Second string vital to tune players up for rigours of SPL

At clubs all over the country, footballers in their teens and early 20s have been stagnating this season without reserve matches. By the summer some will have gone an entire year without a full 90 minutes, save for closed-door friendlies.

This in a nation in which youth development is becoming ever more critical due to financial constraints in boardrooms.

SPL age restrictions currently prevent clubs fielding overage players in the under-19 league, therefore the likes of Hearts' Paul Mulrooney have been left in the wilderness.

The 20-year-old midfielder has managed to successfully propel himself into the Tynecastle first-team squad and delivered an imperious performance at Tannadice last week, but much of this season has been a write-off for him and so many others in a similar predicament.

"My last competitive 90 minutes before Tannadice was last May for the under-19s. That's because they've done away with the reserve league," he explained.

"It's been really hard, to be honest. I didn't think I'd be in the first team at all so I was looking to play reserve games every week and build my way through so the manager could see me.

"With a few injuries the squad has got smaller and smaller and the manager has been able to see me in training. I've been doing a lot of fitness work but you can be as fit as you want, you need to be match fit for 90 minutes of football.

"At times, it's frustrating because you're training hard all week and it comes to the weekend and you don't have a game to look forward to.

"You're just sitting about at the weekend watching other people play football.

"Players' progress can stall. You can train and train and train but you aren't going to get any better. You need to play against other people who are trying their as well.

"Last year ,played against Marc Crosas and people like that in the reserve league and it gave me a lot of confidence. I felt if I could do it against him I could do it against other players in the SPL.

"I'm definitely in favour of the reserve league coming back. I'm playing now and again but I'd still want to play reserve games to keep my match fitness."

SPL managers met at Hampden Park recently to debate how best to tackle the lack of match action for their fringe players, with league officials conceding that "the managers feel there should be one league between the youth initiative (under-19] and the reserve league".

Many also pressed for the abolition of the SPL's under-21 rule, which states two players under the age of 21 must be included in a team's matchday squad.

The SPL are receptive to the idea and are understood to be ready to change if all members clubs agree on the issue.

"It's a live issue we are pursuing at the moment. We have got a group looking at it," said a league spokesperson.

Last month, the St Mirren manager Gus MacPherson called for definitive action from the Scottish Football Review Committee, which is headed by former First Minister Henry McLeish.

In particular, MacPherson wants the absence of reserve football remedied.

"We don't need an investigation: we need action," he said. "We also said that when Ernie Walker had his Think Tank but we didn't get it then.

"The SPL reserve league was scrapped for financial reasons and we now have a youth system which costs an absolute fortune to run in terms of the facilities and infrastructure.

"Unfortunately, I don't believe that we're getting any more or better players through that system than we were without it 20 or 30 years ago.

"So all that money is going out of the game and we're not getting a return."

Reserve football was often dismissed as only being fit for consumption by two men and the average dog, but its vital role in Scottish football has never been better shown than this season. As the song goes – you don't know what you've got till it's gone.