Money seems to be cascading out of Scottish sport.

Diadora went under last week, taking with it the kit sponsorship of the Scotland football team.

The same happened yesterday to Canterbury Europe, kit sponsors of the Scottish rugby team.

Could it be that Scots fans are unpersuaded by the value-for-money of their national teams' replica kits?

And of course, there's the mess left by Setanta's collapse.

There was a concern that only Sky Sports would want to replace its contract to televise Scottish Premier League matches. And without competition, of course it could name its price.

So the hope was that a big sports pay-TV player - ESPN, part of the Disney empire - could come in from the United States and force an auction for the SPL rights.

Some hope.

We're now told that the two giants have got together and they're bidding to share the rights between them.

That's for no more money than Setanta paid over the past four years, while wanting to lock in the Scottish clubs for the next five years.

That helps explain why the Old Firm clubs have let it be known they're trying to put together their own alternative to Sky and ESPN.

It's hard to see how they could sustain the business model, or that it's going to be in the smaller clubs interests.

But it's more likely that Rangers and Celtic are trying to force the TV companies to think again - at least to shorten the length of the tie-in contract.

When Sky Sports got this level of domination over English premiership football, the European Commission stepped in.

Its answer was to force the league to split its TV rights into six packages, not all of which could be secured by one company.

Perhaps the European Commission should take a look at what's currently happening with the Scottish Premier League.

If, as seems to be the case, Sky and ESPN are bidding jointly, it doesn't look like healthy competition, and it doesn't look good for Scottish football.

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They're striking camp at T in the Park, with many of the tents abandoned as cheap and disposable.

One teenager I know claimed to have bought a new tent for her and three friends at £22.

At £170 for a ticket, it suggests the recession hasn't hobbled the spending power of music festival-goers.

And even if the tents are cheap, that's just the start of the costs of this rite of youth passage.

Read more about that from the BBC's intrepid Balado reporter Natalie Higgins.

This brings to mind the curious contrasts of the way this recession is affecting young people.

It's a truism that the debts being built up by government will weigh heavily on their tax bills for decades to come.

Jobs scrapheap

Likewise, the cost of looking after us baby boomers in our retirement, when too few of us have made adequate preparations.

It's also clear from the unemployment figures that young people are taking the brunt of the recession, and we haven't yet seen the impact of the first cohort of school leavers and college/university graduates to try to enter the job market in the teeth of recession.

Those of an age to get into higher and further education are finding competition heating up with others thrown on the jobs scrapheap and wanting to get themselves some new skills.

Possibly this week's update on the figures will reflect young people's struggle, while anecdotal evidence shows students on their long summer break are struggling to find jobs.

Yet there's also evidence that that the age group is ignoring the impact of recession.

It's not just the impression I get from shopping on Glasgow's Buchanan Street this weekend, where the age profile was heavily biased to the young.

It's also clear from retailers' own evidence.

Not bullish

Among those with profits holding up well or surging ahead are clothes shops aimed at the young and the most fashion-conscious - the age group most likely to pay full price for the right look and the right labels.

That includes New Look, Primark and online clothing company Asos, which recently reported sales doubling in the 12 months to March, with profits up 93%, and a further rise in sales since the start of April of 52%.

That partly reflects the shift to online shopping, though company founder Nick Robinson told the market he is not bullish about that growth path continuing.

He can see his target market, aged up to 34, may be about to hit the spending buffers.

So what's going on with the young consumer?

One explanation is a sense of entitlement, built up as the children of the long boom years.

Boozing habits

A survey covering Britain, the USA, Canada, Brazil and Australia and reported in the Financial Times last week showed British youth to be unusually fond of their clothes spending.

Asked what they would never give up, no matter how bad their finances got, Brits put clothes in fourth place behind the internet, mobile phone and satellite TV.

They were much more likely to give up their boozing habits than Americans, while Canadians and Australians put movie-going high up their priorities in a recession.

Brazilians virtuously put their college costs as their most important outgoing.

All nationalities agreed they could probably do with fewer magazine subs, taxis and music downloads.

Another explanation for the strength of youth spending is that studenthood in Britain now involves such a high level of indebtedness that a bit of recession is only going to add to scarily large repayment bills and shouldn't be allowed to dampen their enthusiastic consumerism.

And given that the age at which people enter the property ownership ladder is on the way up, along with more people staying longer with their parents, disposable cash can more readily be splashed on living for today.

Let's not forget the obvious explanation for this paradox: that 'young people' are an exceptionally diverse group about whom I shouldn't even try to generalise.

Pester power

Maybe so, but don't think the young are oblivious to the seriousness of the economic situation.

Yet another survey, this time for Asda, this weekend showed children are much more concerned about their parents' finances than their parents realise.

Questioning 1,000 adults and 600 children aged between seven and 16, the supermarket's market research arm found 18% of parents thought their children are concerned about the family's finances, while 55% of the young people agreed.

They claim even to have throttled back on pester power as a result.

And two-thirds of those aged between 12 and 16 say they are concerned about getting a job when they're older.

If they have to spoil their childhood worrying, they might do better to consider the impact of spending cuts on their school, college and university budgets.

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Glasgow roads seem mercifully unblocked this week, with no school run and lots of Glaswegians on holiday.

The Clyde resort traditions of Fair Fortnight are not what they were. But nor are the latest figures for passengers through the city's airport.

The June statistics from BAA, the company that owns Glasgow, Edinburgh and Aberdeen airports (as well as London's three main airports) show Glasgow figures in real trouble, while Edinburgh is bucking the recession and the aviation trend.

It's been rising for three months. One month it looked like it might have been explained by the date on which Easter fell this year and last. Then it was helped by rugby fans heading for Murrayfield.

But this month, it's looking more like a trend. Perhaps it's because the big banks have to keep in touch with bosses and their government shareholding masters 400 miles to the south, which wasn't the case last year.

But it seems more likely Edinburgh is proving a resilient, attractive travel destination. And that's perhaps as continental holidays lose their appeal.

The BAA figures for all its airports, show European charter flight passengers were 21% down on June last year, though continental scheduled flights were only down 3%. North Atlantic flights were down nearly 10%, but other long haul 0.2%.

At the other end of the M8, it's not a happy story at all. Whether you compare June with last year, or the start of the year with the start of last year, Glasgow has seen passenger numbers down more than 10%. Plane movements were down faster at Glasgow Airport than any other BAA airport - by 14% compared with a UK average of 6.3%.

And on cargo, Glasgow is losing out again. While Edinburgh has seen strong growth, Glasgow has seen a 40% fall in tonnage, comparing the start of this year with the first six months of 2008.

This autumn, BAA is due to complete a £31m extension of Glasgow's passenger terminal. But the figures of divergence between the two airports won't help the company make the case that it's protecting the interests of both. It's because of the lack of competition between them that has prompted the Competition Commission

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