The latest attempt to produce a Scottish football magazine as a permanent addition to the newsagent shelves is understood to be launching in July.
It has to be hoped that the Scots version of Eleven does better than the English Premiership-centred monthly football magazine which carried the same title and was launched in 2002: it did not even last for 11 editions.
According to a Scottish media website, the identities behind the new, Scottish version of Eleven are being secret at present, because of current work commitments.
But a spokesperson told allmediascotland: “Eleven follows many other attempts by publishers, such as those of The Punter and Scottish Football Today, to crack the market for such a magazine.
“However, the team behind the project is confident that it can be a success by providing content of interest to fans of all clubs and by making the publication available for sale in club shops and newsagents.
“The magazine is set to be a feature-led publication, focusing on the personalities and fans of all SPL and SFL clubs, as well as those of the country’s semi-professional game and junior set-up.â€
A print print of between 6,000 and 10,000 is expected and the magazine is expected to retail between £2 and £2.50.
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For it to succeed, the new magazine will need to overcome two major obstacles: the existing wall-to-wall coverage of football in the Scottish daily press and on TV and radio; and the traditional, deep-seated Old Firm rivalries, which pre-dominates all else within Scottish football.
At allmediascotland, pundit Matthew Vallance observed: “There’s a lot wrong with Scottish football, many issues which require serious debate. Unfortunately, even on The Scotsman‘s web pages, any attempt at such serious debate is quickly hijacked by the Old Firm cyberbandits and it degenerates into mutual name-calling.
“I’d like to think there was a market for a serious football publication in Scotland, but experience has forced me into feeling it’s not a big enough one.”