The recent resignations of the president and vice-president of Tennis Scotland looked like the latest example of a disconnect between those participating in sport and the professional administrators who are now running it.

It is a curious business that has resulted in Ian Conway, the vice president of a chamber of commerce, and Jacqui Duncan, a chartered accountant and a company director, feeling they could no longer be involved with the game's governing body when they were holding such high office. They raised some potentially serious issues in explaining why.

"It is with deep regret and disappointment that we feel compelled to write this letter," they stated, in a joint letter.

"Our understanding of our appointment to the Board of Tennis Scotland was that we shared the following responsibilities: determining the company's strategic objectives and policies; monitoring progress towards achieving these objectives and policies; appointing senior managers; accounting for the company's activities to relevant parties.

"We are therefore deeply disappointed that the recruitment and selection process surrounding staff appointments over the course of 2014 does not, in our opinion, provide sufficient transparency and therefore potential neutrality.

"A transparent recruitment and appointment process was a key requirement of the recent Tennis Scotland Board and indeed was fully discussed . . . we believe this transparency has not been delivered.

"We cannot discount the possibility that recent appointments involve cronyism and we have sought, via Board meetings, to have these concerns adequately addressed. Appointments appear to be made by senior personnel acting with apparent impunity.

"This is, in our opinion as Board members, unacceptable. We cannot operate as Board members while senior personnel act in this way.

"We have also found during our Board tenure, that the information flow about company matters is not as free as we believe it should be. At times we believe we are provided with information on a 'need to know basis' only and once again we are not comfortable operating within this environment.

"Taking all of the above into consideration we believe we have no option but to resign with immediate effect."

There are some serious-looking accusations contained therein - Tennis Scotland have taken appropriate advice about what they claim to be "various inaccuracies" within the letter - but at the heart of this dispute lies a system of governance that has resulted in responsibility for the running of sport in Scotland being transferred from those who love the sport to career professionals.

The trouble with so many of these things is that one person's confidentiality is another's lack of transparency, just as one person's passion for sport is another's lack of detachment.

What does appear to have happened, though, is that in many cases these changes have been made without those who have had lifelong commitment to their sports, realising the full consequences.

I am reminded of a Scottish Rugby Union decision to stimulate the youth game voted upon and agreed by its clubs, who traditionally considered themselves the owners of the organisations, that has still not been implemented several years later.

I have, too, had recent contact from officials in the sport of skiing telling me that the consequences of the issues in that sport that we raised in Herald Sport when a career administrator was forced to apologise for lying in order to justify a selection policy, rumble on.

One of the questions, as raised in the interview conducted with Olympic medallist Dave Murdoch in today's paper, is the question of what the priorities for sports are and how much to focus funding on mass participation or on elite player development.

What is particularly worrying is that the growth in the number of administrators seems to be in inverse proportion to the reduction in the number of people taking an active part in those sports.

The pattern I have witnessed during long involvement in rugby and cricket of steady decline in the number of adult teams being fielded is, colleagues tell me, matched by that in the likes of basketball, hockey and volleyball.

Maybe, then, the careerists really do know what is best, but rather than feel cowed and unable to challenge them, those who care for the future of the sports they love need to take a serious look at the issues surrounding how what limited money is available to them is spent.

If they do not like what is happening, work out what they can do about it collectively through the likes of extraordinary general meetings and confidence votes.

If not then the resignations of Ian Conway, Jacqui Duncan and any others who have not been able to see eye to eye with professional administrators will be rendered nothing more than futile gestures.

And Another Thing . . .

What was Sepp Blatter thinking as the results from the latest couple of rounds of European Championship matches were coming through?

The much-maligned president of FIFA has long seemed at odds with the football community in these islands, so we could be forgiven for thinking he would be less than pleased at the fact that there looks like a serious chance that all four Celtic countries could be accompanying England at the 2016 European Championships.

I wonder, though? Blatter has always been exceedingly skilful in building support across developing football countries which has allowed him to fend off criticism, most of which seems to emanate in his native Europe.

Doubtless, he would prefer to have a few more friends nearer home, though, so, should teams from the British Isles occupy more than 20 per cent of the available places at Euro 2016, not least when one of those teams is representing a land that has just decided it is not a real country, just what capital might be made of that across the old continent and its newer territories?