ASTONISHING
Much like a sumptuous piece of Brazilian genius, fallout from SPFL vote will live with us forever
‘CLEVER build-up play by Scot Gardiner. Now here comes Douglas Park charging up the outside and… Whoofff! Back of the net!’
BBC Radio Scotland eschewed the opportunity to use that more common style of commentary during a jaw-dropping hourand-a-bit of broadcasting yesterday afternoon, but there’s no question it would have been wholly appropriate.
Perhaps it was coincidence that Gardiner, fresh from laying out the whole story of Friday’s shambolic SPFL vote on calling the season as it stands, excused himself from
Sportsound to take his Westie out for a widdle at the exact moment Park dropped his statement calling for the suspension of SPFL chief executive Neil Doncaster on the Rangers website.
To these eyes, though, it brought back memories of Pele nudging the ball from left foot to right foot in the closing minutes of the 1970 World Cup final and rolling it into the path of Carlos Alberto at the edge of the area.
Perfectly executed. And really quite devastating.
Even now, the scale and detail of what has been alleged makes you wonder where Scottish football goes next.
The independent investigation demanded by Ibrox interim chairman Park into what unfolded during the vote into ending the campaign and awarding prize money based on current standings looks justified. If Rangers do have further damning evidence, it will be essential.
What it might mean for the powerbase and overall structure of the SPFL remains to be seen. Right now, the organisation is looking more unfit for purpose than ever, with Dundee still having failed to issue what has turned out to be the casting vote on the entire matter.
Doncaster, apparently, turned down the opportunity to join yesterday’s discussion. The Dens Park club refused to comment.
That silence cannot go on for long, though. There needs to be clarity over what led to Dundee failing to register a vote on the SPFL’s resolution to conclude the campaign at the lower levels and give the board the right to call a halt to the Premiership at a later date.
In a country where the paying public remain by far the biggest financial contributors to the game, openness is crucial. At the moment, there appears to be almost none of it. And plenty of conjecture over who really is calling the shots.
It was quite remarkable listening to Inverness Caley Thistle chief executive Gardiner explain how he stayed in contact with Championship rivals Partick
Thistle and Dundee on Friday over voting ‘no’ to the SPFL’s proposal.
According to Gardiner, he saw the ballot paper filled in by Dundee’s managing director John Nelms and was assured by their secretary Eric Drysdale that it had been sent.
The SPFL insist it never arrived. In that case, where did it go? And why didn’t Dundee simply clarify that they were against the SPFL’s plans when informed it had been lost in cyberspace? Instead, they have gone to ground.
Rangers, of course, have already accused the SPFL of trying to bully people. The fact their managing director Stewart Robertson is a member of its board just adds to the overriding madness of it all.
However, in many quarters, giving their 42 clubs just 48 hours ahead of a 5pm Friday deadline to vote through their plans if they wanted their prize money has been painted as the equivalent of putting a pistol to their heads.
Gardiner, though, has pointed it straight back at them and raised valid questions about all manner of issues thrown up by that vote.
Aberdeen, for example, were understood to be in the ‘no’ camp right up until they said ‘yes’ to the SPFL’s resolution. Chairman Dave Cormack says it was to get money to lower-league clubs and leave an option to make a call on the Premiership at a later date.
Others wonder whether they were ‘got at’ and what they were offered. Same goes for Hibs, who were also said to be cool on the SPFL’s plans before opting to get behind them.
Over and above all that, why couldn’t funds be distributed without being inextricably tied to ending the season in the lower leagues straight away?
Gardiner claims he asked and was told that regulations prevented it. If so, which ones?
It says something that Rangers are now after Doncaster and SPFL lawyer Rod McKenzie. The last time they crossed swords with this particular governing body two years ago, it was chairman
Murdoch MacLennan in their sights as a result of his role as nonexecutive chair of Dublin-based Independent News and Media, part-owned by Celtic’s major shareholder Dermot Desmond.
He seems to be off the hook now, but concerns over the balance of power within the SPFL have been bouncing around for some time — and they haven’t come just from people inside Ibrox.
According to prominent former club chairmen Stewart Milne and Stewart Gilmour, who represented Aberdeen and St Mirren respectively, the Parkhead club’s chief executive Peter Lawwell has had way too much of a say on the way the game, in general, is run.
That certainly shouldn’t be the case. An independent inquiry would surely have the potential to address those ongoing allegations, too, and set the record straight.
What is for certain is that this is not going to resolve itself any time soon. Right now, the whole thing stinks and the refusal of Dundee to account for their appalling behaviour at a time when the national sport is lurching ever deeper into crisis just makes things worse.
In many ways, it is perhaps appropriate that the future of Scottish football, this two-bit set-up with its never-ending run of threeact plays, now rests in the palm of the club that brought us Ron Dixon, Giovanni di Stefano and two administration events in seven years before focusing all its energy on a pie-in-the-sky £20million stadium and plans to play league games against Celtic in Philadelphia.
The Dark Blues rarely disappoint when it comes to making it up as they go along. And it is starting to look very much like the entire game operates on those terms too.
If Gardiner really did cut short his radio interview yesterday to offer his pet pooch some welcome relief, his appearance has still made life hugely uncomfortable for Doncaster, Nelms and others.
Lots of folk in the doghouse have lots of explaining to do.