Whilst preparing to face Inverness Caledonian Thistle, the club was required to complete transfer/registration forms for three players against the hard deadline of the ‘Transfer Window’ closing. In focussing on ensuring the associated paperwork was drafted appropriately, and submitted in a timely fashion, an oversight was made regarding the team line-up for that evening’s cup-tie. That oversight resulted in a player being named in our starting line-up and participating in the game when he was not eligible to do so, as he had not been signed by the original date of the tie.

That was in breach of competition rule 12.5 and the club notified the Scottish Football Association of the situation as soon as it became aware. A meeting was held with the Scottish FA on 3 February, and the outcome was that Queen’s Park’s participation in the Scottish Cup for season 2022/23 was ended.

As a result of this, the club has enhanced its procedures around checking eligibility of players and how the club will manage future transfer activity.

At these times of financial pressure for everyone, we greatly appreciated the supporters who made the considerable investment of time and money to travel on a midweek evening to support the team. Accordingly the club have agreed to reimburse the Supporters’ Association. The Association will make appropriate arrangements to compensate those who travelled to Inverness including supporters who made their own travel arrangements.

In addition, every Queen’s Park supporter in attendance at the Caledonian Stadium will be offered a complimentary ticket for our cinch Championship match with Hamilton Academical at New Douglas Park on Saturday, 25 February. These tickets will be available to uplift from Lesser Hampden from Tuesday at 10 am. We would ask that any supporter who is unable to pick up their ticket in person to contact the club on 0141 632 1275 to make alternative arrangements.

Club President David Hunter said: “We did not manage this situation as well as we should have. While we have put new measures in place, this of course is no consolation to our players, staff and supporters, all of whom we let down. I can only apologise, in particular to our supporters who travelled to support the team that night as it was during a month where we had a series of lengthy trips to away games.

“As bitter a pill to swallow as this is, we must not allow this to overshadow our important run in to the Championship season. We made a mistake and we have learnt from it. Now is the time to move on and continue your tremendous support for the team.”