Opinion: Cardiff City and Swansea City should join the Cymru Premier

Wales’ two biggest teams would improve the Cymru Leagues, if they were to swap divisions.

Cardiff City and Swansea City are notably the two clubs that come to everyone’s mind when asked to name two football clubs that play in the English leagues but aren’t actually English.

Despite Newport County also being in professional English league,s and Wrexham’s rise under new ownership, the clubs that compete for the famous South Wales derby are bigger in reputation and history.

With Cardiff City being the only non-English club to win the FA cup back in 1927 it makes you think; why is that their biggest achievement as opposed to their 22 Welsh Cup titles and 10 runners-up medals between 1912 and 1995?

As time progressed and Cardiff and Swansea City began to further distance themselves from the teams in the Cymru leagues it seemed less of an achievement to take that title.

Both Swansea and Cardiff play in the Championship of English football, the second tier in the entire country, a feat that no other Welsh club can come near.

North of the English border, a debate is often sparked on where Celtic and Glasgow Rangers would place in the English tier system if they competed, however they aren’t allowed and hence dominate the Scottish top division, also frequently achieving varying degrees of success in European competitions as well.

With this domination of the Scottish divisions, competition can be few and far between for the bitter rivals, however, as years have passed and Celtic and Rangers have grown stronger, the clubs and reputation of the league around them have also grown. Although a club such as Aberdeen (seen as the third biggest Scottish club) beating either of the aforementioned clubs is still seen as unlikely it’s not as rare as it once was.

So, with this example of how one or two dominating clubs can grow a league, it begs the question why can’t the same be done in Wales?

Although there are obvious reasons such as the finances in the Cymru leagues are far worse than both the English and Scottish leagues so it may not be seen beneficial for neither Swansea or Cardiff City, it could certainly grow.

European qualifying round places are offered to the top clubs in the Cymru Leagues although qualification to group stages are rare, it’s not too far beyond the stretch of imagination.

With the addition of Cardiff and Swansea to the Cymru Premier, you immediately make the standard stronger as the two weakest clubs are relegated, filtering this growing standard down through the leagues. Domination would be clear for a number of years, however as seen in Scotland the league will grow if Swansea and Cardiff off-load their unwanted players to other teams within the Cymru leagues, something that happens rarely now due to their massive reputation differences and the fact that Swansea and Cardiff play in the English football ladder not the Welsh.

So if Cardiff and Swansea take pride out of being the only Welsh clubs in the English leagues and want to be seen as ‘’Welsh’’ clubs, why wouldn’t they want to represent their own country in European competitions and help boost the Cymru Leagues.

The same can be said for the growing standard of Newport and Wrexham although even their standard is two and three English leagues lower than Cardiff and Swansea respectively.