SPFL and SFA go to war

[ian1964 10,721]

By Gordon Waddell

SPFL and SFA go to war over £1m league reconstruction bill

 

10 Nov 2013 09:04

BOSSES of the two organisations are on collision course due to a fall-out over who was to foot the bill for the summer's big switchover.

 

THE SPFL and SFA are on a collision course over the £1million tab for league reconstruction.

 

MailSport understands fuming league bosses are claiming SFA chief executive Stewart Regan and president Campbell Ogilvie are reneging on an agreement to foot the full bill for the big switch-over in the summer.

 

However it’s believed Regan is equally adamant that was never the deal they agreed and has the email trail to prove it, leaving the two bodies at loggerheads.

 

The matter has been discussed both at SPFL board level and at a meeting of the 10 Championship clubs within the past 10 days.

 

Former SFL chairmen in particular insist the SFA supremos gave them an unequivocal commitment to foot the bill for the nuts and bolts of the move to one league body at a meeting.

 

At the time the SFA were desperate to see the two bodies unified and a pyramid system in place, putting another brick in the wall of their 2020 vision for the game going forward.

 

But with the legal and accounting costs of dissolving the SFL and SPL, as well as creating the new set-up, the bill has skyrocketed close to seven figures.

 

However, the SFA have issues with what it contains.

 

It’s understood a six-figure pay-off for departing SFL chief executive David Longmuir is included as a “cost” of the reconstruction, one which will be hotly disputed, as well as the accountancy costs of the SFL’s due diligence into the top flight.

 

The SFA’s understanding of their offer was to partially fund the legal costs but to make a wider contribution to the cost of the play-off system, pyramid set-up and parachute payments for SPL teams taking the drop.

 

That deal would have exposed them to a figure in excess of the £1m mark but over a longer period of time.

 

MailSport, however, believes several league chairmen want a hardline stance taken in any negotiations, despite the fact their coffers have swollen in the past week with a £2m a year deal with Chinese TV.

 

It’s also understood the probe commissioned into secret bonus payments made to Longmuir during his SFL tenure is ready to be presented to clubs at the end of the week.

 

The payments – totalling more than £400,000 – were discovered during the reconstruction process.

 

Then-president Jim Ballantyne claimed to have the discretionary power to award the cash without SFL board approval.

 

It’s believed some of the money could already have been paid back – however that may not be enough to satisfy the clubs awaiting the report.

[Super Cooper 0]

Send us the bill, we have paid for everything else.

[RANGERRAB 3,654]

£2m a year TV deal with Chinese TV - hilarious. Who writes this stuff? does anyone actually believe this even though it's peanuts?

[gisabeer 409]

how can peter liewell and his lapdog rod petrie fight with themselves? its the same people running both organisations.

[compo 7,030]

I could not care less

[ian1964 10,721]

SPFL fails in legal bid over pub showing foreign coverage of games

 

The Scottish Professional Football League is facing a £1.7m damages claim after it failed in an appeal to prevent a pub from showing live games using a satellite decoder.

 

As a result of the latest instalment in the long-running legal battle, the football authority is facing the claim from Lisini Pub Management, which is owned by former Celtic player Harry Hood.

 

Lady Paton referred the case back to Court of Session judges for further action on Friday after turning down the SPFL’s appeal against a previous failed attempt to get the damages claim thrown out.

 

The case relates to the screening of three Celtic games at one of Lisini’s pubs, Angels in Uddingston, in 2006 using a decoder to show a foreign broadcast by the Polish company Polsat.

 

Previously, the football authority successfully had an interdict granted against the pub company over the use of the decoders, claiming it had done so unlawfully.

 

Last year, the Court of Session recalled the interdict after a similar case involving an English firm that sold foreign TV satellite decoders to pubs in the UK to broadcast live English Premiership matches.

 

In that case, heard by the European Court of Justice, it was found that attempts to prevent the use of decoders in the UK were void because it restricted competition.

 

However, the Premier League responded by threatening legal action against publicans who use decoded foreign broadcasts as it could include its copyrighted material – such as the league theme tune and logo.

 

In 2007, Lisini gave the SPFL an undertaking confirming it would no longer use the decoders to broadcast live games after it was initially threatened with legal action. The pub group stated that "in the future" it would not longer use the apparatus to broadcast matches, before a judge later found that the undertaking had no legal bearing after the English case.

 

Lady Paton, sitting with Lord Bracadale and Lord Kingarth, stated: "Looked at another way, the undertaking given 'for the future' should not, in the unforeseen circumstances which occurred, be construed as meaning 'come what may'.

 

"As the whole purpose of the undertaking was to prevent acts which were accepted by both contracting parties at the time as being forbidden because they were illegal, then, when the illegality was removed, the defenders were no longer bound by their undertaking."

 

http://news.stv.tv/scotland/248810-spfl-fails-in-legal-bid-over-pub-showing-foreign-coverage-of-games/

[der Berliner 3,744]

Okay, so essentially the "SPL" lost a case against someone who showed Celtic games? Oh the irony. I bet Penn State FC will stump up the cash from their CL millions to keep the SPL/SPFL afloat ...

[Juancornetto 1]

It's a pity thye both can't lose.

 

Oh wait...