The Scotsman cooks the books over 38,943 Hampden crowd for St Johnstone visit

The Scotsman has attempted to pass off a crowd of 38,943 for St Johnstone’s visit to Hampden on Saturday.

With the Perth side due a 50% cut on the gate money after running costs for Police and Stewarding are deducted the Scotsman figure will be on interest to the Saints directors.

The build up to the game focussed on the likelihood that Hampden would be almost deserted with between 15-18,000 tickets believed to be sold.

Rather than share the bad news with their readers The Scotsman reported that 38,943 were inside Hampden while claiming that the attendance at the Celtic v Hibs match was undeclared.

For the benefit of any readers of the ailing Unionist broadsheet Celtic 365 can reveal that according to the SPFL website 47,370 fans watched Celtic beat The Cabbage while the crowd at Hampden remains undeclared, the only one of the eight cup ties without a crowd.

During commentary on Saturday Premier Sports announced an attendance of 23,000, just less than half the capacity of Hampden.

From the telly coverage the East Stand was completely empty, the North Stand almost full with a just a couple of thousand in the West Stand consisting of the Union Bears and the St Johnstone support. The South Stand barely featured in the Premier Sports coverage.

The Hampden attendance was the third biggest discussion point from Hampden after the incompetence of match officials Matthew MacDermid and Greg Aitken alongside the embarrassing post match celebrations of the serial losers alongside Phil Clement.

A crowd of 23,000 would generate income of around £500,000 giving St Johnstone just over £200,000 for their doomed trip to Glasgow.

With more double that attendance at Celtic Park the following day Hibs will have taken the best part of £500,000 back to Easter Road with David Gray likely to buy a player or two from the the cash paid out by Celtic fans.