SPFL have no choice but to act on confidentiality breaches

Former SPL chief exec Roger Mitchell is fond of saying his old job had all the responsibility and none of the power, as ultimate control of the League lies with the clubs.  Neil Doncaster has lived through a period of his life he will never forget, but after issuing a comprehensive rebuttal to the ‘dossier’ yesterday, he may reflect that his powerbase has been significantly enhanced by the traumas.

The tone of the SPFL’s response, signed by nine of the 10 directors, is unlike anything I have read before from a comparable body; “baseless, damaging and self-serving attacks”, they did not miss the target and hit the wall.

With no charge outstanding, votes against the League will amount to little more than historical allegiances with the protagonists.  They will do well to get 25% support, instead of the 75% required for success.

I commented on Thursday that the phrase “serious breach of fiduciary duties” was likely to feature in news reports soon.  Instead, the League opted for “gross breaches of confidentiality” for distributing confidential parts of their Sky TV contract in the dossier appendix.

The board have no choice but to act in order to protect their broadcast contracts from breach.  The irony of trying to claim the League is jeopardising a contract by actively jeopardising that same contract is off the scale and indicates the levels at which we are operating at.