BAILOUT COMING BUT GRASSROOTS SPORTS FACING TOUGH TIMES

A BAILOUT for Scottish grassroots sport will be announced this week after bosses issued a plea for help to stop them, and their clubs, from going to the wall. The coronavirus outbreak has forced training facilities to shut and decimated the event calendar for months to come. That will turn off the taps in sport income streams with community facilities feeling the squeeze as much as leading football sides. The SFA has found £1.5million to prop up soccer with Scottish Rugby launching a £500,000 hardship fund. But other sports fear the bedrock of their activity could end up going to the wall. Cricket Scotland chief Gus Mackay (pictured) said: ‘Our main concern is the grassroots, with 130 clubs largely shut? ‘We’re not like rugby and football. There’s no slush fund available to keep things going. ‘We’re in talks with various parts of our sport about how to help. The main thing is to ensure that we come through this and clubs are still here.’ Some help is on the way. Governing bodies will be told today that they’ll receive six months funding from Sportscotland. A sportscotland spokesperson said: ‘We will support Scottish governing bodies, from grassroots to performance sport. ‘These are uncertain times, but we know being physically active is one of the best things we can do to reduce the risk of infection and stay fit.’ But that won’t fully plug the gap with cash from the public purse only accounting for around half the revenues of most sports. And money from sponsorship and event sanctioning is now under threat. Scottish Athletics supremo Mark Munro said: ‘Some clubs still have costs associated with their facilities and there’s the problem of how and where elite athletes will train.’