Cameron Howieson (Auckland FC | A-League)

Wouldn't. Always thought his touch was a little heavy and him a little too light weight.

have to agree, would have to improved A LOT in the past couple of years to get a look in at the nix

I confess to giggling every time someone in the global footballing Mecca that is New Zealand slags off Scottish football.

Except for Celtic the A-League is of a higher quality than the SPL IMHO. I went to a few hibbies games when they were in the top flight and the quality was really bad.

Hey...I never said that NZ football was great.

dreaming pal

"Sunday league football is also known as park football, pub leagues, and the Scottish Premier League"

http://backofthenet.wikia.com/wiki/Sunday_League

;)

http://m.bbc.com/sport/football/35041144

The 3 teams which knocked out Scotland's UEFA cup participants this season were from Romania, Armenia, and Kazakhstan

not again...it can't be... why kiwi footballers can hold a pro gig  overseas? there's some kind of gypsy curse on them?

The A League is improving but that's just fanciful (that it is better than the SPL).  The issue with the A-League is the uneven quality, the worst players and teams are very bad, although the best players and teams are pretty good (relatively)

Scotland's UEFA coefficient is worse than 22 other countries. 7 of the 12 teams average less than 5000 people per home game. I'll admit I haven't watched games from there in years but I've seen highlights (for instance when Rory Fallon was at Aberdeen) and seen their clubs' results in Europe, and none of that suggests to me that the SPL is better than the A League (especially as he said "Except Celtic"). Scotland's domestic game has been declining for years, and that accelerated when Rangers went bust. The A League is getting better too. On what grounds is it fanciful or dreaming to suggest the A League could be better than the SPL

Not sure it is worth continuing this discussion when you admit to not having watched Scottish football

Haha fair enough. I'll admit I'm drawing conclusions from secondary data (performance in European comps for instance) but that indicates to me that the quality is poor. Is there another explanation for the failure of Scottish sides in Europe? 

I have never seen the Kazakh league either, not even highlights, but I would confidently say the quality of it is poor based on the performance of those sides in Europe. Why is Scotland different? Because they speak English and used to be good?

Edit: not taking the piss but genuinely asking is the SPL better than its teams' performances in Europe would suggest? If so, why have they been so poor? If the A League is significantly worse than the SPL, what European league would it be equivalent to?

I don't see the point of this discussion, Howieson wasn't even playing in the Scottish Premier League and the Nix already have lots of midfielders, he won't be back to NZ nor will play in the A-League

I have watched the SPL and I believe the A-League is superior, even Celtic isn't that great if you look at their record in Europe although based on pure financial power they should be better than any A-League team,(although they are competing for players with the english clubs which would inflate the wage bill).

Another means of comparison which will likely be dismissed is the amount of SPL players that make the Scottish national team compared to the amount of A-League players that make the Australian team and how well they each do in international competitions.

I don't actually know where to start in response to these. So, I'm not even going to bother. As someone who has very probably watched more Scottish football than anyone on here, and as much A League football as most, I don't know, or care, whether one is superior (define superior?) to the other but all I'll restrict myself to saying is that some of the "means of comparison" being presented to back opinions are bizarre. 

Well it's impossible to compare so its apples and oranges, but you can try and draw conclusions by various means.

You're initial opinion was that the scottish 2nd division is better than the A-League, that might have been close to true last year when Hearts (and perhaps Rangers and Hibbies) were down there but I don't think so, please tell us why you think the  scottish championship is supperior to the A-League? 

Have to say it's pretty ignorant for a lot of you to comment on the "poor quality" of the SPL if you don't watch it. I've spent a lot of time over there recently and Aberdeen and Celtic would win the A-league at an absolute canter. Players at the top teams are all good Championship level players. Even at the bottom of the SPL you are talking solid League One and League Two level players. Let's remember two years ago Mooy was a very average player at St Mirren (average SPL side back then). 

For example, Aberdeen have beaten top teams from Holland and Croatia in the last two seasons in Europe. That Kazakhstani side which knocked them out had some very good players (the Ukranian Tymoshouk from Bayern Munich is one). 

The problem comparing with comparing the A-league is like the MLS or Chinese League, the quality differs significantly between players and squads. Broich, Bonevacia and Mooy right now would be good SPL players no doubt. But the likes of Tom Doyle, Fenton and Blake Powell would be very unlikely to get into an SPL squad (certainly they would get very little gametime). 

Yep, they bet Barca at home, they've also beaten Ajax at home and Spartak Moscow. But things happen in cup competitions, in general they don't do well.

now that he has been released would he have put his had up for selection for the AW?

Yep, I'm only looking at recent history seeing as the quality of the SPL league has dropped since the rangers were relegated. 

Since 2010 the only competitive year that Celtic had in europe was 2012.

In fact twice they only managed to progress because the teams that they were playing (who had them well beaten on agregate) were docked their wins for fielding ineligible players.

This hasn't precluded a lot of players being effective at A-league level and it is a debatable statement. Has had the discipline of playing in some serious club environments. If he had the right attitude I think he could be a good fit at the 'Nix. 

It's hard to say what will be successful too. Manny yes, Mulligan no. Not what might have been expected based on pedigree and experience. He's also a left footer IIRC, which brings a bit of variety, when outside Doyle (and Danaskos and McGarry, if they haven't been released) we don't have any other strong left footed players.

If the question is aimed at me? Firstly, at no point have I said anything about any tier of Scottish football being any better, or any worse, than the A League. My initial post was a lighthearted response to Dale's "can you get any lower....." comment and how it amused me that people in NZ happily slag off Scottish football. I gave no opinion on the comparative merits of football in either competition. My later post stated, quite clearly, that I didn't know, or care, which was 'superior' and that I just simply found the methods being used to compare the two somewhat odd. That's all. 

If it wasn't meant for me to respond to, please ignore everything I just typed  :-)

Wont get signed... pointless conversation. 

Good luck to him, but I expect to see him playing for ACFC

So no pointless conversations during the off season then? 

only five months to go....

Looks to be trialling at Bolton

http://www.uptheclarets.com/messageboard/viewtopic.php?t=6096

Thats a step up from Div 1 Scotland!

Bolton are currently in League 1 - 3rd tier in England so not really much of a step up

Judging how poorly Scottish clubs are faring in Europe against some pretty unimpressive opposition - it actually probably is.

With a couple of exceptions (Celtic 2003, Rangers 2008) Scottish clubs have not done well in Europe since the 1980's. 

One of the clubs in Europe this season was actually a Championship (div 1) side (Hibs). There isn't a huge difference between the Premiership and Championship in Scotland. So while Bolton will be a step up in terms of wages for Howieson, it's not that much of a step up from what he was playing at St Mirren

Not doing well in Europe since the 1980s has generally been the experience of most smaller leagues (well, probably better to say since the early 1990s) - don't think that's a big surprise.

But when Scottish clubs are being knocked out by Maltese opposition, and lose games to clubs from Luxemburg and Gibraltar, you have to admit that the outlook is pretty dire.

Aye the outlook is dire (although last time Celtic had a humiliating result (0-5 to Artmedia Bratislava) they went on to reach the last 16 of the Champions League in the following 2 seasons). Scottish clubs seem to have a bigger problem than most adjusting to these games being played in what is effectively their pre-season.

I don't think you can use the early knock out stages of Europe to compare leagues - some teams are in pre-season mode, others like the Scandinavians and Russians are in the middle of their seasons and they are 2 legged cup games.

The point I'm making is that going from St Mirren to Bolton is not much of a step up for Howieson (if he signs)

Actually the Ruskies have now switched over to align themselves with most of the rest of Europe. But I do get your point, and those July/early August games can be tough, and have tended to produce curious results over the years. I'm just saying that the results from this season against that level of opposition - Malta, Luxemburg, and Gibraltar - are genuinely terrible. You could write off one of them as an oddity/early season type of thing, but when it happens to three different Scottish clubs...I don't know. It's almost unbelievable, and makes me wonder if the standard of Scottish club football has sunk to an all-time low.

so any news on how he is going?

Big step up.  Scottish Premiership players constantly end up in England's League Two and many struggle to make it successfully.  My club "The Argyle" have a number of ex Scottish prems in L2 for this exact reason.