Airdrie & Coatbridge Advertiser
Supporters vote against the Colts
Airdrie fans stand up
The Airdrie Supporters Trust have stood against the introduction of Colt teams in the lower leagues.
The announcement comes after a public consultation with fan group Supporters Direct Scotland which revealed a resounding 74 per cent of Scottish football fans would be against Colt teams being introduced.
Colt teams from the Scottish Premiership competed in the IRNBRU Cup last season for the first time and will do so again in the 2017/18 campaign.
Now the SPFL want to take that one step further.
The clubs would enter the set-up at the bottom of the pyramid — the Lowland and Highland Leagues.
They would only be allowed to go as far as League One.
In the event that a colt team were to win the title or finished in the promotion play-off places, it would be ignored, and their promotion place re-allocated to the non-B teams.
Now, the New Broomfield faithful have spoken out against any proposed change to the structure.
The Trust carried out a poll of Diamonds fans with a huge 89 per cent stating that they do not want to see the likes of Rangers, Celtic, Aberdeen and Hearts second string sides introduced into the league pyramid.
In a statement, the Trust called for the figures, which include over 200 Airdrie fans, to be taken under consideration by the club.
They said: “The Trust decided to run its own poll on this matter to gauge the feelings of our own supporters.
“With the proposal to introduce Colt/ B- teams into the Scottish Football League, a number of Supporters Trusts and fan groups decided to gain the views of their members on the said proposal after it became apparent that this was a proposition that seemed to be creating some very strong feelings amongst football supporters.
“The poll ran for four days on our Twitter account and was also shared on the Facebook page, the views of people who do not have Twitter have been added to the poll results.
“As well as the overwhelming lack of support for the proposal, there were a number of people who expressed that they would not attend any matches involving Colt/B-teams as they feel it diminishes the competitive nature of League football, as well as giving other football clubs a stronger influence than necessary in the game.
“We hope that these poll results will be of interest to you, and that they may be taken into consideration if and when any official decision is to be made regarding the matter.”