SFA vice-president Mike Mulraney believes it would be “foolhardy” to dismiss the chances of any of Scotland’s major clubs going out of business due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

Mulraney, who is also the chairman of Ladbrokes Premiership club Alloa Athletic, admitted he had budgeted for the worst case scenario of playing the entire 2020/21 season behind closed doors.

And the businessman believes many top flight clubs are going to be faced with huge problems in the months ahead due to the devastating financial impact of the coronavirus crisis and football shutdown.

“We always believed the smaller clubs were going to be impacted first and that proved to be the case,” he said. “But we also believed the medium to long term impact of it was going to be larger

“From an Alloa point of view, our crowd is critically important to us, but our whole business model allows us to change quickly. It is the same for many part-time clubs. But the full-time clubs, with their structure and the way their contracts are set up, are going to be presented with problems which are very, very significant.

“Although it is not one answer fits all, some of our larger clubs are going to face some real, real searching questions over the coming months.”

Asked about the possibility of clubs going out of business on Sportsound on BBC Radio Scotland, Mulraney said: “I think to not believe that that is a possibility is foolhardy.

“However, I believe that the SFA and SPFL have a responsibility to look at all eventualities to defend and protect our game. We are working incredibly hard and have been for weeks to make sure when we come through this we have a game.

“But do I think that there is a realistic chance of us losing clubs at all levels of Scottish football? Anyone who does not believe that is foolhardy.”

Mulraney admitted the SFA and SPFL Joint Response Group has been examining creating “bio-secure environments” to stage football in and playing games behind closed doors.

“One season without fans?” he said. “We think it is theoretically possible for us. It would be incredibly difficult. There is no point in pretending otherwise. We have run the numbers and we think we could probably do it. We think it will incredibly difficult in the Championship.

“The other thing is football is the crowd, it is the fans. If it requires us to do something like this to ensure we have got a football product at the end of it then we have to do it. We have to look at how we give our media partners content.

“But I am doing this to give my town and my fans a club to cheer. If I can create an environment under which they can do that on a screen, maybe create a Zoom page that can run side by side with it on a screen, slag the referee off with their pals, we need to look at totally new ways of how we get our game back and then our game to our fans.”