The negotiable discipline involved in Scottish football has again been highlighted by a fine and suspension handed out to Reece Donaldson for playing in a match in which he was suspended.
The defender helped Peterhead to a 3-2 win over Ayr United in a match in which he should have missed through suspension.
Rather than follow the UEFA lead demonstrated against Legia Warsaw earlier this season the SPFL have fined the club, ordered a replay and suspended the player from the replayed match.
An SPFL statement read: “The club were censured, ordered to replay the game against Ayr United Football Club and fined £10,000 (part suspended). Reece Donaldson is suspended from playing in the replayed fixture.”
Commenting on the decision Neil Doncaster said: “In the interests of sporting integrity and fairness to both sides, the game will be replayed.”
After over 100 years of evolving and last years merger of the SPL and SFL it seems that Scottish football still has no adequate system for dealing with breaches of discipline.
Ayr United played a match in good faith, players and supporters made a trip approaching four hours against opponents unable to follow basic rules and are being asked to do the same again!
The decision again flies in the face of the bizarre logic of the Lord Nimmo Smith case where he decided that Rangers (IL) had received no sporting advantage from fielding players for whom they hadn’t declared their earnings to the football authorities.
Going on the word of SFA Registrations supremo Sandy Bryson the Nimmo Smith hearing fined the Ibrox club £200,000 but didn’t order any matches to be replayed despite multiple breaches over a number of seasons.
In a separate move today Livingston were fined £10,000 and deducted five points for being behind with tax payments, commenting on that Doncaster said: “The tax default and reporting rules are an integral part of maintaining fair league competition.”
With flexible punishments it’s hardly a surprise that no company is willing to tarnish their name by sponsoring the SPFL despite it having one of the highest attendance rates per head of population in Europe.
Four weeks after making the draw for the semi-final’s of the League Cup the SPFL have still to announce the dates of the matches.
