Premiership CEO realises he is in a ball and chain to the Five Way Agreement of 2012

Soccer Football - Scottish Cup Final - Celtic vs Motherwell - Hampden Park, Glasgow, Britain - May 19, 2018 Celtic chief executive Peter Lawwell (2nd L) and Independent non-executive director Dermot Desmond (C) in the stand Action Images via Reuters/Jason Cairnduff

Dave Cormack has finally realised that Scottish football has a different set of rules in place, giving the Ibrox Tribute Act special status.

The SPL and SFA signed up to the Five Way Agreement in 2012 with all clubs contacted as Neil Doncaster pushed ahead with the deal to try and retain the O** F*** brand essential to his bonus prospects.

At the same time Peter Lawwell was helping the SPL chief negotiate a new television contract with Sky Sports. The previous one was dependent on four O** F*** derby matches.

All of a sudden there could be no challenging of SFA and SPL decisions such as the circumstances that granted Rangers a UEFA licence in 2011. Rod Petrie and Andrew Dickson remain in office with influence inside Hampden.

The Ibrox Tribute Act are unpunishable. Anyone doubting that was given a reminder when they opted out of the cinch sponsorship deal, the SPFL proved to be toothless with the 11 other Premiership clubs providing additional branding to cinch while James Bisgrove signed up a shirt sleeve sponsor and had additional boardings to sell at Ibrox.

The latest issue to suffer the Ibrox veto is a new television contract with Sky Sport, writing on the Aberdeen website Cormack pleads:

Once that plan has been developed and agreed, the SPFL should share the key pillars that will get us there, and ongoing updates on progress. The Innovation and Strategy Group would continue to provide input, guidance, and support to the executive in pursuit of achieving these goals.

We have so much to get on with as a league. What we need is to get this Sky deal concluded and to get the never-ending cinch dispute behind us. We can then focus all our energies tackling the other critical issues and opportunities we face to improve our game and income.

From my perspective we’re just kicking off. Let’s see where these initiatives to grow our income take us before we give ten reasons why every single initiative won’t work.

Until the Five Way Agreement of 2012 is published and voted down Scottish football will be run for the needs and demands of one club/company.

At the Celtic AGM in November 2019 Peter Lawwell laughed when asked if anyone at Celtic had been involved in drawing up the Five Way Agreement, adding that he hadn’t eve seen in. Fifteen months later Lawwell announced that he was stepping down as CEO.

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