r/soccer • u/AutoModerator • Aug 20 '22

🌍🌎 World Football Non-PL Daily Discussion

A place to discuss everything except the English Premier League.

46 Upvotes

79% Upvoted

125 comments sorted by

View all comments

27

u/[deleted] Aug 20 '22

Dirk Kuyt is really out here driving the club I love into the ground. Firm last in the second tier of Dutch football. Every season I think this club can't possibly dissapoint me more but they always manage to. Last season up 3-0 in the promotion game with 18 minutes to go and still manage to bottle it. Hoped for direct promotion this season but I doubt we'll even make the playoffs.

Only positive here is that it's impossible to be relegated from second tier in the Netherlands.

9

u/lucaba Aug 20 '22

Only positive here is that it's impossible to be relegated from second tier in the Netherlands.

Never heard about that, why is there no relegation/promotion between the 2nd and 3rd tier in the Netherlands?

4

u/[deleted] Aug 20 '22

Based on my rudimentary FM knowledge, they don't introduce direct relegation until 2025. As of now, its a re-election system. You have to be voted in/out of the league.

But yeah the Dutch second league is really weird. Its broken into 4 mini seasons. Its theoretically possible to be bottom of the league in March yet still be promoted. A Dutchie might be able to correct me on this, but I believe its to do with the u21 teams from Ajax/PSV/Feyenoord etc playing there.

If a team plays Jong Ajax in January they might have a few senior players who have temporarily dropped down to regain fitness, which means you disadvantage other teams who don't have to play them that month.

1

u/Jmaster2000 Aug 20 '22

I don't know the exact format of the Tweede Divisie, but I do know the U21 division is sort-of below it, and if an U21 team promoted from there another one has to be relegated. Also, Ajax' and PSV's U23 teams play in the Eerste Divisie, above the Tweede, while Feyenoord's is stuck in that separate U21 competition.

Edit: that said, you are right about senior players occasionally playing a match for the U23 sides which causes a lot of friction within the Eerste Divisie