Do stats suggest SPFL one of worst leagues in football?

How does the SPFL compare to other top leagues around the World? Is it really as bad as people outside of Scotland usually say it is?

If the website FiveThirtyEight and its Global Club Soccer Rankings are to be believed, things are as bad as they say they are for Scottish football.

That’s because its rankings have Dundee FC languishing right at the bottom of 426 Worldwide Clubs. Is this fair? Is this accurate and are Scottish club’s a wee bit better than this list might suggest?

So, you’re in the pub in Scotland talking about “Fitba” and in walks a Lady or a Gentleman from another Country and decides to jump in on your conversation that you’re having with your pals. You’re giving it this and that about our League and how good would Celtic be do down in England if we had the same resources, TV money and all that jazz.

You can see the person at the end of the bar like somebody waiting to jump in on a skipping rope then BOOM!! “Your League is terrible”. “My Nan could score 40 goals a Season in Scotland”!! “You all slag the English League off but look at Celtic’s wealth compared to the other teams in the SPFL”!! Etc etc etc.

You probably read the same stuff I do daily on Social Media and it gets a bit monotonous eh?

That’s when you stick your chest out and do your best to stick up for our league, but it all falls on deaf ears. Barring Celtic, we’re just not really respected outside of Scotland. Rightly so or not. It’s difficult to put up an argument when the Scottish teams barring Celtic again, do so poorly in Europe. But…..

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Do you agree with it? Or, are they talking nonsense and Scottish club’s aren’t as bad as let say, MLS sides?

Would Toronto FC, who are in position 171, really beat all the SPFL sides barring Celtic and Aberdeen comfortably?

I beg to differ really.

Then again, it is hard to argue that Dundee haven’t been terrible over the past two seasons either. Further, this list not only has Dundee at the very bottom at 426. Celtic’s Glasgow derby rivals Partick Thistle are 424th and Kilmarnock come in at 425th.

Yes, that means three of the 12 clubs in the SPFL are at the very bottom of FiveThirtyEight’s rankings. Here is a look at the rest of the league:

While that isn’t exactly good news, these are just one set of rankings and the beauty of football is that a lot of this is subjective…even if you are using stats.

Football, like any other sporting endeavor involves a large human element that any statistical analysis can’t account for.

I’ve worked all over the World for the past 20 years and fought countless arguments about our league. It does get your back up, as I know that we’re not as bad as the rest of the world think we are. Should we just ignore these ranking structures? Or are they pretty much spot on?

The reality is that we may not be as bad as some believe, but clubs like Aberdeen and Sevco failing on the European stage over the past few years doesn’t help much.

It sure would be nice to argue about Scottish football being on the upswing and also be able to point to European success from a club not named Celtic.

Then again, we’re hoops through and through and I’ll take Celtic continuing to be a success on the European stage over the rest of the SPFL being mediocre on the same stage any day of the week.

Next: Takeaways from Celtic's crazy night in Astana

One thing is for sure, these rankings give Celtic fans a lot to be proud of, and a lot of work left to do for the rest of the SPFL. Do they have the answers to fixing what seems like a statistically awful league?