Scots seek safety in numbers

Phil Gordon discovers that the need for a radical overhaul is urgent

When Murdo MacLeod played with Borussia Dortmund, the hardest battle he faced was finding a space for his Mercedes in the club car park. Nowadays, things are not quite so smooth for the former Scotland international. Being in charge of Partick Thistle is like running a Trabant: it's only a matter of time until you call out the repair man to help you get home.

MacLeod and a clutch of other Scottish First Division managers currently need a lift from the RAC, only here the acronym refers to Rangers and Celtic. Partick, Glasgow's third club, are on the road to financial ruin if they miss out on a return to the Premier League this season, and they are not alone.

There is a traffic-jam of medium-sized clubs jostling for the one guaranteed promotion place back into the big league. St Johnstone, Airdrie, Dundee, St Mirren, Falkirk and MacLeod's team, who were just 60 seconds away from retaining their top-flight status in May until a goal from Dundee United in the play-off forced extra-time, which proved fatal.

The 10-team Premier League has become too small to satisfy the demand from those on the outside hammering to get in, and those on the inside frightened of being ejected. The clamour for increasing its size to 16 is growing. Rangers have submitted a plan to the Scottish League pleading for radical changes - and not just to the size of the current four leagues of 10 teams - while 15 other clubs met in Glasgow last week to discuss the same thing. Celtic even raised the possibility of leaving the Scottish League and joining the English Premier League

The crisis is not tomorrow. It is here today for the likes of Kilmarnock, trying to protect the pounds 8m investment in their splendid all-seater Rugby Park - which will host Scotland's World Cup tie with Estonia in April - and Dundee, one-time European Cup semi-finalists, who are living on a life-support from their bank after several failed promotion attempts.

The spectre of Dundee hangs over MacLeod, who made his name with Celtic in the 1980s before his move to the Bundesliga. It was just 300 yards down the street from Dens Park, at Tannadice, that Partick lost their Premier status. "That one minute in the play-off with United cost us several million pounds in lost revenue, from attendances and television money," MacLeod said. "This season, we've had to cut the playing staff from 30 to under 20. I have signed six new players but none of them cost a penny in transfer fees because our bank would not allow it. I dread to think what the future holds unless we get back in with the big boys."

Those big boys, Rangers and Celtic, reiterate the message. "The smaller clubs are going to have to live off their own income from now on, rather than rely on handouts from the Old Firm," said Campbell Ogilvie, the architect of Rangers' plan and the club's director-secretary. "Forty clubs is too many for a Scottish professional league to carry. No-one wants to put anyone else out of business but the reality is that the smaller clubs have to find their own level to operate at, while the Premier League looks after itself."

Rangers and Celtic are fed up with money for televised matches on Sky being shared out among everyone at Scottish football's table. Pay-per- view is encouraging the Old Firm to seek its own TV deals. Ogilvie reflects: "We would make far more money selling, say Celtic v Rangers, than the pounds 80,000 we get from Sky. We accept that a percentage should go into a central fund and that money should go back out to help full-time clubs trying to meet the standards. Without a strong Premier League we have nothing."

Ogilvie insists the cosmetics of how many teams make up the Premier League should not cover-up that what is really needed is a total makeover of the Scottish game. He wants every professional club to have a proper youth structure, starting with boys at the age of eight; specific stadium criteria; feeder sides, as in baseball, for farming out youngsters; and clubs containing a pre-requisite number of players, with reserve football being scrapped.

"The quality of our players needs to be improved," declared Ogilvie. "There are 200 full-time players in the First Division alone and these clubs can't carry that. Everyone is going to have to prune, and that includes Rangers. A lot of players are going to be out of a job over the next year."

Back at Firhill, MacLeod said: "The quality has not disappeared, but no manager will play youngsters in the Premier League because they are under pressure. I couldn't do it last season. That can't help football."