THE Scottish Football Association would have to spend about (pounds) 1m to
pay-off Berti Vogts and Tommy Burns before the expiry of their contracts.
John McBeth, president of the SFA, vehemently denied he would sanction the sacking of the management team in the event of defeat against Moldova tomorrow night in Chisinau. However, public pressure may force their hand and place serious question marks over the futures of those men who endorsed the appointment of Scotland's first national coach and who have refused to budge despite dwindling status and a gradual on-field regression under Vogts.
The coach was lured from the Middle East with a (pounds) 400,000-a-year contract - plus considerable bonuses for reaching the finals of Euro 2004 and World Cup 2006 - and his agent, Andy Gross, is understood to have secured a watertight agreement that would ensure him the maximum pay-out if his contract was terminated.
With 20 months remaining, the SFA would need to write a cheque for almost (pounds) 700,000 to remove him from office and, with Burns earning in excess of (pounds) 100,000 in his role as assistant, the SFA stand to lose about (pounds) 1m in compensation before they even considered a new coaching team.
Walter Smith is the favourite to assume control among the more
pro-active members of the SFA executive committee. His attraction is enhanced by the fact that he is currently out of work and would accept considerably less than Vogts' salary which, incidentally, is about double what Craig Brown earned in his dual role as national coach and technical director.
Despite the support from McBeth and David Taylor, the chief executive, Scotland can ill-afford to miss out on qualifying for another major championship. Defeat against Moldova would virtually condemn Scotland to Group 5 failure and would increase to (pounds) 12m the amount of qualification money lost to the SFA since 1998.
At least (pounds) 3m is at stake as direct FIFA prize money for qualifying for the next finals in Germany, with potentially another (pounds) 2m generated from commercial spin-offs in the event of Vogts' side claiming a place among the finalists.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article