Scottish clubs have been urged to continue talking with their supporters as they prepare to revolutionise the country's league structure.
Paul Goodwin, head of Supporters Direct Scotland, has asked the 12 clubs in the Scottish Premier League and the 30 in the Scottish Football League to consult with their fanbase before making a decision which could change the face of the game north of the border.
SPL chairmen this week "unanimously" threw their backing behind plans to redraw Scottish football around a 12-12-18 set-up, while reports suggest clubs in the SFL lower leagues, who are due to meet tomorrow, are now considering a 12-12-10-10 proposal.
Goodwin and his colleagues from SDS recently met three chief executives of the SPL, SFL and Scottish Football Association - Neil Doncaster, David Longmuir and Stewart Regan - and presented a wish-list that fans want the three bodies to stick to as they continue with their negotiations.
They called for a more "equitable" distribution of cash throughout the leagues, a new set-up that does not involve teams playing each other four times a season, fairer voting rights for all clubs and tighter rules to ensure clubs do not fall victim to administration and liquidation.
Goodwin said: "Supporters Direct Scotland has had several meetings with the CEOs of the football bodies at Hampden Park in the past weeks to discuss the league reconstruction proposals that are now being considered.
"As part of this process we were invited to prepare a paper for the Professional Game Board which we did after full consultation with our council. This paper notes the views that we feel are widely held by fans and which we believe the clubs should be taking into consideration.
"Following the submission of this paper, our Scottish Council was invited to a meeting at the Scottish FA where the detailed league reconstruction plans drafted jointly by the SPL and SFL were presented to us.
"We were pleased that the Scottish FA acted as facilitators for this and we believe the dialogue and views exchanged proved to be useful for both parties.
"We would encourage clubs to continue to urgently discuss and debate the finer details of the proposal with their own fans' groups and to urge the Professional Game Board to take into consideration our members' views."
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article