BILLINGHAM, UK – After the release of this blog post regarding what was seen by many fans to be a poor state of affairs regarding NIHL North, EIHA North League Manager, Gary Dent, replied to a few comments on Twitter.
Following on from this, Gary said he would be more than willing to answer some questions via an email conversation so he could give the other side of the story so to speak. Here is that conversation.
With the addition of the new National League came a press release from the EIHA on March 16th, 2019. In that release it was stated that the Moralee Conference would have “an eighth team to be confirmed.” What changed over that three-month period?
The release said an eighth team ‘to be confirmed’ as we didn’t have an eighth team at the time but we hoped to get one. It said ‘to be confirmed’ for a tenth team in the south on the same basis, but in that case we did manage to get the extra team.
We weren’t keen on just accepting it would be seven in the north (or nine in the south) at that time. It was actually put forward (by a club) at the March meeting that it would be better to stick at seven in D1N rather than force the issue too much and nobody disagreed.
Do you feel that maybe the language used suggested that an eighth team was almost done and would be confirmed shortly, as opposed to that the EIHA hoped an eighth team could be added to the league?
If we were sure of an eighth team we would have put it down as ‘to be announced’, not ‘to be confirmed’. We can’t really control what people decide to read into our PRs, but we will give clarification if requested so long as that doesn’t require us to put confidential information into the public domain.
All I can add to that is read the PRs and take in what they actually say. Speculate about what is missing, but don’t make assumptions. We were still hoping for an eighth team when the PR was issued, but the other seven teams were aware of the position as it stood at that point in time.
I had spoken to prospective eighth teams before the meeting and I also went back to them in the weeks following the meeting. I spoke to more than two existing D2N teams and there was another possibility (apart from adding a Scottish team) that was investigated but didn’t come through.
Can you confirm that Murrayfield Racers offered to take up the eighth spot in the Moralee Conference in March, but this was blocked by two Midlands-based clubs as well as it being your thought that either Widnes Wild or Telford Tigers 2 would make the step up to Moralee?
Murrayfield and Dundee Comets applied in good time to take part in any North Cup for 2019/20 and were invited to the meeting in March because of those applications.
I don’t recall an offer to join NIHLN1 being made, but Murrayfield may have spoken to other clubs on the subject. There was certainly no formal application made to the NLMG.
There was quite a lengthy general discussion on the subject of D1N numbers and the fixtures format at the meeting. What we did get was Widnes volunteering to take part in any sort of “Midlands” cup to even up the number of teams in cup competitions.
Once it became apparent that no one was going to step up from Laidler, is it true that you approached Murrayfield and they said no as they did not want to jeopardise the SNL so late in the day or be a back-up option when everything else fell through?
When it became clear that the chances of an eighth English team going into D1N had dropped to virtually zero I didn’t contact Murrayfield, but I did speak to David Hand (SIH Chairman).
That was to check the SIH (SNL) position and get their thoughts on the impact of Murrayfield moving to D1N, although it was made clear in that conversation that it was a long shot and was unlikely to be acceptable to several current D1N teams.
It couldn’t happen without SIH agreement anyway. It was really a matter of seeing whether it could be put forward as an option to the remaining seven D1N teams if they desperately wanted an eighth team.
David indicated that Murrayfield leaving the SNL would do too much damage to that league, so the option was discarded.
Were other SNL sides like Paisley Pirates, Aberdeen Lynx and Kirkcaldy Kestrels offered an adequate amount of time to weigh up the ins and outs of joining the cup competition or was this done with a last minute deadline?
We didn’t trawl around SNL teams searching for applicants to play in the North Cup. We put Murrayfield into the cup for 2018/19 after their application to join the NIHL was rejected.
This season we received early indications of interest in taking part in any North Cup from Murrayfield and Dundee and they are both in that competition for the coming season. We have not received any expressions of interest from other Scottish teams.
Last summer (2018) we did receive a late, and indirect, application from Dundee for the North Cup (after Murrayfield were already in) but, apart from any other problem, which there would have been, there wasn’t enough space in the schedules for the extra games to have been fitted in by a number of the teams already in that competition.
Why has the extremely popular Play-Off Weekend for the Moralee Conference been scrapped? This event ran well for four years prior to the EPL sides entering the fray, why could it not work this year?
There may be differing opinions on how popular the NIHL Moralee Play-Off Weekend was at the point it stopped, certainly from some teams, but the option has not been scrapped anyway.
We have announced two groups of three to qualify for the play-off semi-finals, but have not yet announced the format of those final stages. I’d expect that announcement to come within the next week or so.
To confirm, has the play-off later stages been confirmed internally or is the Play-Off Weekend format still on the table?
The March meeting decided on the league format, the play-off format for D2N and the initial stage for the D1N play-offs.
The cups were agreed in principle as well. The number of fixtures in the round robin stage of the cups, the latter stages of the cups and the D1N play-offs were left to be decided as they were interdependent due to constraints on the total number of games (requested or absolute) that applied for several teams.
We have now decided upon the cup formats and the final stages of the play-offs should be determined within the next few days.
There are still three options on the table – a straight home and away final, home and away semi-finals and final, or a play-off weekend involving the top two in each group. Logistics and financial considerations will be factors in the final decision.
We try to manage the NIHL by consent and consensus so most of what you get is in accordance with the wishes of a significant majority of the teams either in the league or in a specific competition.
Sometimes we (the NLMG) do step in, but that is when we believe that the matter is such that moving in a certain direction would be highly detrimental to the league, a division in the league, or the sport as a whole.
If most of the above sounds like the teams run the league that would be a false impression. The NLMG actively manage the league and usually set the agenda but we are always aware of the impact on clubs (as a group or individually) of anything we do and are aware of the limitations we have to work under.
Teams have a big say, but not always the final say.
Pro Hockey News wishes to thank Gary for this interview.
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