Elgin City chairman Graham Tatters feels clubs in League One and Two are being made to feel like scapegoats after their seasons were halted for the rest of the month due to Covid-19.
All football in Scotland below the Championship will stop for at least three weeks, including the suspension of the Scottish Cup, with further reviews to take place before matches return.
Premiership and Championship clubs will be able to continue on the condition they undertake testing.
Despite testing not being carried out by clubs at Elgin’s level Tatters feels there has been minimal disruption to the fixture list in the bottom two SPFL divisions, while a number of top-flight matches have been postponed as a result of Covid-19.
Although Tatters does not dispute the decision to pause the campaign in the face of the new variant of the virus, he feels clubs further down the divisions are being made to suffer.
Tatters said: “We have got no complaints. Somebody at a higher level has made the decision and I understand that. I appreciate the dilemma they are in.
“I just feel if it was going to stop, it should have stopped at every level.
“I don’t think any lower league club has cancelled a game because of Covid-19.
“It’s a bit harsh that we are having to stop, while the Championship and Premiership keep going.
“I understand the Premiership because they are testing, but the Championship has two part-time clubs in Arbroath and Alloa.
“Even the clubs that are testing, the players have got homes to go to and they have kids that got to school. You then look at what’s happened with Celtic.
“I think the joint response group made the right decision, I just think they should have done it for everybody.”
Tatters feels his club made all provisions to safely facilitate matches, however he says the health of the nation is the greatest concern.
He added: “Nobody has come to me and said they are not happy playing. We have followed all the protocols.
“We built a shed last winter for the machinery, but we have managed to turn it into an away dressing room.
“A guy who runs a local tent hire company gave us heaters, so it’s ideal.
“We have put all the social distancing in place and had a stadium that has managed to cope with it.
“We feel quite safe. The problem with the part-time clubs is the same as what happened when we played Ross County, when our players were tested on the Thursday, then went back to work on the Friday and didn’t play the game until the Tuesday.
“It defeats logic – it cost us £60 a head for the testing.
“We would have continued playing, but I think eventually you have to look at it from the point of view of the national health, and we don’t want to contribute to the point where the NHS could be overflowed.
“I can’t argue with them starting the league because we were doing very well.
“It’s only this new variant which has come in and caused the major problems.”
Tatters is hoping to once again make use of the furlough scheme during the temporary shutdown, but accepts the timescale to finish the season is reducing.
Tatters added: “It’s getting tighter and tighter for pre-season. The close season is very limited anyway with the Betfred Cup, and now if we stretch it out to the point where we don’t finish by May, we will be lucky to have four or five weeks of a close season.”