Neil Doncaster in favour of finding an alternative to controversial SPL split

Rangers and Motherwell are among those who have expressed unhappiness with the final five fixtures of the Clydesdale Bank Premier League campaign.

Doncaster admits he thought the idea of a league split was "odd" before taking up his post with the organisation and is willing to canvass clubs in a bid to find ways to improve upon the system.

He said: "Certainly, when you are looking from the south up here to what it looks like, you raise an eyebrow and it does look a bit odd. But when you come up here, it makes more sense.

"You've got 12 teams in the league and the only way that you can have the right number of games for those 12 teams is to have the split in the way that we have it. No-one is pretending it's perfect.

"I'm certainly one of those who would very much like to look at the whole league structure, to look at better ways of doing things and to look again at whether we've actually got the optimum structure for football in Scotland.

"My view is that possibly we haven't. So I welcome the thoughts about looking at the league and looking at how we improve the situation going forward.

"If there are any ways, as part of those improvements, that we can do away with some of the imbalances the split creates, I would absolutely welcome that.

"I'm with those who question the way the split operates at the moment. Ultimately, once we've done the consultation and gone round and talked to the clubs about what they would like to do, we would all like to see change, it's for the clubs to decide whether they want that change or not."

While Rangers are furious at the prospect of three consecutive away games, Motherwell kicked off the complaints after being handed just 18 home fixtures instead of 19. Craig Brown's team have been given a third away clash against Celtic, meaning they lose the financial advantage of a home game against the Old Firm in the final five matches – a situation chief executive Leeann Dempster claimed had "sporting and financial" implications for the club.

Responding to their complaints, Doncaster said: "I can certainly sympathise a great deal with Leeann and with everyone at Motherwell. To have 18 home games when you are expecting 19, and budgeting for 19, that is unfortunate and it's a great shame for them.

"But they are not alone. Over the years, Gretna, Kilmarnock, Inverness, Aberdeen, Livingston, have all had seasons where they have had 18 home games.

"Because of the way the split operates, as soon as Aberdeen were not in the top six this year, there was automatically going to be an imbalance. There was no way that we could have created 19 home and 19 away for every club.

"That is a real problem for Motherwell, and I do sympathise, but that is a direct result of the split. It's not a question of anyone at the SPL deciding that that's what they would like to do.

"It's a direct result of having the split system and the way the fixtures were organised. Someone was always going to have 18 home games this season."

Asked why Motherwell were the team to suffer, he added: "The precise system for going through it is quite difficult to explain. There are a list of priorities recommended to the board by a fixture working group and those priorities are considered and set by the board and the board then set down those priorities, give them to Iain Blair, our secretary, and he creates the best possible fixture list based on those priorities.

"There is no subjective judgment about what may be fair.

It's not a question of anyone at the SPL saying, 'We actually think that Motherwell should be the team with 18 home fixtures' – it's purely as a result of the fixtures that are laid down by the board that are recommended to it."