Parks of Hamilton pick up the statement baton to slam SPFL

Parks of Hamilton have issued an angry statement about the SPFL’s cinch sponsorship deal which has Ibrox fingerprints running through every line. 

After a year long stand off the SPFL capitulated to the Premiership runners-up who had refused to take part in their new four division sponsorship deal. 

At the heart of the dispute is the misguided view inside Ibrox that the SPFL has been plotting against them since inception in 2012 when the then SPL clubs voted against allowing Charles Green’s Tribute Act to join the top division of the Scottish game. 

Under the hopeless leadership of Neil Doncaster the SPFL agreed a five year £8m sponsorship deal with cinch that provided the car firm with a shirt sleeve panel on every kit plus trackside and backing board advertising. 

In March 2021 The Sun published a list of 29 official Ibrox sponsors/partners that didn’t name Parks but a secret deal was used to justify not taking part in the cinch partnership. 

Covering a statement from Parks, The Sun reports:  

We were not surprised to learn from the media announcement last night that the SPFL have finally acknowledged Rangers legitimately engaged rule i7 in June of last year and thus, vindicated the stance held by the club for over a year. It is not for us to speculate as to why the SPFL leadership sought to ignore their own rules for so long. 

The fact that the SPFL prevaricated and continued to stall an arbitration process they themselves initiated in August last year, and which was ruled upon by the court of appeal in October, underlined the weakness of the case they truly had. 

Throughout the last year, Park’s have kept their counsel as the SPFL leadership insulted us. 

We have a long standing and proud association with Scottish football, and it was entirely wrong that we were compelled to take the SFA to court because the SPFL decided to abuse the SFA’s arbitration process. We believe that the SPFL and members of its leadership have brought the game in to disrepute and have failed, as have the SPFL as an organisation, to act with the utmost good faith towards their members. 

The SFA must carry out an independent investigation into this issue which has cost all parties involved hundreds of thousands of pounds. Despite being awarded expenses in court, Park’s will not recover all their legal fees nor be compensated for the reputational damage caused by the SPFL. 

Finally, the glaring omission from the SPFL’s statement was an apology. The SPFL leadership owe their members an apology, they owe Park’s an apology, they owe the SFA an apology and they also owe an apology to Rangers. Unfortunately, they seem to lack any accountability and would rather spend their members money than admit their failures 

Earlier this year the Tribute Act agreed to pay Sports Direct undisclosed damages for breach of contract, Sports Direct leaked next season’s home kit on their website last week.

Ibrox Managing Director Stewart Robertson is on the board of the SPFL.

Celtic have a long standing relationship with Parks of Hamilton providing the firm with priceless publicity at all matches, home and away. No Celtic Supporters Club uses Parks for travel.