Hi guys,
Firstly congratulations to all those who have been successful thus far playing the Northern Irish League. Im FM's head researcher for Northern Ireland and it's great to see so many outside of the country taking up the challenge and hope to see this vein continue in FM2007!
Few wee research queries raised in the thread I thought I should address. Firstly, why do Enniskillen Rangers, a junior club get automatic promotion at the end of the first season. "Late on in the testing for FM2006, a senior club called Omagh Town folded which left a void in the premier division league, a team from each division was moved up one, leaving the 2nd division with only 11 clubs instead of 12. It was decided in real life that for one season the league would have 11 clubs then an amateur club would fill the void if their application was successful. At the time, the Northern Irish Intermediate leagues were opting to form a new First and Second division in which factors such as ground, support, geographical basis etc would be taken into consideration. Clubs were required to apply to this new Intermediate Premier League/First Division. One such club, which was touted in the press to apply was Junior side Enniskillen Rangers, who had successfully applied to their own council to build a new multi-purpose sports ground on the Enniskillen Road in the town. They were the only club outside the league clubs already exisiting that had confirmed their application and the decision was taken in FM to give them automatic promotion after the first season to make up the numbers to 12 again."
In reality, the new Intermediate leagues have still not been formed and may happen next year or the year after. In the meantime, the void was filled this season by a club called Glebe Rangers, who beat another club Trojans in a promotion play off. Now Glebe will be the 12th team in division 2 this season.
One important thing from a research point of view that has helped me a lot in this thread is the stadium issues. Northern Irish stadiums generally are crap outside the top league and many have no seats, limited capacities to well under 1000 etc. However, in reality if PSNI did in fact make European football they would indeed play at Windsor Park or the Oval etc. However this is not the main database. Only
prem clubs have been fixed to play at other stadiums for European competition. I will fix this in the first data update as the data deadline has passed now for FM2007 but thanks for highlighting the issue to me
I hope a lot of you will play the league again in FM2007 and whilst I've pushed SI for several new competitions to be added, only one new one has but it involves all First and Second division clubs and is known as the Intermediate Cup (not to be confused with the Intermediate League Cup which is already in the game)
Anyway, good luck and keep up the good work, this thread has dried up a little so someone kick start their game again today to keep the thread alive!
Cheers,
Mark Hill
Head Researcher FM Northern Ireland
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