Inverness Caley Thistle recently made a bold offer to the SFA, which would have seen the Scottish Cup Final moved from Hampden Park, but on the plus side fans would have been able to attend the game.
The Scottish Sun reported that the Championship side’s chief executive, Scot Gardiner, contacted the SFA about hosting the Celtic v Hearts fixture at the Caledonian Stadium.
300 fans could have attended game
Gardiner made the approach as Inverness are in Tier 1 of the Scottish Government’s system – meaning that 300 fans can attend games at their stadium.
Hampden Park will host the Scottish Cup Final (Photo by David Goddard/Getty Images)
The plan was to have 150 fans of each team attend the game. However, the report goes to reveal that the move was rejected by the SFA.
The reason given was that there is a contract that the game is to be played at Hampden Park, and that television companies weren’t keen on the idea.
Would have been unique occasion
It would certainly have made the Scottish Cup Final a unique one, if the request had been granted. Instead of being played in a 50,000 capacity stadium, the game would have been played in a 7,500 capacity one.
Celtic and Hearts faced each other in the 2019 Scottish Cup Final (Photo by Mark Runnacles/Getty Images)
However, that is not going to be the case, and the game will be played at an empty Hampden Park. You would imagine that the players on each side would still rather have the game at Hampden Park rather than at Inverness’ stadium.
That is despite the fact that no fans will be at the game at Hampden, and 300 could have attended the game at Inverness. Hampden Park is the home of the Scottish Cup, and it is easy to see why those in charge of the game would be reluctant to move it elsewhere.