Interview: Gordon Smith, chief executive of the Scottish Football Association

ABOUT to complete his first 18 months in the job in which he succeeded David Taylor on 1 June last year, Gordon Smith was not only looking ahead, but reflecting on the vicissitudes of a sometimes thankless task and, along the way, debunking one or two misconceptions when we met this week.

Not least of these is the seemingly widespread idea that the chief executive of the Scottish Football Association is one of the prime movers behind a prospective bid by Scotland and Wales to co-host the European championship in 2016.

Not only is he not a supporter of the proposal, but he is likely to expend considerable energy on an investigation into the feasibility of the project that will confirm his conviction that it is a non-starter.

"In practical terms, I don't see any chance of it happening," said Smith. "But I'm going to exhaust every angle of the possibilities so that I'm not seen to be rejecting it purely on the basis that I don't think it's workable.

"What I expect to be doing, in effect, is verifying my own opinion that it can't be done. I'll check all the criteria, everything that's required of a host, and that will be far-reaching.

"But the thing a lot of people don't seem to understand is that hosting that tournament is not just a matter of coming up with nine stadiums, which is now Uefa's minimum requirement.

"You also need training camps, and, don't forget, in 2016 there will be 24 teams at the finals. You need hotels, for the teams as well as the fans. You need different centres, you need suitable transport infrastructure and roads infrastructure. I'm now hearing that Ukraine are now struggling big-time to meet these criteria in order to co-host the 2012 championship with Poland.

"I don't mind admitting that I was happy to vote to increase the number of teams at the finals from 16 to 24 purely out of self-interest, as so many other countries were. It gives us a better chance of being there, knowing full well there's very little chance of us ever staging the tournament, even as a co-host.

"I saw somewhere recently where somebody suggested a triple or even quadruple hosting, including England. Do you really think Uefa are going to allow four countries four automatic qualifications just because they have the stadiums? No chance.

"But my other reason for supporting the 24-team proposal was how much the qualifying campaigns are likely to benefit. Groups will be more open, with more meaningful matches right to the very end. That means greater interest, bigger crowds, more revenue. If three teams can qualify, you could have five in contention, maintaining the excitement right to the last day. That could apply right across the board.

"So, don't let anybody be fooled into thinking I am all in favour of a Scotland bid for 2016.

"I am very much of the opinion that it's not going to happen and I expect to demonstrate why it's not going to happen. If I am proved to be wrong, we'll be applying for it."

On domestic matters, the Scottish Premier League's decision the other day to announce the parameters of the 2009-10 football season could be construed as nothing other than a barely-disguised declaration of contempt for the notion that SFA president George Peat's vision of the future includes an amalgamation of the country's three governing bodies.

By disdaining established protocol – that is, pre-empting the annual discussion of dates between themselves, the national association and the Scottish Football League before a schedule is finalised – the heavyweights of the top league simply gave notice of their intention to remain a separate, self-controlling entity, repelling all attempts at a merger which could dilute their power.

The SFA's official response may have stated that "today's announcement has taken us completely by surprise", but the shock would not have applied to their own chief executive.

Just hours before the SPL's unilateral action, Smith had confided his conviction that, whatever changes in the game may arise from the Peat initiative, turning three into one would not be among them.

"I don't think an actual merger is the road we'll go down," said Smith. "You have to realise that, comparatively speaking, the SPL is a big, big financial organisation now and, obviously, they broke away from the Scottish Football League for their own reasons, because they thought it would best serve their interests.

"I'm actually placing more emphasis on all of us just working together. I think that could be enough, rather than have just one body running the whole show. From a personal perspective, there is already so much to do at the SFA that running two leagues as well would be extremely difficult.

"The fact is that, in terms of George's proposal, these are very early days.

"It's something he and I have been discussing for a while, and he wanted to get it out there, to let people know we were being pro-active in this matter.

"We simply want to look at ways of taking the game forward, to get the various stakeholders in the game basically to have a say in whether we are going about it the right way. Everybody has a different opinion.

"The initial idea is to form a strategy group and the difficulties there include how it is composed, who makes up the group, what's their remit, what powers, if any, would they have to implement change. There's a whole load of factors to be agreed before we can even get started.

"Amalgamation or streamlining in some form of the three bodies, of course, is something that could come out of the strategy group, if people think that's the way to go.

"They may conclude that three associations becoming one is the way ahead and, in that case, it would become an issue. I don't think it will. I just think co-operation and co-ordination between the three bodies is the priority."

Even before he started work at Hampden, Smith had voiced slight apprehension over the near-certainty that he would encounter frustrations in his attempt to get things done, primarily because the chief executive does not enjoy the autonomy that would allow him to implement his ideas. All major issues require the approval of a ten-man board, leading to the kind of delays and obstacles that arise from government by committee. So far, however, he has been pleasingly surprised by the progress made in these 18 months.

"There have been little frustrations, but I think you just have to live with that," he said. "There are a lot of good people involved here, giving their time voluntarily, working away to try to get things right. But, of course, there's a kind of paradoxical element to the SFA in that the people on the board will be deliberating and voting on issues that will affect their own clubs.

"You'll see examples of it in things like club licensing, the Scottish Cup, how many games they'll play and board members, who are club men after all, will have different views. Sometimes getting things done can take a bit longer than ideal because the process can be slow. But it's democracy and you just have to accept it."

As a former broadcaster and newspaper columnist himself, Smith has an understanding of the occasional excesses of the media and was prepared from the outset for criticism, even for some that would be unfair and unreasonable. He does, however, take exception to criticism that is based on untruths.

"As a rule, I don't react to it," said Smith. "But I did have occasion to phone a journalist one day over his blaming me for something that had nothing to do with the SFA. It was actually an SPL matter. When I told him I was merely pointing out that he had got that wrong, he said, 'You're being a bit sensitive, are you not?' I said I don't think so, I'm just clarifying that the matter you got heated about had nothing to do with me or the SFA.

"He then said, 'C'mon, Gordon, you have to realise this is just a bit of fun'. So, I said, it's a bit of fun for you to write untruths and misinform people and falsely show somebody in a bad light. It's not very funny for the person you're writing about. I sometimes have to smile when people ask me how it's going in a way that suggests they think it's not going very well, because they've been getting that impression from the media.

"But it really is going very well. I've had a load of things to do since I came in and they've all been done. I've had great support internally.

"Some people outside kept bringing up the fact that we didn't have a sponsor for the Scottish Cup in a critical way. But we brought in a broadcasting deal for the four years from 2010 which is probably going to be worth about £60 million to the SFA, while the cup sponsorship was previously worth £1m a year. It was as if some people were deliberately looking for negatives and they found one in the Scottish Cup.

"Now that one's gone because we have sponsorship, so I suppose they'll probably look for something else to throw up. As a result of that kind of thing, even friends will ask in a concerned way if everything's okay and if I have problems and I have to reassure them that everything's working out fine.

"Actually, I'm not sure you should write that the job is going well and that I'm actually enjoying it. It might leave some of my more feverish 'well-wishers' psychologically damaged."