I believe that shareholders in the game can and should challenge this.
I think Celtic should for the sake of their business, but won’t because time has moved on, the club has secured nine in a row and so the fans won’t care a jot at this time/
That however is short termism.
Everybody knows now what happened in season 2011/2012. The evidence came out in court. The SFA were misled by one club and there are direct and implied consequences for every other club.
Now imagine if the deception of the SFA continued after the period involved in the UEFA licensing process
Someone who is behind with their taxes may well be behind in relation to other payments — such as those promised in a side letter to a trust in Jersey. Could it be that right up until 2012 payments were being made to those trusts out of sight of the SFA and in breach of SFA rules?
You might possibly think that — I couldn’t possibly comment.
However all of that is history and many fans will be vexed with the question could the Celtic board have done more; Were the Celtic board privy to the 5 way agreement, had they seen it, are they involved etc?
The CEO said very clearly at last years AGM that he had not seen the 5 way – and that to be honest is my greatest worry.
If that is correct, and I am not going to suggest that it is incorrect, then the implications and consequences are horrific.
It would mean that a club like Celtic can enter SFA competitions each year on the basis of the football rules as presented to them only to find that the SFA has agreed to change those rules in secret and behind closed doors without telling Celtic or any other club.
It would mean that officials within the SFA have free reign to enter into agreements and binding contracts which sign away their ability to enforce rules, or to change the rules, without ever consulting Celtic or other clubs.
It would mean that agreements like the 5 way agreement can be entered into and signed by SFA officials who are either crooked, or, so grossly incompetent as to not know what they are doing in terms of jurisdiction and so on.
It would mean that Celtic PLC have a business worth potentially hundreds of millions of pounds which is forced to play within an association structure which has been shown to be way out of control, acts on a frolic of its own, covers up its own incompetence and over which the best business brains at Celtic PLC have little influence and no control whatsoever
It would mean that Celtic PLC cannot, and never could, give any shareholder, season ticket holder, sponsor advertiser, player, agent or anyone else any type of reasonable reassurance that the events narrated above and elsewhere were a one off or could not be repeated in the future.
Others believe that Celtic are complicit in this mess and I have to admit that Peter Lawwell has on occasion done himself no good by boasting that awkward issues have been kicked into the long grass etc — that is disappointing from someone who has shown very good qualities as a CEO over a long period.
However, I have been at meetings when I have been told that when it comes to meetings at the SFA, other clubs simply don’t care about the issue, that Celtic has only one vote, and that the club have tried and have spoken to other club officials and officers but can’t get them interested in any sort of inquiry of any kind.
I genuinely believe that to be the case as Scottish Football is not run like any other business and it is not subject to the law of the real world.
When giving evidence at one hearing I believe that Rod McKenzie stated the opinion that “the law had not caught up with Scottish Football”
What I believe he meant by that was that the law of the outside world does not apply at all times to Scottish Football.
When clubs gather under the auspices of the SFA or the SPFL it is like a conclave of Cardinals in the Sistine Chapel. While the world is outside, it is only their rules and their votes on the inside that matter.
If they chose to amend the rules, ignore the rules, waive the rules, or whatever by way of a vote or an agreement there is nothing you, me or any dissenting club can do about it.
If the implications and consequences for the SFA are construed as harmful in any situation then lets abandon the rules even if that lets injustice prevail and wrongdoing go unpunished.
Noises will be made saying this couldn’t happen again and there has been reform and all that tosh but in actual fact that is nonsense.
The SFA are skint, they can’t afford to monitor the veracity of what club officials present to them and they can’t do, or won’t do, anything about past perpetrators presenting current documentation which require greater scrutiny than in the past if only to ensure there is no repetition of past mistakes.
Can the board of Celtic PLC, or any other club for that matter, guarantee that there will never be another agreement such as the 5 way agreement? I don’t think they can.
Can the SFA, UEFA, Celtic or anyone else guarantee that the SFA will not be misled in future and be found to be inept at dealing with licensing processes and any other such deception — I don’t think they can.
On a commercial basis, can anyone at ADIDAS be confident that the SFA will do all in its power to ensure that UEFA rules will be properly applied and that their strips will rightly and properly be seen in licensed competition with the licensing rules being properly overseen by the people at Hampden — I don’t think they can.
Forget the detail of what happened in the past, the decision of the SFA this week, the timing of which was no accident, has raised questions about the entire future and basis of Scottish Football and its Administration.
If that decision is allowed to stand without comment or challenge then Football in Scotland has been holed below the waterline and the consequences may be fatal.
The precedent has been set. The rules will be broken and flaunted again and the SFA will bot deal with it swiftly or adequately.
And Celtic, their board, their sponsors, shareholders and fans are absolutely powerless to do anything about it.
For them, the implications and consequences are both plain to see and absolutely dire.
BRTH