Rangers may have been unsuccessful in their bid to get an external investigation into the resolution on the end of the 2019/20 season when just 13 of the 42 SPFL clubs voted in favour of it at an EGM last month.
Could, though, the legal challenge which Hearts and Partick Thistle have launched against the decision to declare final placings on a points per game basis provide some of the answers which they, and many others in Scottish football, were seeking?
The SPFL have received expert advice from QCs at every step of this protracted and painful process and are comfortable they have acted professionally and properly throughout.
Yet, the Tynecastle and Firhill clubs, who were last week relegated from the Premiership and Championship respectively when league reconstruction plans were rejected, have done likewise.
They haven’t taken this drastic and expensive step amid a cataclysmic economic downturn and unprecedented financial crisis without being confident they have been unjustly dealt with.
Indeed, Thistle confirmed back in April that they had sought a joint opinion from both senior and junior counsel and been informed the SPFL executive may have been in breach of their fiduciary duty by failing to “provide sufficient information” that allowed members to make a “properly informed decision”.
So who is right?
Supporters' views have very much been coloured by the implications for their particular club. Fans of Celtic, Dundee United, Raith Rovers and Cove Rangers have had little problem with the outcome. Followers of Rangers, Hearts, Inverness Caledonian Thistle, Partick Thistle, Falkirk, Stranraer and Edinburgh City have been incandescent.
Now, however, a judge could decide. Provided, that is, an agreement isn’t reached before it gets to that point. An out-of-court settlement remains a possibility, albeit a slim one.
Receiving an independent assessment of the events that transpired after football was suspended due to the coronavirus outbreak back in March is what Rangers were after.
The dossier which the Ibrox club circulated before the EGM vote contained many accusations, assertions and suppositions. Not all of them will be addressed by the Hearts and Thistle legal case if it goes ahead. But many will be.
Crucially, whether the SPFL were right to insist, as they did repeatedly, that the only way end-of-season fees could be paid out was if league placings were finalised will be addressed.
The alternative resolution put forward by Rangers before the vote was deemed not competent because it suggested advance payments. Should it have been allowed? Hearts and Partick Thistle are very much of the view that it should.
A section of the petition they lodged at the Court of Session last week states: “Advance fee payments could have been made to members. The company (SPFL) agreed to make advance fee payments of £150,000 to the second petitioner (Thistle) and Motherwell FC in around January 2017.”
The argument which has been put forward by SPFL chairman Murdoch MacLennan, chief executive Neil Doncaster and board member Les Gary was that it was completely unrealistic for £9.3m in prize money to be paid out in that manner in the timeframe involved. Are they correct? Or should that avenue have been explored? We may soon find out.
Hearts and Thistle taking legal action over this matter has been applauded by some in the game, roundly condemned by others.
Stewart Gilmour, the former St Mirren chairman and SPL board member, is certainly appalled. He feels that involving lawyers in football matters, such as disciplinary proceedings, has been to the significant detriment of the sport here.
The Gorgie and Maryhill clubs could also find themselves in trouble with the SFA if they are deemed to be in breach of Article 99 of their Articles of Association – which states that clubs under their jurisdiction should submit disputes to them for arbitration.
Compliance officer Clare Whyte has written to both asking why they have they haven’t done so. Notices of complaint and judicial panel charges could follow.
It’s unlikely that Hearts chairman Ann Budge or her Thistle counterpart Jacqui Low are overly concerned; they would like a judge to scrap promotion and relegation across all four divisions or award them £8m and £2m in compensation respectively.
The court may decide they have no place to rule on the whole sorry affair. But there would be some definite benefits for Scottish football if they were to hear the case.
The game in this country has been beset by conflict, ill-feeling and suspicion at a time when there are myriad challenges which all stakeholders need to come together to address. Trust in the SPFL hierarchy is at an all-time low. Many remain convinced the resolution was rushed through to suit certain parties and have no faith in those at the helm.
A court case will either dispel some widely-held but inaccurate assumptions and allow everyone to move forward or show that the SPFL have been guilty of gross mismanagement and change is required.
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