SPL clubs edge towards 10-team premier division

• SPL chairman Ralph Topping

All 12 SPL clubs met together for the first time in the ongoing talks over league reconstruction after a working party proposed two divisions of 10.

No vote was taken at the meeting at Hampden, which lasted more than three hours, but SPL chairman Ralph Topping and chief executive Neil Doncaster emerged to declare themselves confident that they had persuaded all present that a 16-team or 18-team top league was not financially viable.

With no other alternatives on the table and the status quo out of the question, it appears a top-10 SPL 1 and 2 will be ratified at the next meeting between the clubs on January 17.

Milne left the national stadium in confident mood but was mindful of a recent poll which showed almost 90 per cent of fans who responded to a survey were opposed to a 10-team league, with around three-quarters favouring a league of 16 or 18 teams.

The Dons chairman said: "I think we have moved forward but there is still a bit of work to be done.

"Each one of the options has been fully evaluated and the one that delivers way above any of the other is a 10-team league.

"I am still fairly confident that's where we will end up after the 17th.

"There were no alternatives put forward but I genuinely believe that's the right way forward for Scottish football, without any doubt."

St Johnstone chairman Geoff Brown added that he believed the proposals would be pushed through.

Brown said: "The meeting went well and I would be fairly confident of the two 10-team leagues.

"It has not gone ahead, all we have had is discussions and every club can make their own minds up, but I would like to think we have a consensus."

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A strategic review group featuring Topping, SPL chief executive Neil Doncaster and representatives from six clubs - Hibernian, St Mirren, Motherwell, Celtic, Rangers and Aberdeen - formulated the proposals following research by Doncaster.

The other six clubs met on Christmas Eve to discuss the plans ahead of the official meeting amid public scepticism over the 10-team proposal from some of those clubs.