SCOTTISH ministers privately decided to blame the Irish if a joint bid to host the Euro 2008 football championships fell apart, despite praising their partners in public.

Newly released cabinet papers also reveal the Labour-LibDem coalition ploughed ahead with the bid in 2002 despite negligible debate and repeated warnings about shaky finances.

“This was a clear departure from the normal processes for collective decision-making," a cabinet minute noted.

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The plan cropped up repeatedly in cabinet discussions through the year, but UEFA ultimately awarded the games to Austria and Switzerland instead.

The Scottish Executive had hoped to stage a solo bid for the world’s third largest sporting event, but in late 2001 UEFA announced it would need eight 30,000-seat stadia for the tournament, not the six previously stipulated.

As that would have meant creating four venues in addition to Murrayfield, Hampden, Ibrox and Celtic Park, attention switched to a joint effort with Ireland.

On 22 January 2002, an ad hoc meeting of ministers debated the idea, with officials warning the cost would be £50-70m and any economic benefits “marginal”.

However First Minister Jack McConnell had already spoken to Taoiseach Bertie Ahern, who was “keen to pursue the idea of a joint bid” and “confident that Ireland could have two stadiums by 2008 which met the criteria”.

Driven by “relentless pressure from the media”, the Scottish Cabinet made a snap decision on a joint bid the following day and decided to “work up the details” later, ahead of formal bid documents being lodged with UEFA on February 28.

Treasury guidance on economic appraisal was ignored, it was unclear if Scotland’s return would be in proportion to its input, and the bid’s value for money rating was low.

An economic study said predicting any return was “inherently uncertain”, with estimates ranging from a £50m loss to a £42m gain - if Treasury guidance was ignored.

However ministers felt there could be “a number of unquantifiable benefits” and the “vision implicit in a joint bid made it attractive”.

Mr McConnell informed MSPs of the bid just hours after it was first run past full cabinet.

The next month, culture minister Mike Watson presented a paper a head of the final bid to UEFA which talked of “very positive discussions” with his Irish counterpart.

However it then said that if cabinet decided not to proceed with the bid “this would be an unpopular decision with the media”, in which case “our key presentational points might then include: The Republic of Ireland was unable to meet their end of the bargain”.

In the end, the cabinet did proceed, but Dublin failed to deliver the vital two stadia.

The proposed Stadium Ireland, dubbed Bertie’s Bowl, was abandoned as a costly flop, while the Gaelic Athletics Association refused to let Croke Park be used for soccer.

With the joint bid in tatters, UEFA rejected it in December.

Mr Watson told cabinet it was “very disappointing” but he remained convinced “that the Scottish/Irish bid was as good as the winning bid”.