A Sunday newspaper has launched a bid to close down two sporting governing bodies it says are responsible for 20 years of “failure and shame”.

The Glasgow-based Sunday Mail wants to scrap the Scottish Football Association and Scottish Professional Football League, and replace them with a single Scottish Football Federation.

SFA chief executive Stewart Regan resigned last week as the organisation continues to search for a new manager for the Scotland national team, who last played in a World Cup in 1998.

Launching its ‘Project Save’ campaign, the Mail said a new body would “rid our game of the scourge of vested interests” and accused SPFL clubs of “putting themselves first”.

The Mail is proposing a new Federation with an “independent board made up of football people with business pedigrees”, as well as fans’ groups.

An editorial on the campaign states: “Scotland hasn’t qualified for a major finals since 1998. Twenty years of failure. Twenty years of shame.

“The clubs ARE the SFA and the SPFL – they need to think about what Scottish football looks like for the next generation. More of the same is not an option.

“One governing body would be in a stronger position to negotiate new sponsorship deals. TV cash from league games and internationals would be pooled.

“The country’s top clubs’ commercial interests will still have to be served. But a percentage of the cash has to be fed back to grassroots level. This would bring the clubs and the national team closer.”

“There has never been a better time for all parties 
to unite and revive our failing game. Let’s get the Bravehearts beating again with some radical surgery. Get all the interested parties and politicians round a table and talk. Project Save should be No.1 item on the agenda.”

Sunday also saw the Mail score a victory in its campaign to outlaw plastic straws, reported on by HTFP last month.

The paper splashed on the revelation that both Holyrood and Buckingham Palace have banned them.