TIME TO FOCUS ON THE REALITY

Squabbling clubs told to forget the infighting and concentrate on saving Scottish game

FOR David MacKinnon, the old loyalties didn’t count for much in the end. In the four years between 1982 and 1986, the current chief executive of Morton played over 100 games for Rangers.

Yet, when time came to vote on an Ibrox resolution seeking an independent investigation into the SPFL’s plan to curtail the current season, his playing career was irrelevant. Focusing on the reality of a coronavirus crisis which threatens the existence of his club and others, MacKinnon sent back an email voting ‘no’.

And last night, through the relief of victory, a twinge of regret — perhaps even disgust — was evident.

‘Scottish football should be embarrassed just now,’ he told

Sportsmail. ‘We have people dying, we have fans dying, a pandemic we are struggling to deal with. And we have lockdown and families struggling locally and in the country at large.’

A former Kilmarnock, Dundee and Hamilton director, MacKinnon now works for his local club. Dubbed Scotland’s Covid-19 heartland, Inverclyde already has the highest coronavirus death rate in the country.

‘Our community has been hit incredibly hard,’ he said. ‘Yet, every day you lift the paper and somebody is having a go at somebody else. Football in Scotland is doing itself a huge disservice.’

Weeks of infighting over an SPFL resolution to end the lower-league season, crown Celtic Premiership champions and relegate Hearts resulted yesterday morning in a heated EGM.

Officially, Rangers, Hearts and Stranraer were disputing the competence of the league’s handling of the season-ending ballot. Unofficially, it was a vote of no confidence in league chief executive Neil Doncaster.

Forthright in their demands for the suspension of the CEO and of his legal advisor Rod McKenzie, the Rangers campaign gained impetus when Aberdeen — long suspicious of Doncaster’s relationship with Celtic — joined them in the ‘yes’ lobby.

A little after 11am, Hearts, Rangers and Stranraer were asked — in alphabetical order — to make their opening plea. Hamilton vicechairman Les Gray, an SPFL board member, offered what was described in the parlance of the week as ‘a robust’ defence of the league.

Aberdeen chairman Dave Cormack spoke up to make it clear that the Pittodrie side were not necessarily supporting the resolution for the same reasons as their bitter rivals Rangers. Instead, the Dons detected a ‘distressing’ breakdown in trust between the league executive and member clubs. Stenhousemuir’s Iain McMenemy added his voice in agreement.

Celtic’s Peter Lawwell broke his own self-imposed silence on the subject with a robust — that word again — dismissal of the Rangers dossier justifying calls for Doncaster’s suspension. And it was time to vote.

That the SPFL would win the poll, and that the resolution would fall short of the 75 per cent needed to pass, was never in question. But, even on the SPFL board, there was a concern that 15 ‘yes’ votes or more would represent a serious blow to Doncaster’s authority. Anything close to 20 — or 50 per cent of the vote — could have been a fatal blow.

It didn’t come to that in the end. Embroiled in a bitter war of words with Inverness CEO Scot Gardiner, Championship clubs voted 9-1 against the resolution. In the end, just ten clubs added their voice in support of Rangers, Hearts and Stranraer.

Gardiner’s stage-managed revelation of private WhatsApp messages between clubs on Radio Scotland helped the

Rangers case. And, come polling day, helped destroy it. ‘I have no doubts that some of the tactics employed on the “yes” side were detrimental to their cause in the end,’ said MacKinnon (pictured below). ‘I’ve been in many disagreements over the years. I’ve had differences of opinion. But I have never seen a battle won by aggression or by publicly calling out the other side. ‘That never succeeds. It became clear that people were becoming very aggressive and, when you do that, you never win hearts and minds.’ A hefty margin of victory grants Doncaster and the SPFL hierarchy a measure of relief and wriggle room to call the Premiership season. It can’t spirit away the threat of legal action by Rangers and Hearts. Or alter the fact that 30 per cent of the member clubs voted for an investigation into their own leaders. Some were clearly settling old scores with Doncaster. Others were acting out of naked self-interest. One or two — such as Stenhousemuir — simply wanted to register a protest over the way the SPFL do things.

Last August, this newspaper reported allegations of heavy-handed tactics against the League Two club and others by league chiefs. Veiled threats to cast lower-league teams adrift financially unless they toed the line were taken seriously enough by Warriors chairman McMenemy to speak out in this newspaper.

‘The SPFL don’t have a set-up which invites or welcomes opinion or welcomes critical analysis,’ he told Sportsmail last night.

‘I spoke about it in your newspaper last year and the outcome of that was that they wanted to speak to me about the comments I made publicly.

‘If you raise the possibility of having a debate and they don’t agree with it, they are on your back as if you are the enemy.

‘You’re not. You can have people who are critical friends at times.’

After a board meeting on Monday night, Stenhousemuir resolved to vote in favour of the resolution and released a statement yesterday morning to say so.

A PR man by trade, McMenemy is neither religious nor partial to Rangers. Yet, he did offer some media advice to the Orange Order in Scotland in a professional capacity and, within minutes of the ‘yes’ statement appearing yesterday, his business links were dragged up by Celtic supporters on Twitter. It didn’t change the way he voted.

‘Scottish football is always viewed through a Rangers and Celtic prism,’ he laughed.

‘But we were quite deliberate in the way we worded our statement.

‘We were not choosing any sides and set out exactly the reasons why we felt the governance and culture issues should be addressed

‘That’s not about Rangers and Celtic. That’s about the way the league is structured and the way the bigger leagues tend to dominate the league and financial distribution.

‘As a club, we really thought long and hard about the best thing to do. We didn’t wholly agree with the

When you’re aggressive, you never win hearts and minds

Rangers resolution. We didn’t wholly agree with the way they had gone about the process.

‘But we also didn’t agree with the way the SPFL have handled it.

‘Mistrust clearly exists between the SPFL and clubs — and between clubs.

‘Some of that could be broken down. We could work for the greater good of the game.’

At Morton, MacKinnon sees the greater good of the game in stark terms.

The SPFL decision to halt the campaign was motivated by a desire to distribute end-of-season funds and keep 42 clubs in business. With football suspended and no gate money coming in, MacKinnon sees nothing more important than that.

‘Every club has to realise the severity of the situation now,’ he warned. ‘We have a few weeks to save football in Scotland and I don’t think people have really grasped that.

‘Football should take a good, long, hard look at itself. Let’s make sure our game is here and our clubs are here at the end of this.

‘If we don’t do that, then it’s a tragedy. If we don’t do that, then the ba’ is on the slates.

‘Let’s be honest here, clubs will not survive.’