Craig Levein believes the bad blood between Hearts, Partick Thistle and those that sent them down last summer may never disappear.
The Jags lifted the League One title in an empty Firhill this morning, but SPFL and SFA chiefs Neil Doncaster and Ian Maxwell were banned from attending.
It comes just a couple of weeks after Hearts decided to lift the Championship trophy but not celebrate after supporters had called for them to leave it on the stand.
Doncaster and Maxwell were in attendance that day but fans have since suggested that the Jambos should have done what Partick did and not let them in.
Levein criticised both bodies for not realising the depth of feeling there was towards them from fans of certain clubs, and can’t see everyone being pals again any time soon.
He told BBC Scotland: “If I remember correctly, the Hearts decision was that they weren’t going to celebrate, they were just going to receive the trophy and that’s exactly what they did.
“Partick have taken it one step further by not allowing any representatives from those two organisations this week and for me, that stems from a legitimate case.
‘We’ve been over this and over this and over this but what happened to the clubs who were forced out of divisions was absolutely disgraceful. And I can understand why people are still bitter.
“For anyone to be unfairly disadvantaged in this situation was ridiculous and there’s a lot of healing to be done - if there can be any healing done, because there are some really deep rifts between different clubs and different divisions. There’s some real anger still at the hierarchy at the top end.
“Without wanting to speak for anybody, I’m convinced Rangers will still be really angry about what happened with what they tried to bring in.
“If they want to take the same stance as Partick Thistle, I can see their point. The problem here is that the hierarchy haven’t really understood the depth of feeling those clubs and the supporters of those clubs have.
“I think it’s going to be really frosty in boardrooms all over Scotland for years to come.”
