Pure dynamite, the two Scottish clubs that would play in the Premier

The cold data says that between the two big Glasgow clubs they have won 86% of national championships, a figure unparalleled in any other elite league. In Germany, the beginning of the century witnessed five different winners in a decade. In France, even the almighty PSG has recently been overtaken by Lille and Monaco.

For this reason, the competitive imbalance and geographical proximity have always invited the Scots to flirt with the idea of their great pairing making the move towards the pyramid of English football. There is already some precedent, although more due to territorial anomalies than due to level sports: Border Towns United FC, which plays in Gretna, plays its matches in the FA system.

The clearest example to follow, however, would be Wales, with Swansea, Cardiff City, Newport County and the high-profile Wrexham perfectly consolidated at the English professional levels. The first two even played Premier League matches until not too long ago. But what is stopping Catholics and Protestants in Glasgow from taking the same path? The answer is more complex than it seems.

Firstly there is something that many Scots deny in public but recognize in private; while competitiveness would increase, without Rangers and Celtic the value of the Scottish Premiership would plummet. In terms of income, in terms of attractiveness for television operators and, no less important, in terms of UEFA ranking. Aberdeen, Hearts or Hibernian, to name three teams that would share a good part of the pie without the big two, would be incapable of supporting the weight of a thriving Scottish league on their shoulders. Let's return to the Welsh example; the Cymru Premier, with the modest New Saints as its greatest exponent, is the fourth worst league in UEFA coefficient, behind tiny championships such as those of Andorra or the Faroe Islands.

Secondly, as the historic Neil Lennon has confessed in an interview, it would be difficult for two fans so accustomed to winning as a routine to suddenly join the middle class of a competition in which, at least in the first seasons, they would not start. as favorites. The Old Firms, the great Scottish classics, are goose that lay the golden eggs that would lose some shine within the English panorama, where they would be far from being games that decide leagues.

The option for the transfer to materialize reached its highest point in 2009, when Phil Gartside, boss of Bolton Wanderers at that time, submitted a formal proposal to the Premier that ended up being rejected practically unanimously. Looking to the future, one of the few optimistic voices is that of Stiliyan Petrov, an illustrious former Celtic footballer, who believes that a hypothetical victory of the Super League project could end up uniting the English and Scots in opposition in the same competition that would stand up to the giant.

An unlikely future

It is not difficult to come across, walking along Buchanan Street, Glasgow's great shopping street, children dressed in the t-shirts of the city's great idols, whether they are from the blue bank or the green bank of the River Clyde. Boys who have grown up with the feeling of belonging that their parents and grandparents instilled in them, nostalgic for Scottish football that was very thriving in Europe in the sixties and seventies. It is possible that those times are now blurred, but what remains intact is the free and proud character of the inhabitants of the north, those who always looked askance at the English. The Premier League, for now, will have to wait.