Craig Levein has begun legal action against the SFA following his dismissal on 5 November of this year, according to a report in the
Star Online. Scotland had failed to qualify for Euro 2012 under Levein, finishing behind the Czech Republic and Spain, and had only taken two points from the first 4 matches of their 2014 World Cup qualifying group. U21 manager Billy Stark has been appointed interim manager as the SFA deliberate on who is the right man to control of an exciting, young Scotland team for the rest of the World Cup qualifying campaign and beyond. Despite Leveins dismissal from the role of manager - the SFA had decided not to terminate his contract, which still had a year and a half remaining. It is likely the SFA took this move as it would mean a cheaper compensation deal for them. Leveins remaining contract with the SFA was worth £700,000 or £8,000 a week. However, if Levein had taken another job during that time the SFA would have been able to write off the remainder of the contract. Because of this, Levein has now resigned from his contract and served the SFA with a writ. He presumably wants to get the full £700,000 compensation figure from the SFA up front which would allow him to move on from the Scotland job and seek new employment. The SFA issued this statement on the matter, "The Scottish FA has since received notification that Craig has chosen to resign, thereby foregoing the offer made to honour his contract in full. "In the notification received, failure to make a proposal in lieu of compensation has been cited. It is the view of the Scottish FA that no such offer is required given Craig's decision to resign, especially since an offer of mediation was rejected by his legal representatives. It is clear the SFA believe that as they offered to honour his full contract, they should not have to pay Levein any compensation as he has now resigned from the job. Although Levein did not perform particularly well as Scotland manager, it is hard to criticise him for wanting the SFA to honour his full contract. As it seems the SFA were trying to put him in the difficult position of choosing between the money they owe him and his career prospects.