Gretna are promoted, but is it good news for the SPL?

As with the top flight, the Scottish Football League Division One took a surprisingly long time to declare a winner this season. Twelve points clear at the top at the turn of the year, and scoring for fun, Gretna looked a shoe-in for the title and their third successive promotion. But their subsequent wobble, coupled with St. Johnstone's great run of form (they were fighting in both cup competitions, too, remember) made for a thrilling last day of the season.

It's heart-breaking for the Perth team, who have ended up with nothing after a season that promised so much. They got to the semi-finals of both the League and Scottish Cups, and pushed Hibernian and Celtic hard in both games, but eventually the better resourced teams came through. On Saturday, they got even closer - they beat Hamilton 4-3 in a pulsating game, and for 5 minutes were Division One Champions as it stood. But then the news came through from Dingwall - Gretna had scored again to go 3-2 up against Ross County, and back above the Saints in the table. They held on and took the title by a single point.

Gretna's rise has been meteoric. The former English non-League team have risen from Division Three to the SPL inside 5 seasons, and became the darlings of many last season when the got to the Scottish Cup Final, and only lost out to Hearts on penalties. Those same observers will now be hailing the romance of this small-town club earning its chance to play against the giants of the Scottish game next season. Eccentric owner Brooks Mileson has promised he will invest more of his fortune to ensure that Gretna will be able to hold their own in the SPL.

And yet... while the management team obviously deserve credit for organising things on the park, Gretna's turbocharged ascent has been entirely down to Mileson's cash. In Division Two, they assembled a squad more costly than many SPL clubs' wage bills. Their crowds at Raydale Park have hovered around 2,000, and while they can expect their SPL status to attract more fans, the fact that they will be playing their "home" games at Fir Park next season (Raydale Park doesn't meet the SPL's minimum criteria) means a 250 mile round trip will probably dissuade many of them from travelling. And the SPL needs more empty seats like the Scottish Labour Party needs the Iraq issue.

Given the limited catchment area, it's genuinely hard to see how the support can grow significantly in the longer term. Gretna are a small town club, propped up by a wealthy benefactor, not a genuine new force in Scottish football. If Mileson ever turns off the taps, it's hard to see how they can sustain their position.

Compare this with St. Johnstone. While Gretna took 500 fans to Dingwall on Saturday (admittedly, a tough journey), the Saints took 3,000 to Hamilton. They have built a team under an astute young manager, Owen Coyle, with the experience of players such as Derick McInnes and Jason Scotland, who desperately wanted to test themselves in the SPL again, week in, week out. McDiarmid Park would love to welcome the Perthshire crowds back to watch the big boys come to town, and dream of the days when their club took on SV Hamburg or Monaco in European competition. At the end of the day, they couldn't quite do enough to get promotion, but romance is not the preserve of the wedding specialists from near the Border.

As it is, they will have to bide their time. Gretna are up, and time will tell how much further they can go.