Neil Doncaster has paid tribute to Ralph Topping despite the retiring SPFL chairman presiding over the shambolic Nimmo Smith enquiry.
Topping will be replaced by Murdoch MacLennan on August 1 and departs with the shadow of the Rangers issue cast against his name.
For over a decade the SPL dutifully registered contracts from Rangers (IL) that were well below the market rate and figures banded about in the media. The deficit was made up and more by secret payments concealed from the football and tax authorities.
In the summer of 2012 as liquidation followed administration the SPL desperately tried to get the new club parachuted into the SPL.
When the SPL launched an enquiry into the dual contracts issue they specifically stated that the remit of the enquiry was from July 1998.
Nimmo Smith conducted an enquiry that started in November 2000 without a single dissenting voice from the SPL board and no explanation.
Perhaps the Discount Option Scheme used to pay Tore Andre Flo and Ronald de Boer proved too challenging for the gymnastics of Nimmo Smith and Sandy Bryson to get around?
In a statement to the SPFL website Doncaster said: ““I have very much enjoyed working with Ralph, who has played a key role in steering the SPL and SPFL through some turbulent times.
“He has been a huge and positive influence behind the scenes, particularly in the successful 2013 merger of the SPL and SFL. I doubt very much whether that merger would have happened without his expertise, vision and diplomacy.”
