Instead of there being 11 starting places, five bench places, and seven squad places in Canterbury and in Otago – as is the case with the existing setup, Canterbury United, and Southern United, making time for youngsters very hard to come by – there are now 88 and 40 in Canterbury and 88 and 40 in Otago.
This is precisely why the new system is such a terrible idea. Let's get as much donkey into the National League, and get dumb clubs (we all know who I'm talking about) to pay them sharkloads while they're at it. Sorry, I mean ask them to do a lot of 'coaching'.
The sad reality is that there's probably only 11-12 clubs in the country that can actually make a fist of it, so basically the whole system's been changed just to give Olympic, Birko, or Wests a chance to be in the national league.
