Royal Pacific M-League

The RoyalPacific M-League is the premier league of Football in Meridiania since 1983. It began as an entertainment alternative to the Championship. It originally ran off a franchise system with 8 teams however when the two merged in 1983, a promotion and relegation system was set up.

1975-1983: The Combined Era
In 1973, Sam Kotai, owner of Kotai Entertainment Corporation, announced a new league, the M-League, to begin play in 1975, with new, modern, refreshed rules, designed to promote higher scoring and an overall more entertaining game. 1975-1982 M-League only rules
 * No Offsides rules
 * Unlimited substitutions
 * Clock stops on the referee's whistle, No extra time
 * No Draws, all ties after 90 minutes lead to a sudden death shootout.
 * Red Card may result in a fine but only under league orders may a player be sent off.
 * Fighting and player to player rivalries were "encouraged."
 * 1.5 million dollar (USD) salary cap.

The Kotai M-League was immediately picked up by MBS's networks, with bi-nightly MBS2 broadcasts and a "Game of the Week" on MBS1 each Saturday night. Kotai's league was forced to play in state owned facilities and abandoned Championship stadia which were falling apart and leased to them by the former club with outrageous restrictions. The exception being Vulputate Vikings who were a Championship side who abandoned the Championship to play in the M-League. One example of the restrictions were the Boracoredia Hawks who leased Simpson Stadium from Boracoredia City, who then played at the new Boracoredia Stadium. Michael Quentin, owner of Boracoredia City, deliberately made the Hawks lease terms at Simpson Stadium as onerous as possible after the city received a franchise. The Hawks were owned by Jaxon Kotai, son of media mogul and M-League founder Sam Kotai. The older Kotai had formerly been part-owner of City with Quentin before falling out with his partners. The Hawks lease with Boracoredia City called for them to pay $15,000 per game, which was negotiated by Quentin's son Bill while the elder Quentin was in jail. However, by the time the Hawks played their first game, Quentin had regained control of the Gardens. Much to Kotai's outrage, the Stadium was dim for the first game. It was then that Ballard demanded $3,500 for use of the lights. Quentin also denied the Bulls access to the City locker room, forcing them to build their own at a cost of $55,000. He also removed the cushions from the home bench for Hawks games (he told a stadium worker, "Let 'em buy their own cushions!"). It was obvious that Quentin was angered at the M-League being literally in his backyard, and took out his frustration with the renegade league on the Hawks. As a whole, the M-League was not well received by the Championship and it's owners, often seeing games scheduled at the same time, big matches and small matches against each other. When MBS signed on to broadcast M-League games, the Championship's teams all cancelled their contracts with MBS and announced they would not accept any lower teams receiving promotion who allowed their games on MBS. Despite all the disputes between the M-League and the Championship, by 1980, the M-League was drawing as good, if not better at times and championship knew it. The M-League discussed expanding for the 1983 season into Angelorium and Barrington Beach with new stadia and new teams, plans were already in the works for the 9th and 10th teams by 1981 when the Executive of the Championship approached Sam Kotai and the M-League Board to discuss a merger between the two entities and a formal acceptance of the M-League as a professional League against the Championship. Plans were formalized and in 1983, the top 10 teams in the Championship joined the "Original 8" from the M-League and the two new expansion teams (Angels City and FC Beach Bums) for a 20 team league with a provision that none of the 10 M-League teams could be relegated to the Championship for three years.

1983-Present: The Premier Era
After the merger, the ripple was felt through the MFU Leagues, many reducing in size to reduce the teams ripple, but it was none the less felt 8 tiers down. To help prove that the M-League was not just an entertainment league, but a competitive sports league, the first combined championship was won by the Moonshine Coast Shiners, their second M-League.

Clubs
See Also: List of M-League Stadiums

End of May Cup
The End of May Cup takes place on the last Sunday in May, one week before M-League kickoff between the previous season's M-league champion and the MFU Cup winner (or second if the Champion and MFU Cup winner are the same team) at National Stadium in Angelorium.

MFU Cup
The MFU Cup is the tournament between all major Meridianian Football Union sides, from the top 4 tiers. All 20 M-League teams are automatically qualified, as are the top 16 Championship teams. From League One the top 8 make the field while the top 4 in League two make the event.

States Cup
The States Cup is a tournament between 12 teams representing the states and territories of the Commonwealth of Meridiania. All nine states apart from Regnum are represented by one team, as are the overseas territories of Central Texas and Follycravie. Regnum is represented by two teams, Regnum West and Regnum East because of it's massive population in comparison to other states. The First round contains matches between finishers 5-12 in the previous season's tournament, the top four skip the first round. The highest seed advancing from the first round faces the four seed while the lowest seed faces the top seed, with the others filling in in similar fashion. The same procedure is followed in the third round, with the four remaining teams playing two games. The States Cup then advances to the finale which is played at various stadia, never in either team's home state, including the Regnum teams. The States Cup has annually been held since 1956, and in 55 editions, Regnum East has won 21 times, while South Coast, Ipsum and Central Texas have all yet to win any titles.

Performance by Club
INCOMPLETE TABLE