Hmm, wonder who that might benefit?

Bolton chairman and FA board member Phil Gartside has revealed that he wants the Premier League’s format to be changed to a two-tier system featuring two divisions of eighteen teams and has suggested abolishing relegation to the Football League.

While it would all prove very handy for his team, who escaped relegation by one point last season and are one point above the drop zone in this campaign, it’s hard to understand his logic on how it would benefit football:

“We have already got to the situation where the three clubs that go down from the Premier League are usually the three that come up, although a couple of others might sneak in.

“I don’t have the answers but it is certainly time for a debate - perhaps even on not having relegation from a second division of the Premier League.”

So in Gartside’s mind almost everyone that gets relegated comes straight back up? Perhaps Leicester, Leeds, Wolves, Crystal Palace, Norwich, Southampton, Sheffield United, Charlton and Watford, who make up the 75% of sides that have failed to regain their top-flight since relegation between 2004 and 2007, might have something to say about that. It’s also worth noting that none of the three sides promoted this season - West Brom, Stoke and Hull - had been relegated from the Premier League in the previous campaign.

The story of the season so far, besides Chelsea actually becoming watchable and Tottenham and Newcastle’s struggles, has been Hull’s incredible five-year rise from the fourth-tier to third place in the Premier League. If Gartside has his way, there would be no chance of this ever happening again.