We can formally announce of our intention to join the East of Scotland league next season, subject to their ratification of our application, having given notice to the SJFA and ERSJFA earlier this week. We have sequenced our intentions officially in this way to allow the junior associations time to plan ahead for next season, and also by way of courtesy to an association that we have been members of for just over 120 years.

The proposals outlined at the SGM last month were to either move to the East of Scotland league or wait and see the outcome of the survey issued by the SJFA on pyramid membership and at what levels member clubs would prefer to join, with a view to implementation in season 19/20. (Survey results were not known at this time but have since been released). There was a large majority at the SGM that voted in favour of our proposal to join the East of Scotland league (results here), which has been replicated by and large with the wider support base in the subsequent weeks.

This hasn't been a decision that has been taken lightly but there has been a general conensus to it. As per the statement released last year, our intention for the past five years has been to attain SFA entry level licensing. The barriers that we perceived to be in place twelve months ago are clearly no longer there, with Edusport Academy promoted to the Lowland League this season so there is freedom of movement from Tier 6 to Tier 5, subject to licensing criteria. We also committed last year that if there were ever to be a decision on our league status we would put it to our members, which we have done.

We believe we have almost everything in place to apply for our entry level license in the summer - we have invested in our facilities every season since we came on board, even when funds weren't readily available and we have had club policies in place for several years. This is our primary driver for moving now as we currently cannot attain one in the league we are in at the moment.

There are several other drivers for our rationale to move to the East of Scotland league, one of those is the ability to continue to enhance our facilities. While there are fantastic facilities up and down the country and some nearby which are council funded, we are paradoxically held back by owning our own ground and it is a general postcode lottery as to what clubs receive. We currently get zero support from our council and we have had to rely on our own funds, sponsors and our supporters to get us to where we are just now. By committing to the pyramid it opens up funding channels from other third parties which could be of benefit to the club. SFA membership also provides other benefits, such as annual payments for being a member club and also annual entry into the first round of the Scottish Cup.

For the avoidance of doubt the proposals discussed at the SGM outlined in the second paragraph above both intimated the intention of joining the pyramid - the only difference being a quesion of timing.

Hopefully that clarifies our position to all, given intense speculation over the past few weeks since notice was given of our SGM. Our focus just now is to give our management team and players as much support as we can, given on the playing side we are very much in the hunt on three fronts for silverware this season.

Finally on behalf of our committee I would like to sincerely thank Tom Johnson at the SJFA and in particular John Reilly, Chic Spence and Syd McAlpine of the ERSJFA for their support to us over the past nine years, in particular in the early days when we were thrown in at the deep end trying to keep the club afloat.

For any media queries please use the contact section of the website or direct message me on our social media channels for initial contact.

Regards
Brendan Parkinson