THE short list for BBC Sports Personality of the Year was never going to satisfy everyone. There were bound to be glaring omissions in a vintage year - arguably the toughest ever to pick a winner, after a feast of Olympic and Paralympic titles and medals.

I suppose it is the ultimate endorsement of "Britishness" for Andy Murray that Dunblane's finest should be included among the 16 people nominated by a panel of 12 (six women, six men) which includes no Scots.

Having won Wimbledon, retained Olympic gold, and become World No.1, Murray is backed down to 1-6 with a fortnight to go before the ceremony, but in a year of outrageous poll results, who'd bet against another crazy outcome?

Is there bias on the part of the selection panel – 10 English, two Welsh, and no Scots or Irish? The Irish certainly believe so. Their First Minister, Arlene Foster, said lack of Irish representation was "absolutely scandalous" and her sports minister, Paul Givan, wrote a letter of protest to BBC Sport. One has some sympathy.

Givan referred specifically to the omission of WBA featherweight world champion Carl Frampton, superbike world champion Jonathan Rea, and four-medal Paralympic swimmer Bethany Firth.

Conspiracy theorists – and there are many – have noted that the BBC have three senior executives and two broadcasters on the selection panel, plus a sixth panellist who earns part of her living as a BBC presenter, and a seventh who did analysis for them at the 2014 Commonwealth Games, and who featured in a documentary they aired this year, and on Strictly.

The BBC decline to comment on criteria for being on the selection panel, so Irish journalist Stephen Nolan has submitted a freedom of information request. He works for the BBC!

Critics have observed that all but two on the short-list are English, plus a correlation between them and the sports in which they compete, and whether these are sports of which the Beeb has appropriate footage. Having grown up in the era when Auntie enjoyed a monopoly of major events (and the best commentators), I can only now lament the travesty which this once-great showpiece has become.

The BBC don't have live rights to Frampton's boxing title fights, the superbike championships, or the Paralympics. Nor for the PGA tour, or the first Irish victory in 111 years over the All Blacks – or their win over Australia which might have brought a mention for rugby captain Rory Best. And C4 was the live channel for the Paralympics.

Frampton, who dethroned Mexico's unbeaten three-weight division world champion Leo Santa Cruz in New York, conceded: "Murray's going to run away with it ... but I still feel out of the 16 I would like to have got in." Rea retained the World Superbike crown (first Brit to do so since 1999), and Firth was Britain's most decorated Paralympian in Rio, with three golds and a silver.

Former Spoty winner Barry McGuigan, now Frampton's manager, will boycott the ceremony, while Frampton suggested it was "maybe anti-boxing and maybe anti-Northern Ireland".

Yet Scotland's Ricky Burns has perhaps more reason to feel aggrieved. The Coatbridge man inflicted the first defeat in nine years on Italian fighter Michele Di Rocco, winning the WBA super-lightweight world crown - first Scot to win a world title at a third weight and first British fighter to do so in 24 years. Sky had the live rights to that one.

Chris Froome, having won his third Tour de France in four years, must wonder what he has to do. His omission is appalling. His success was watched live by millions on ITV4, S4C and British Eurosport. But not the Beeb.

McIlroy (two US PGA tour victories) is ranked No.2 in the world this year, 10 places higher than Danny Willetts who is nominated. The BBC don't have live PGA Tour coverage, but did have extensive footage of the Masters which Willets won.

Murray apart, Scots have been overlooked. Heather Stanning, who with Helen Glover retained Olympic pairs gold, surely deserves to be there. She and Glover are Olympic, World, and European champions and World, Olympic, World Cup, and European record-holders. But there is no mention for her, or compatriot Katherine Grainger who won a record fifth successive Olympic rowing medal.

No word either of visually-impaired Paralympic sprinter Libby Clegg, whose golds in the 100 and 200m in Rio surpassed the achievements of any British sprinter ever, at World, Olympic, or Paralympic level.

Spoty is famous for controversy. After staging the Commonwealth Games, Glasgow hosted Spoty 2014 -,for which no Scot was short-listed.

We recall a certain George Best finishing second to equestrian Princess Anne 45 years ago. Last year, Olympic gold-medallist Scott Brash, from Peebles, became the first man ever to win show-jumping's Grand Slam, yet did not even make the short list.

David Steele, in 1975, stood up bravely to the formidable Australian fast-bowling duo of Lillee and Thompson, but never made a century, and the Aussies still retained the Ashes. For this, Steele won Spoty, generally considered among the weaker winners. Last year Joe Root was the world's No.1 Test batsman, hitting more runs in a calendar year than any English batsman ever. Nobody did more to win England the Ashes. He did not make the short list. And he has failed to do so again. Of course, cricket rights are now bought and paid for by Sky.

A selection panel was rightly introduced after shocking failure of 27 UK sports editors to nominate a single woman in 2011, but one has to question the "independence" of a panel of which more than half earn money from the BBC. Are they out of touch? One selector, BBC head of sport Philip Bernie, has done much innovative work, acknowledged by a salary of £156,400 a year despite presiding over the haemorrhage of major events from the Beeb. He's famous for making Pavarotti's rendition of Nessun Dorma the 1990 World Cup theme tune, and for having claimed £7.10 expenses for a kebab while covering Wimbledon.

Spoty was once iconic. Now it's a blot on our screen.