St Johnstone fans shouldn’t criticise their club for being smart on Celtic tickets.

Maybe I shouldn’t be surprised to find yet another example of Scottish football’s shortsightedness online after the game last night. But lo and behold, there it was.

Prominent St Johnstone fan accounts were complaining about the situation involving our supporters pretty much taking over their ground for the game. I get the grievance. I get why they’re upset about it. I understand what they’re trying to say.

But let’s live in reality.

These clubs, like all clubs in this country, tolerate a governing body which is hopeless at governing, one which does not know how to market or sell the Scottish game. So, we continue to be the poor relation of European football, with a television deal which absolutely stinks to high heaven.

We also have the unfortunate circumstance wherein there are two massive clubs which dwarf all the others in terms of support and resources. One of those problems is self-imposed and could probably be fixed by getting rid of the leadership in this game and starting again with people who know what they are doing.

The structural fact of two massive clubs is something else entirely.

That is about as alterable as the laws of nature.

We know the problem of SPFL and SFA leadership is not going to be fixed because we know the clubs have no appetite to fix it. So, we will wander on through this wilderness, finding ways to make ends meet and finding ways to make it work.

And that at least should simplify how clubs handle the second problem.

It is going to exist whether you like it or not.

You may hope that another three or four years of Ibrox in the doldrums will scatter their fanbase to the four winds, but I see no realistic prospect of that. So, the only thing clubs can do with that reality is find the best way to live with it that they can.

Not long ago on this site, I wrote about the Russian parable of the wealthy landowner who falls on harsh times and has to move in with his pig. The pig is messy. It is loud. It snorts, pisses, farts and shits wherever it likes.

But eventually, like everything else, you get used to it.

You may not like it, but you’ve got to find a way to live with it.

And the traditional way clubs in this country have lived with us is to say: well, if there are tens of thousands of these guys and they are willing to spend money filling all the seats in the stadium that we cannot sell ourselves, then for those weekends of the season we’ll take their money.

That has traditionally put more money in the pockets of these clubs and allowed them to spend more. Spend more on players, spend more on academies, spend more on facilities and spend more on improving the experience for their own supporters during the games where those supporters have their stadium back.

There are 38 league fixtures in a Premiership season. If everything goes the way you want and you make the top six, you can expect a small number of home games against Celtic and the Ibrox club where this issue arises.

Four home games out of 19 at home sounds like a lot when you put it that way, but it is still less than a quarter of your home programme.

And those games can be worth serious money.

St Johnstone have not tried to hide that fact.

Earlier this year the club openly acknowledged the unhappiness among its own supporters over giving Celtic and the Ibrox club three stands, but also explained that the extra revenue was significant enough to affect what they could spend on the football side. The club even set a season-ticket target of 3,800 which would allow it financially to keep the East Stand for home supporters and reduce the away allocation to two stands.

That is what I mean by living in reality.

For the directors of some of these clubs, decisions like this can be the difference between carrying losses and putting extra money into the playing budget. The reality exists. It is not nice and it is not comfortable, but you make the best of it that you can.

And I don’t even mind that, in the analogy, we’re the smelly pigs. Clubs probably see us that way anyway, even as they charge our supporters outrageously compared with other away fans. At least the analogy acknowledges reality.

And what the St Johnstone board has done is acknowledge reality.

Some of the complaints said that these are football decisions being made by business people. Well, yeah. Sometimes that is what has to happen.

Football clubs in Scotland have to learn to live within their means. This is a good example of a club taking a hard decision precisely so that it can do that.

St Johnstone themselves said before the game that relocating East Stand season-ticket holders for this fixture generated a “significant financial boost” which was vital to helping the club compete and invest on and off the pitch.

That isn’t greed. That is arithmetic.

And I can also tell you that if you look at other sides in this league who have played in front of empty seats while Celtic supporters were locked out over the last couple of months, any club which shows a little common sense is going to emerge from these fixtures with a chunk of change those clubs don’t have.

Right there, there is an advantage.

It is parochial, small-minded and stupid to deny paying customers a chance to come through your gates when you cannot sell the seats yourself. That so many clubs in this country are now willing to do that, willing to be small-minded, willing to be parochial and willing to leave significant money on the table, is baffling to me.

It would be different if Scottish football was swimming in cash.

It is not. We know it is not. The SPFL has increased its distributions in recent years, but the domestic broadcast market remains modest by major European standards. Sky’s current arrangement allows for up to 60 Premiership matches per season, while Premier Sports has a separate package of 22 matches.

These are the same clubs which go on and on about the resource gap and the financial differences between the top two and everybody else.

And all the while, what are they doing about it? They are denying themselves opportunities to make money. They are denying themselves a chance to exploit the very situation they are complaining about.

What else is there to do with that situation but acknowledge it and profit from it?

St Johnstone, as a club, have done the right thing.

They have taken the decision away from the emotional reaction of supporters who understandably hate seeing their stadium heavily populated by Celtic fans, and they have looked at what actually benefits the club.

They will take that money and put it back into the operation.

Ultimately, isn’t that what every supporter wants?

For a handful of games in a season, you may find yourself heavily outnumbered in your own stadium. That is the reality of Scottish football for clubs which choose to exploit the enormous travelling supports of Celtic and the Ibrox club.

And this is the first time I can remember seeing people talk incessantly about bridging a financial gap while actively choosing policies which make that gap bigger.

St Johnstone’s board have looked at the situation in front of them and chosen the money. Good. That money can pay wages. It can fund recruitment. It can support the academy. It can improve facilities. It can help keep the club competitive.

You don’t have to like Celtic supporters taking over large parts of your ground. You just have to decide whether disliking it is worth the price of leaving all that revenue sitting outside the turnstiles.

Scottish football clubs complain constantly about poverty. They complain about the financial imbalance. They complain about Celtic’s spending power. They complain about the impossibility of competing. Then some of them voluntarily turn paying customers away.

That isn’t principle. It is self-harm.

St Johnstone, at least, have looked at the world as it actually exists rather than the world they wish existed. More clubs in this country should try it.

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