Scottish Professional Football League

[Popmart]

The SPL and SFL merged over this summer as the SPFL with renamed divisions and logos.

[Gothamite]

Don't like it very much.

To the extent the lion/ball works at all, it won't without the text. In any case, looks like a seahorse.

[nas1787]

I really hate how League 1 is actually the third division, in both Scotland and England. You'd think they wouldn't make that mistake when renaming these...

[Digby]

Strange they chose to directly emulate the English league system with those names.

[illwauk]

I really hate how League 1 is actually the third division, in both Scotland and England. You'd think they wouldn't make that mistake when renaming these...

Or the fact that the "Championship" is actually the second division.

[Gothamite]

Yeah, that bothers me in England. Only makes sense when the lower leagues are an entirely separate entity, which isn't true in either country.

Strange they chose to directly emulate the English league system with those names.

Why wouldn't they? The FA is one of the most successful and profitable leagues in the world. Even Scottish nationalism only goes so far.

[Jaffa]

Yeah, that bothers me in England. Only makes sense when the lower leagues are an entirely separate entity, which isn't true in either country.

England's Premier League is actually a separate entity from the Football League, just as both are separate from the Conference and other non-League divisions - although of course there's promotion and relegation between the leagues and they work in close partnership with one another. But I agree, it's not the best of naming systems particularly where League One and Two are concerned.

In Scotland's case though, all four divisions are part of the same organisation so it's a little odd that they've gone with this naming convention - and a little disappointing that they've not opted for something a little more unique.

Anyway, from a kit geek's point of view I'm looking forward to seeing if there's going to be a new numbering font introduced across the divisions - and indeed if the lower three divisions are going to adopt squad numbering.

[fumbler]

Whats with the Scottish, why wouldn't it just be Premiership of Scotland and so forth?

[Saintsfan]

The tongue on the lion is very strange.

I do think the names are a bit poor as well. I don't get the 'championship' in this context either. In England it's partly to market the Football League as a separate thing, as others have pointed out. Makes no sense when it's part of the same organisation as the Premiership and hence not going to be marketed separately. It also smacks of copying the English, which seems unimaginative and unrepresentative of an increasingly confident country wanting its own identity.

[MJWalker45]

It should be interesting to see how a sponsor will be added to the logo as well.

[lost_limey]

I kind of wish they had gone for a red lion to match the Scottish part of the Royal Standard and to distinguish more so from the blue lion of the EPL logo.

For reference, the Scottish lion is the top right of this flag:

That also accounts for the weird tongue.

[Jaffa]

Anyway, from a kit geek's point of view I'm looking forward to seeing if there's going to be a new numbering font introduced across the divisions - and indeed if the lower three divisions are going to adopt squad numbering.

No new numbering font, however squad numbering has been extended to the second tier as well - Scottish Leagues One and Two will still see starting players wearing 1-11 though.

Just thought I'd best mention it as I'm sure a lot of people were on tenterhooks waiting to find this out.

[Malpass]

The Football League Championship in England is exactly that: The Championship of the Football League. The whole Championship = 2nd Tier is confusing, but there's at least some logic to it. The Scottish Championship as a name, on the other hand, is pretty non-sensical, and it makes the SPFL look as if they didn't fully do the research before deciding on the name. The Scottish Professional Football League name doesn't work either - several teams are only semi-professional and Queens Park are fiercely amateur! In other news, it's a shame they went with Scottish Premiership instead of the Scottish Super League - good bit of alliteration missed out on there!

This is pretty much a rebranding exercise (and a rather poor one at that), as there's still no promotion to/relegation from the bottom tier, and the league numbers haven't changed either.