Mick McDermott: League fixture schedule needs revisiting

Glentoran became the latest Irish league club to call a game off due to international call-ups for Conor McMenamin, Terry Devlin and Aaron Wightman, with Friday night's game at Glenavon now postponed until Tuesday 8 November.

It follows Larne's decision to postpone Tuesday night's clash at home to Linfield as they to have several players on international duty.

McDermott feels having to fit these games into an already tight fixture schedule is unfair on teams, and for him, not having league games planned for international breaks is the way to resolve it.

"We made the decision (to postpone Glenavon game), but it now means we don't play for 13 days," said the Glens boss.

"We have three players away on international duty - Conor, Terry and Aaron.

"We don't want to call games off but it's a case for me that league games shouldn't be put in FIFA windows.

"The FIFA calendar is already written until 2024.

"Don't put league games in FIFA windows because it jams the schedule up and everybody suffers.

"We suffer with no games. Glenavon suffers potentially because they miss out on a massive crowd for a Friday night game.

"That game will now be played on a Tuesday with three quarters of the crowd.

"I know it's frustrating with us having to cancel the game on Friday night but why should we have to field a weakened team because of a fixture decision which isn't ours? That isn't fair on us either."

One proposal McDermott feels for filling up those international weekends is reformatting the regional competitions.

"The suggestion I had was to put the County Antrim Shield games for the FIFA windows," he explained.

"Football continues for the fans with no cancellation of league games.

"There are 16 teams in the County Antrim Shield so make it four groups of four.

"You play each team in the group once, creating more games would also help raise money.

"The top two would then progress to the quarter-finals and so on.

"The bigger clubs would play weakened teams.

"So it would be more games, more revenue, more entertainment and no cancellations of league games.

"When I was in the UAE they moved the smaller cup competition to the FIFA window and they made a rule that you had to play a minimum of four Under-23 players.

"I just think you need to be creative, and that's not a criticism at all.

"Now that our league is stronger the teams have had more players at Under-21 level and the senior squad.

"We have to look at how we can prevent cancellations and jam ups."