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Daily Record
Daily Record
Sport
Gabriel McKay

SPFL clubs pledge financial support as promoted trio battle Hearts and Partick Thistle in SFA arbitration

Dundee United, Raith Rovers and Cove Rangers will continue their SPFL battle after fellow clubs pledged to help with legal bills.

After the 2019-20 season was called to a halt early Hearts, Partick Thistle and Stranraer were relegated.

Reconstruction plans that would have seen no relegation across the divisions failed, leading the Jags and Jambos to launch legal action.

That was referred to arbitration by the Court of Session in Edinburgh, with the three promoted clubs on the other side.

Mounting legal costs meant the trio were considering abandoning their fight, but Raith Rovers announced on Monday they'd be launching crowd funding and appealing to fellow SPFL clubs for help.

It appears that support has been forthcoming, with Rovers chairman Bill Clark telling the Fife Free Press : "Things haven’t changed, the three clubs will continue to defend themselves.

“We will be at the tribunal which we expect to start next week sometime.

“It was a joint decision we made together, we looked at all the aspects of it and did a scoping of the pluses and minuses and decided we had to go ahead with it and defend our position.

“We have been dragged in to this, it was not our intention to be dragged in to a legal despite but because Hearts and Partick served us with the petition we felt we had to respond to it.

“We carried out a risk analysis and we are going forward.

"We have had a fair amount of support from other clubs in Scotland across saying they would support us financially if need be.

“Dundee United on behalf of all three clubs are starting a joint crowdfunding page.

“Between the money we’ve put in and the money we hope to get from other clubs and that should make us secure in terms of the money position."

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