The future of the EIHL...long term

[Phil Mitchell]

I know that we may have touched on this subject before, but since were coming towards the end of another season. What to the future hold for the league as it currently stands

We have a league that's owned by the owners of the clubs within the league as I understand - and I'm not convinced that its ideal (but that's just my own personal view)

I constantly read that certain teams will not play in the EIHL because its not financially viable - Manchester, Basingstoke and Bracknell come to mind as they've played in the league in the early days of its inception, but struggled to make it pay and dropped down to the EPIHL

We've lost teams due to closure of venues because of the local authorities claim that the facility was no longer financially viable and due to Government funding cuts the ice rinks/arenas had to go (Newcastle plus Durham and Southampton - pre EIHL days and others besides)

Will the league ever expand beyond the 10 clubs, its been talked about for years (London amongst other places)
Its about getting the sport out there and in the public eye so that clubs survive and attendances are raised.

Lastly - how long before the league needs a new sponsor; how long has the deal with Rapid Solicitors got to go.

[panthersdave]

In terms of competition the league has never been healthier. Any team can beat any other and this is a good thing.

I dont know what the financial state of clubs is but on the outside it appears more stable, no teams going into meltdown for a couple of years. The situation with the owners isnt ideal but theres hardly a queue of millionaires waiting to pump money in.

The rumours are that a couple of new teams will be joining soon. This is positive.

As long as the league is viable with no soap operas then the quality of olayers coming can be sustained or increased.

I dont buy the idea that the Phoenix and Bison moved solely due to finances, they very quickly rose to the top of the epl. I think a lot of it was due to the apparent 'big four' domination. They wanted some of that and the only way was to drop down.

[tootootrain]

Mar 28, 2014 18:27:51 GMT panthersdave said:

I dont buy the idea that the Phoenix and Bison moved solely due to finances, they very quickly rose to the top of the epl. I think a lot of it was due to the apparent 'big four' domination. They wanted some of that and the only way was to drop down.

Fully agree.

Phoenix especially were (still are?) owned by a walking ego with ambitions that stretched further than his patience. He wanted silverware, any silverware, and was quite happy to drag the Phoenix into the little pond that is the EPL to go 'pot hunting'.

[pantherdman]

I hope us leaving and joining a European league is the future.

No import limit

And a rule book

[cooperphil156]

I don think it is all negative. The 10 teams seem to be all viable, although Caps causes concern. Braehead as a new team are now getting capacity crowds some of the time and I think will continue to strengthen. Also another team one hopes next year from London, which with the Blacks pushing it should be viable. Manchester Phoenix (if I am up to date) are due to have a new stadium, which will increase the capacity and could well be in the mix in the future. At the present they probably dont have enough capacity to support a EIHL team. Also at least there is now coverage on the box.
I would love us to be involved more in Europe. However the crowds for a show case event were viewed as a success, but matched disappointing midweek crowds. Lets face it some already are questioning as the whether the Continental Cup cost us a lot in the league, particularly in terms of wear and tear and mental fatigue.

[oldman]

Still need in an ideal world teams in London, Liverpool, Manchester and perhaps Leeds and Dublin, we are a bit scottish centric right now.however it is a better than it used to be.

[cooperphil156]

Mar 28, 2014 20:59:13 GMT oldman said:

Still need in an ideal world teams in London, Liverpool, Manchester and perhaps Leeds and Dublin, we are a bit scottish centric right now.however it is a better than it used to be.

There was a window of opportunity when the Leeds Arena openned. However the shape of the building rules ice hockey out. Its difficult to see how they will now be able to get a suitable venue.

[calv]

Mar 28, 2014 19:03:30 GMT tootootrain said:

Mar 28, 2014 18:27:51 GMT panthersdave said:

I dont buy the idea that the Phoenix and Bison moved solely due to finances, they very quickly rose to the top of the epl. I think a lot of it was due to the apparent 'big four' domination. They wanted some of that and the only way was to drop down.

Fully agree.

Phoenix especially were (still are?) owned by a walking ego with ambitions that stretched further than his patience. He wanted silverware, any silverware, and was quite happy to drag the Phoenix into the little pond that is the EPL to go 'pot hunting'.

Manchester were losing £150,000 a season in the elite, which is unsustainable. They have a reduced wage bill in the EPL but are charging the same ticket prices as when they were Elite. To sustain the increased wage bill, the ticket prices would also have to increase substantially. It's unfortunate, but they won't be coming up any time soon. I believe they have a rink rental of £3,000 per game which is a hell of a lot for such a rubbish rink.

Also, the new rink is not getting built. Due to the financial crisis the plan changed, and it is getting a bit of a refurb and a bowling alley stuck on the side. The terrible sightlines are staying....

[kwall100]

Mar 28, 2014 20:19:29 GMT pantherdman said:

I hope us leaving and joining a European league is the future.

No import limit

And a rule book

wow how selfish

[PantherG]

I thunk the league is in pretty good shape, crowds in Fife and Braehead are up this year. The two teams who do concern me are Edinburgh and Cardiff.

We will see at least two new teams join us in the 2015/16 season, one being London and if that goes well it can really help this league.

Absolutely not interested in Europe and I'm literally praying Belfast don't get the wild card.

[Phil Mitchell]

Having read all of the posts...let me add a few points

Leeds - First Direct Arena was built the way it is - to be different from the standard arenas such as Nottingham/Sheffield/Braehead

Some of the clubs such as Sheffield and Cardiff for example - are they actually making any money each season, when you've paid £3k per time for the ice, players wages, away travel costs etc - are you realistically going to fill a 7500 capacity arena as in Nottingham's case for every game. It makes me think that some of the clubs (unless they've got rich owners) must be verging on the same scenario as Manchester.

I can understand why Manchester dropped out of the EIHL back in to the EPL - with Neil Morris's ego - to win silverware. But it surprised me that Tony Hand is still coaching there and doesn't want to move on to bigger things.

With the additional teams mentioned - London has been talked about for a few seasons now, but where would you put the facility and could it be seen that the club is also owned by Neil Black - its bad enough at the moment with Nottingham/Braehead - would there be a time when 'a conflict of interest' would happen

I have to ask whether Guildford have ever been asked about joining the league - they've got a 2000 seater arena & Olympic size pad

There are very few places that have reasonable facilities - full size ice pad and at least 2000 seats unless you can find a rink operator who sees building a new facility in any town/city as long term financially viable


The other issue is midweek games - they do nothing to swell the coffers - as crowds are usually below average attendances at the weekend

As I see it the majority of the EIHL teams seem to have strong financial backing one way or another

Lets see what happens but it would be nice to expand the EIHL to 12 or even 14 clubs then you wouldn't see the same opposition so often.

[tootootrain]

Mar 29, 2014 12:02:16 GMT Phil Mitchell said:

I have to ask whether Guildford have ever been asked about joining the league - they've got a 2000 seater arena & Olympic size pad

I really can't see Guildford joining the EIHL given their owner was the #1 agitator fighting against the formation of the league, to the point that its rumoured he even started buying up any website domain names related to "Elite Ice Hockey".

He is quite happy with what he has, being one of the big fish in the EPL, with three teams positioned within easy reach in the Thames Valley for natural local rivalries.

As for the size of The Spectrum, they rarely fill it and even if they could ram it every game a 2000 capacity take is small fry when you have to consider the increased costs playing in the EIHL would bring, especially given the costs of housing etc in the stockbroker belt.

[PantherG]

First if all I understand that Cardiff pay nothing to play I the BBT, Edinburgh are the same and Fife probably pay next to nothing, so they just need bums on seats. I think Cardiff need 1600 to break even, I read that somewhere. I'm sure Fife have a break even number too and Edinburgh probably compensate for small crowds by employing some cheaper Eastern Europeans. I really tip my hat to Scott Neil for sticking with the Capitals.

Guildford would be a good addition but apparently have never been interested and Neil Black stated that the only team they'd be interested in recruiting now in the south would be a London team, which is why in 18 months we should have a team playing out of Wembley, I've heard a rumour the other team being muted is Telford, but that's just speculation.

I guess we just need to keep the clubs we have and try and grow by 2-4 over the next few years.

[Phil Mitchell]

Mar 29, 2014 12:14:19 GMT tootootrain said:

Mar 29, 2014 12:02:16 GMT Phil Mitchell said:

I have to ask whether Guildford have ever been asked about joining the league - they've got a 2000 seater arena & Olympic size pad

I really can't see Guildford joining the EIHL given their owner was the #1 agitator fighting against the formation of the league, to the point that its rumoured he even started buying up any website domain names related to "Elite Ice Hockey".

He is quite happy with what he has, being one of the big fish in the EPL, with three teams positioned within easy reach in the Thames Valley for natural local rivalries.

So there are some owners of clubs within the EPL who would rather stop there than join the EIHL because of the way its set up
Then you wonder why Ice Hockey in general hasn't got a big marketable product - because of the 'them and us' situation with the EIHL and EPL etc - something has to be done for the long term financial future of the game

[tootootrain]

Mar 29, 2014 12:22:06 GMT Phil Mitchell said:

So there are some owners of clubs within the EPL who would rather stop there than join the EIHL because of the way its set up
Then you wonder why Ice Hockey in general hasn't got a big marketable product - because of the 'them and us' situation with the EIHL and EPL etc - something has to be done for the long term financial future of the game

To be fair to Guildford, you need to see it from their POV.

- As it stands they play in a league where the furthest they need to travel for a game is Manchester and three teams they play against are less than 45 minutes drive away (Basingstoke = about 45 minutes, Slough and Bracknell are about 30 minutes away).

- Then you need to factor in the player costs etc. Their Brits are either guys at the end of their careers or kids on the way in, but in both cases the majority of them are part-time players, with 'normal' day-to-day jobs who get a bit of pin money for playing hockey.

- All this of course whilst playing out of one of the most expensive areas of the country to live and work in. (I used to live near by Headley, Surrey, I know just how expensive it is to live down there).

Now consider if they step up to the EIHL.

- Regardless of conference make up, their travel costs would go up. The league would realistically need to expand a fair bit before a North/Midlands/South conference system was practicable, which would likely mean Guildford would slot into the current Erhardt Conference somehow. This would mean trips to Belfast (as its unlikely that Belfast would be put into the Gardiner Conference, they have enough of a bye in the Challenge Cup, giving them an bye to the league title every season wouldn't go down well). Suddenly, rather than Manchester being the furthest they travel, it becomes regular longer distance trips with frequent flights to Belfast and occasional 14-15 hour round trips to Scotland.

- Costs will rise, no matter how careful they are with their spending. Debate about who costs more, 'import quality Brits' or imports, aside there will be an increase in costs as fewer 'part time' players could be carried and more imports, with attendant housing costs in an expensive area, will need to be employed to be competitive.

- All this whilst playing out of a rink (The Spectrum is not an arena) with a fairly small capacity given the income needs relative to all the above.

Yes I'd like to see more teams step up the the EIHL but Guildford have a good thing going on as is, and its easy to see why Manchester looked upon their lot and decided to jump ship too. In the EPL they are the big boys, in the EIHL they'd be another Hull/Coventry/Cardiff.

[sparkymark75]

According to the EIHL site, Cardiff's average attendance this season was 1,385. Surely they were running at a loss? Fife's average attendance was 1,632. I imagine a break even for Fife is around 1,100.

[ted logan]

Mar 28, 2014 20:59:13 GMT oldman said:

Still need in an ideal world teams in London, Liverpool, Manchester and perhaps Leeds and Dublin, we are a bit scottish centric right now.however it is a better than it used to be.

I would love to see a team in the North East back in the EIHL too. If a Liverpool and/or Manchester team could join up, that's a North-West representative.

Can see a London team joining some time soon will should hopefully improve the National media coverage.

After that, who knows? Dublin maybe? What about Milton Keynes? The Elite League is governed by a board of ten directors: the owners of the eight participating teams, plus the owners of the London Racers and Milton Keynes Lightning, who maintain the right to join the league without making an application.

Would be great to see the whole set up expand and bring with it a proper Conference system and a real end of season play-off series.

[GiantsFan00]

GM kindly participated in a q&a when you guys were over here alongside Todd and they did touch on where the league is heading... they both see the only sticking plaster as Edinburgh - find it hard to push the league too far forward, too quickly as they can't / won't keep up, but neither want to put any team in the position that they feel obliged to cease as a club so for the time being things will progress slowly.

They are working together to try and improve the overall image of the league - both did joke that Ragan had offered Panthers & Giants his PR team to help improve the image of the clubs.

They both regard our 2 clubs as the biggest in the UK - and frequently share good practices & ideas to keep both clubs in a growing state - "a rivalry with respect" it was described as.

They don't envisage any teams joining in the future or any teams leaving (as above)

Moran wants playoffs to leave Nottingham for a year to shake the format up - he wants to give Belfast a shot but there are some who are against the idea. He thinks Nottingham get unfair criticism when a lot is out of their control - it is a league decision to have playoffs in Nottingham so all clubs have to take responsibility for that, - Todd agreed with this - and made a joke that although it's described as "PantherFest" the event is not organised by Nottingham.

Last week the European question was raised to Todd - if the wild card is offered to the league we get first refusal - however entrance fee, potentially bringing players in early, extra travel costs will be taken into consideration before we decide to enter. The games will be Tuesday evenings with a possibility of one Saturday game. He did imply that if EIHL are offered the wild card and we turn it down then GM has stated Panthers will enter the Champs league while we take the Conti Cup.

[Phil Mitchell]

The worry I have is that the league seems to be drifting along aimlessly with little direction; and possibly has stagnated.
We need more teams, a bigger better setup and more neutral venues used for play-off final etc (Wembley etc)
The whole thing seems to have lost a bit of sparkle and needs to have greater promotion to the general public out there - bums on seats and all that

[pantherdman]

More chance of a team in France joining the league than London.

[PantherG]

Apr 1, 2014 20:07:18 GMT pantherdman said:

More chance of a team in France joining the league than London.

Think you'll be surprised as a London club is in scope for season 2015/16

[Robbie Nud]

I think a lot needs looking at, starting with the basics. Officiating, old hat I know, but how many players wont come to these shores because they have been put off by others because of the standard of the officials.
Having a panel and not one person having autonomy on discipline matters.
Change of how the fixtures are arranged so you aren't playing the same team more than 10 times a season.

[gump]

Repeating myself, but the league needs to do away with the grandslam mentality. Provide the league winner with home ice advantage and go to a true playoff format, dump the challenge cup in favor of divisional/conference winners, create a salary cap monitored by independant firm and penalize teams by loss of points that exceed it or fine them and disperse money to the other clubs ie: Major league baseball. Broker with France or other Euro leagues a exchange of games for each team that count in the schedule thus reducing number of times each team is played. some of these suggestions would require a monumentale shift by the present owners but somethings need to change if the league is to survive.

[NickThePanther44]

Apr 1, 2014 15:19:00 GMT Phil Mitchell said:

The worry I have is that the league seems to be drifting along aimlessly with little direction; and possibly has stagnated.
We need more teams, a bigger better setup and more neutral venues used for play-off final etc (Wembley etc)
The whole thing seems to have lost a bit of sparkle and needs to have greater promotion to the general public out there - bums on seats and all that

You say it seems to have stagnated, I think the EIHL looks to be at its most stable in its ten year existence.

The only two real negatives at the moment are an ever-lagging behind Edinburgh organisation and a Cardiff arena that almost seems to refuse to be built! On the other side of the spectrum though we have attendances up practically league wide, a trio of Scottish teams that are developing fantastically and becoming genuine assets to the league, two seasons of very competitive hockey since the conference format was introduced and a genuine chance of a London franchise coming to fruition in the coming seasons.

I don't pretend to have any 'inside info' but from what I understand there will be refurbishment work at the Wembley arena which will enable a team to play out of there from the 15/16 onwards.

I can understand why some fans are desperate for more variety but adding teams to the current format would be extremely difficult. There are very few teams in the EPL who could compete at EIHL level and then they'd be going from trophy contention to realistically being mid-table at best. Hardly a great selling point. There is potential out there for future additions to the league but the stability we've seen over recent seasons is far more important when it comes to seeking investment and/or any serious national recognition for the sport.

[spik]

But whilst the Elite seems strong are we fans getting anything better?

Cardiff are having there arena built now but at anytime we could loose a team, or are we going to 'chip in' to save the Scottish Capital team.
The conference has given a little hand up for those Gardiner teams (I nevr liked the idea) but in one fell swoop it has been taken away again.So what of next season for them now?
Be nice to have a neutral venue for finals but have the Elite the money for that. Rather than use a good format of Cup games (both Challenge and PO)they change the CUP I am sure just because someone is winning it all the time, no other reason, otherwise why wait till now? It will be a Wembley side in 15-16 with perhaps that arena as a 'Finals' venue I guess, no real neutral as wanted.
Great to have stability but this seasons fans complaint of playing the same sides too many times has had some input into the loss of conference advantage for Gardiner teams.
This Play-Off's event with one main sales stand and a paint your face stall plus letting the GB sit by the entrance is as good as it gets now.