Celtic Should Support A Football Regulator For Scotland No Matter Our Misgivings.

Going over the list of things that Celtic should do and haven’t done gets tiresome. We know that there are things that we’ve missed and what that has cost us, and we know there are areas where we have dragged our feet and continue to.

This club continues to act as though it believes that Scottish football works perfectly and never needs to change, but inside the walls there has to be a realisation that this is not the case. I know we do not believe that legislative hands should be anywhere near football – we were vehemently opposed to the Offensive Behaviour Act and are wary of some form of Strict Liability – but at the same we cannot believe that football in Scotland is run right.

To change anything needs the building of a broad coalition. We’ve either tried and failed or we haven’t tried at all. If change doesn’t come from inside the game it can only come from outside of it. A Scottish football regulator would be able to do much that the current leadership of Scottish football is either unable or unwilling to do.

It might act in demanding reforms to officiating. It would certainly change rules and regulations on fit and proper person, dual ownership, financial fair play and other things. It would make it nearly impossible for Scottish clubs to mortgage their futures away.

It would not allow clubs to spend more than they earn. And it would come with guarantees for fans, including, perhaps, that minimum allocation guarantee which the clubs won’t provide themselves.

The conversation is being had all around us.

We should be at the forefront of it.

We will not agree with every power that the parliamentarians at Holyrood would want it to have but if we want to get some kind of influence over how those powers are set and how they would be used we cannot but be an active participant in the process, and we certainly cannot be one where our default position to the idea is outright opposition to it.

Celtic should not hesitate to support this idea in principle, and then work with the politicians to decide how best to implement it. It is better to be in that room making your case than standing outside it hollering to be heard.

Our club can be diabolically short-sighted at times, and really narrow in its focus. This is not an area where we can afford to be found wanting. A day will come when this is not just something being talked about on the margins; the closer English football moves to its regulator the more people in the stands of Scottish football will clamour for ours.

Celtic can either be caught cold or we can be part of that process from the start. It would be a good thing for our club to get in front of this issue by making a statement in support of the concept and expressing our clear desire to play a part in framing the debate.

Frankly, anything else would be a dereliction of duty from our board.

Yes, another one.

You can continue the debate and read more over on An Internet Bampot.