The Daily Record has maintained it’s attack on Scot Gardiner after the Inverness Caley Thistle chief tried to convince Championship clubs to vote down as SPFL proposal while he prepared a Null & Vid alternative.
Gardiner started to throw the dirt around on April 11 when he appeared on Sportsound to share selective details of his WhatsApp chats.
When the Ibrox dossier finally surfaced last week it was described as a water pistol rather than a smoking gun with EGM support hard to find.
On Sunday Inverness Caley Thistle piped up with claims of bullying but a day later the true picture started to emerge with Dunfermline highlighting the aggressive actions of Gardiner.
Late on Monday night the Record revealed that six clubs witnessed Gardiner pushing for Null & Void even though it would result in his current club picking up £300,000 rather than the £475,000 prize for second place.
Davie McKinnon added further detail with the Daily Record reporting the Morton chief saying:
“On Thursday April 9 before the Good Friday vote – and I’ve got it here – Scot Gardiner said he was working with Hearts and Rangers to put in a new resolution. He said they would try to put that resolution in before the vote so there would be two resolutions to vote on.
“If not, and if the SPFL proposals were voted down, then they would try to push on with their own resolution – and that resolution was to void the season with no promotion and no relegation.
“I then said that I wanted to bring it to everyone’s attention on the Zoom call that, if there’s no promotion and no relegation then there can be no league placements of any kind because the season didn’t take place.
“How can you pay out on placements if the league is voided and didn’t happen?
“Clearly, in that event, the only way you could distribute monies between the Championship clubs would be on an equal basis, a 10-way split of the kitty. In my opinion they hadn’t thought it through. But that was a consequence of basically calling the season and having no promotion and no relegation.
“It’s also logical to conclude, if there are no placements there can be no champions, promotion and relegation.
“Immediately, I also thought if there can be no placements then how can you then determine which teams have qualified for European competitions? So that was pointed out on the Thursday night.”
MacKinnon’s notes show the following day he asked Dunfermline chairman Ross McArthur to reach out up north and confirm ICT actually understood the consequences of their proposal, both to themselves and every other club.
For clarity, by virtue of a second-placed finish, John Robertson’s men had earned Inverness a runners-up prize pot worth £475,000. Under Gardiner’s plan the payment would have fallen to £300,000.
MacKinnon said: “Ross agreed to phone Inverness and let them know how the other clubs felt – that this was the logical consequence.”
But then logic appears to be in short supply way up there in the Highlands where, later yesterday, ICT found themselves even more isolated than normal.
The big EGM shoot-out left them all alone as the only Championship club to vote in favour of Rangers’ demands for a QC-led probe into the conduct and competency of the SPFL board. A 9-1 thrashing which MacKinnon and the rest had probably expected.
He said: “I have tried to keep respectful to everybody within this. I have been in the game 20 years as a player, at five clubs as a director and three of them as a chief executive. So I know the game and it’s important people are treated with respect.
“But I find it difficult when I see words like ‘coercion’ and ‘bullying’ being bandied around. It wasn’t my experience of being at that meeting.
“I’ve kept quiet over these last few weeks because at the end of the day I am respectful and I understand why emotions have been running high.
“But there comes a point when you can’t allow it to go on without comment. It’s great for you guys in the media – absolutely brilliant. But some of the behaviour which has gone on here, particularly around matters of confidentiality, has astounded me. I can’t comprehend it to be honest.”
After their angry lunchtime statement yesterday there has been no further comment from Inverness Caley Thistle.
