allowed to enter. I think if it ever comes to a Nordic league it's not a question of quality but a question of uniting all Scandinavian countries. So it would have to include Finland, and the few top clubs there (eg Alianssi and HJK) would certainly compete with their Norwegian/Swedish/Danish counterparts (with the exceptions of their very top teams such as Rosenborg, Brondby, AIK,... who would be too strong for the Finnish)
A lot of people write off the Finnish league. Sure, it's no Danish or Norwegian league, but the Veikkausliiga has a couple of teams that could really surprise. A resurgent HJK has bounced back after last season's disaster, with youth no less and are proving that they are truly Finland's team. Tampere United, which is playing Lazio in Intertoto right now has a real good European record. Interest in the Veikkausliiga is on the increase, with more games being played on TV and watched no less. More games are drawing out more people and it's no longer uncommon to see an attendance record past 3,000. I'd really like you guys to see what I do with the Veikkausliiga at soccer24-7. If you can't follow it, you can't understand it. If you can't understand it, you fear it. HJK or Tampere United could play any Swedish team right now, perhaps for maybe DIF or MFF.