The Gozagga Twitter account has continued to shine a torch on the medical discrepancies in Scottish football with little known about the testing procedures that clubs are undergoing.
It would seem sensible and fair to have a universal system in place but since the Five Way Agreement came into place in July 2012 the two tier, at least, nature of Scottish football has been central to the ‘success’ of the sport.
While the rest of European football adheres to some form of Financial Fair Play the issue has never been raised in the Scottish game despite famous names like Airdrieonians, Gretna and Rangers forced out through liquidation.
The lack of money is the regular reason thrown up to avoid developments in the Scottish game with VAR the latest example while drug testing is believed to be extremely rare with results unpunished.
Neil Lennon was outspoken about testing issues following Celtic’s disastrous trip to Dubai but like most uncomfortable issues Scottish football likes to cover things up and pretend that there are no issues that compromise fair play and an even playing field.
Anyone care to guess which SPFL team could not find a lab in Scotland to do their Covid tests so have been sending them to the discredited lab who starred on Dispatches?
— gonzagga (@gonzagabd1) March 10, 2021
So are Celtic going to challenge it. Probably not
— Charles 1916 (@charlesdonaghy) March 10, 2021
@gonzagabd1 I would be willing to pay another £50 extra for my season ticket next year to go after them big time. Put them right back in their box. Show us the money and im sure a large percentage of us would pay extra to help fund it.
— pedro rosinnio (@pr75pete) March 10, 2021
From November Channel 4 reported:
The Dispatches reporter is told that Randox’s high-paying “VIP” clients, some of whom are from the rugby and travel sectors, are being given “priority” over some other tests. Randox denies VIP tests are given priority, saying it “does not prioritise private clients” under any circumstances and denies that “VIP” tests delay the processing of other tests.
Samples from England may take twelve hours or more to arrive at the Randox laboratory in Northern Ireland. Unpacking of large shipments may take more than a working day, and sometimes more than 24 hours. Randox, which has no control over travel times to the laboratory, says it consistently “meets the agreed turnaround times,” and processes samples mostly within 24 hours from receipt.
The Dispatches reporter is told that samples are colour coded according to a traffic light system based on how long it is since the sample was taken. Randox told us green is up to 38 hours, amber up to 77 and red up to 114 hours – nearly five days.
