Reserve teams in Norwegian football
Reserve teams in Norwegian association football play in the ordinary league system. They are always attached to their first teams with a "2" suffix, must play in a lower league than the first team, and cannot play in the Premier League or First Division. Furthermore, if a club's first team plays in the First Division, the reserves team cannot play in the Second Division either.
Controversy
Reserve teams have in general been criticized for fielding uneven teams from week to week, with many first-team players one week and more youth players the next. They have also been criticized for keeping smaller clubs out of the Second Division, meaning a more centralized football culture. In 2009 manager Ivar Morten Normark proposed to throw the reserve teams out of the ordinary league pyramid, and other managers like Dag Eilev Fagermo agreed. In a survey, 19 of 31 responding Second Division clubs wanted the reserve teams out, as did 30 of the 49 responding Third Division clubs.
Reserve team
In sports, a reserve team (or reserves team in Australian English) is a team composed of players under contract to a specific team but who do not normally appear on the team's roster during matches. Reserve teams are usually composed of young players who need playing time in order to improve their skills, as well as members of the first team recovering from injury.
In Association football
Reserve teams usually consist of a combination of emerging youth players and first-team squad players. These teams are distinct from a club's youth team, which usually consists of players under a certain age and plays in an age-specific league. In England, Argentina and the United States the term reserve is commonly used to describe these teams. In Germany and Austria the terms Amateure or II is used, while B team is used in the Spanish football league system, the Czech Republic, Slovakia, and Portugal. In the Netherlands and Norway these teams are distinguished by a 2. In England reserve teams of league clubs play in completely separate leagues and competitions such as the FA Premier Reserve League or the Central League, although further down the pyramid, reserve clubs feature in the same system as their parent clubs and can be promoted through the system. They cannot usually play in the same division as their parent team.
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