While the proposed Judicial Review of the LNS decision is to be welcomed it is a position that is fraught with legal difficulties such as the capacity to raise the proceedings, potential time bars and all sorts of other arguments.
It would be complete folly to base an argument here solely upon a judicial review of LNS as that would only leave one string to the bow.
Further, take the stated opinion or Mr Rod McKenzie that LNS only dealt with the issue of Player Registrations within the SPL/SPFL — and nothing else.
Any analysis of what is meant by that statement (and others made by Neil Doncaster) leads to the conclusion that there are other matters to be considered which were outwith the tight and narrow remit handed to LNS by the SPFL.
For me, the clearest consideration is this.
1. Craig Whyte has already been personally convicted by the SFA for deliberately failing to pay taxes as and when they fall due under article 5.1 of the SFA rules.
2. No such charge has ever been levied against RFC — just against their CEO.
3. Not only did RFC fail to pay taxes as and when they became due under Whyte’s watch, they deliberately failed to pay taxes for a 13 year period under the stewardship of Sir David Murray. They did this by deliberately entering into two unlawful tax aggressive tax avoidance schemes which even their advisers warned them could only be undertaken at considerable risk to the club as the schemes were never guaranteed to be successful.
4. Those schemes were entered into so that the club could buy players they would otherwise not have afforded.
5. In furtherance of those schemes, RFC chose to deliberately withhold the full details of their contractual arrangements with both players and managers from both the SFA and the SPL when submitting their applications to play under licence and in terms of the rules of both organisations.
6. In each of the years concerned, RFC had to apply for both domestic and European Licences to play football, and it is the granting of these licences which allows any football club to play in structured competition organised under the auspices of, or with the approval of, the SFA or UEFA.
7. Each and every licence application as submitted to the SFA in the knowledge that key financial and contractual information had been excluded in furtherance of tax avoidance purposes, and tax, which has since been declared to be legitimately due and payable from 1999 onwards, was unpaid and remains unpaid.
8. The above processes and procedures are no different, and indeed are considerably worse, breaches of article 5.1 under which Whyte was personally convicted and fined.
9. Further, as part of the HMRC investigations into the use of unlawful tax schemes, RFC deliberately lied to HMRC, SFA and SPL about the existence of side letters and other contractual documentation. This is particularly so in relation to the annual application for a playing licence.
On 20th May 2011, HMRC, in relation to one of the tax schemes, wrote to RFC and accused the club of “deliberate and fraudulent” behaviour in relation to the continued submission of false PAYE and NIC returns over a period of years.
10. It, therefore, follows that each and every application for a football licence made by RFC to the SFA from 2000 onwards (at least) was based on falsified financial, contractual and tax information and was designed to mislead the SFA with a view to persuading them to grant a licence on misrepresented grounds.
11. Not only is the above a breach of article 5.1 of the SFA handbook, but any licence obtained by misrepresentation has not been validly obtained as it has been obtained by way of false representation and deception.
12. It is a pre-requisite of entry into any league competition that the participating club holds a valid licence to play football.
13. In the event that a club did not or should not have held/hold a valid licence to play, that same club is not free to enter structured competition or register players to participate in such competition. It also follows that any declaration of a result of 0-3 in relation to any particular game as a result of a rule breach (such as fielding an ineligible player) is of no consequence because the club concerned was not eligible to participate at all.
14. The Court of Arbitration for Sport has already been invited by UEFA to hold that any application for a licence or any other compliance submission, which is devoid of all necessary financial and contractual information should be treated as null and void and as never having been received.
15. The same Court has also held that any title, championship, award, record, reward or other benefit which has been gained as a result of an improper or prohibited process should not be allowed to stand, the records of the award etc should be expunged and the sporting records corrected accordingly.
None of the above is dependent on a successful review of LNS but goes hand in hand with that process.
In the forthcoming review of Scottish Football recently announced by the SPFL, in conjunction with the SFA, all of the above should be under consideration.
LNS, under review, may determine that the players were in fact not eligible, but much more fundamental is the fact that there are clear facts and circumstances which should mean that the club itself was never eligible in terms of established legal jurisprudence.
As had been pointed out by Rod McKenzie, none of this has been considered by the SPFL as all matters concerning a licence are solely under the jurisdiction of the SFA.
Thus far, the SFA have taken no action against RFC or any of its officials as a result of the clubs involvement in, and cover up of, the Big Tax Case or the Wee Tax Case – both of which will be the subject of the forthcoming review demanded by Celtic and others.
easyJamboAugust 8, 2017 at 23:22
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My take is that those running and connected to DAFC were appalled by what they found when the lifted the bonnet after Mastertons departure.
As for CQN- I’m not connected to them or even Celtic “minded” but I doubt they are firing blanks.
wottpiAugust 8, 2017 at 23:03
‘..The current Pars Board clearly have taken the moral high ground …’
__________________
With the greatest respect, I disagree.
(Leave aside the allleged match-fixing episode.You’re probably right in thinking that there is likely to be little concrete evidence for that)
It is not ‘taking the high moral ground’ for a club to urge us to treat the cheating of SDM’s Rangers FC as being no more importance than the ‘ordinary’ business failure of club.
Indeed, the readiness to condone such heinous offences as a decade’s worth of tax- and football-cheating is pretty far removed from ‘taking the high moral ground’
Further, indeed, the immediate and ready defence of that cheating might conceivably suggest that Mc Arthur wants to move on for reasons less to do with ‘forgive and forget’than with concerns that matters other than the tax and football cheating associated with the wee and Big tax cases, and which might directy touch on his club’s history, might be in the spotlight.
The monstrous wrong done by SDM to and by RFC and Scottish Football governance must be addressed and dealt with, not defended or condoned.
The current DAFC board are probably fine upstanding gents – I have no knowledge of them whatsoever. We do know, however, that previous board member Gavin Masterton was on the inside of some supremely dodgy dealings in the past whilst a director at DAFC.
There are aspects of their statement today that range from fairly decent (acknowledging some of the mistakes of previous DAFC boards) to bizarre (what is with the date?) to the absolutely infuriating (lets all move on and not deal with any past misdeeds).
Given all of the shenanigans we have seen so far in this saga, you are going to have to forgive me if I put on my cynical hat and ask the question – why would DAFC want to keep a lid on past misdeeds involving Rangers?
I have no knowledge of the nuclear material or whatever it is being called at the moment.
But if it does point to some dark misdeed by a previous DAFC board or board member, or other senior employee, is there not a danger for them of at least further damage to reputation and possibly further sanctions if it can be shown that they were involved in something as serious as e.g. match rigging?
Are DAFC the same club post-administration?
Do they have the protection of a 5-way agreement?
Are the SMSM going to wait for scraps to fall from their succulent lamb dinners?
Hmmm. Not quite in the same position as the dignified lot on the southside of Glasgow then, eh?
If the CQN story is correct, and you have to say that they have put a lot of credibility on the line for it, and there is indeed an SFA investigation on-going, then we are in for further interesting times…
Peter Lawell’s recent move to the SFA could be viewed slightly differently tonight as well. Mibbee.
Scottish Fitba – whit a soap opera!
ZilchAugust 8, 2017 at 23:57
The current DAFC board are probably fine upstanding gents – I have no knowledge of them whatsoever. We do know, however, that previous board member Gavin Masterton was on the inside of some supremely dodgy dealings in the past whilst a director at DAFC.
££££££££££££££££££££££££££££££££££££££££££££££££££££££££££££££
I sincerely believe that Gavins biggest dodgy dealings were during the time he led the Bank of Rangers (Scotland) Plc. Before leaving HBOS he feathered his own nest with shareholders money and interest free loans (interest free for 35 years !!).
Who knows what really went on in that tight little business world in Edinburgh Toon when both HBOS and RBS almost bankrupted Britain, never mind Scotchlandshire. Ian Fraser the respected financial “reporter” has a few words to say on this.
Any chance we can get him to write a blog on here to help us join the dots to the business and football corruption that blights this country.
JOHN CLARKAUGUST 8, 2017 at 23:40
Sorry but I can’t’ get worked up over this one.
The Pars have stated they brought the game into disrepute by failing to pay taxes and going into Admin.
While it may have been nice to see it in clear language, the implication is the Rangers similarly brought the game into disrepute and then some.
This implication is a strong as anything I have seen from countless other clubs.
As for the Big Lie they are morally no better or worse than the other 40 clubs who have remained silent to date.
Bigger beasts could have said more. Turnbull Hutton of another smallish Fife club spoke out but at the end of the day, when he needed it, the bigger clubs shat it.
I am more concerned over the lack of action and moral fibre from Celtic, Hearts, the Don’s and Hibs than the Pars.
Ah yes Bogs Dollox, the Bank of Rangers. A very good point!
The cynical hat is putting all sorts of thoughts into motion tonight.
For example, wasn’t it telling that one of the Bunnet’s first moves was to remove Celtic’s business from the Bank of Rangers?
You know what would be really incendiary? What might actually cause Armageddon for Scottish Football?
If it turned out that the Bank of Rangers, operated by Masterton in potential connivance with SDM, did indeed use its financial clout to rig the game in Scotland.
Imagine for one second how furious you would be if it transpired that SDM had been able to bully your club into selling your star player, thereby scuppering your chances of winning trophies.
I reckon that fury would be firmly directed at any board members that were complicit in such rigging of the game.
Man, if I was a director at a club that had that in its dirty laundry I sure as hell would not want it hung out in the daylight.
I might be tempted to keep absolutely schtum, even when my paying customers were demanding to see me take action when the Supreme Court made it clear SDM cheated.
If speaking out was going to destroy my own club as the resulting revelations were so embarassing, yup, I could see why I might just retreat into the board room and hope like hell it all passed over without any reveleations coming back to haunt me.
Because we all know that supporting a football club is not a rational action. It is a visceral, tribal thing. We pour ourselves into the identity of our clubs and we expect them to reflect our deals and our ambitions.
If it transpires that not only are they taking the cowards road now, but that they did so at SDMs behest for years – I reckon there’s a lot of football fans are going to burn their season tickets and find something better to do.
The deafening silence is worrying.
What are they hiding?
How much faith do you have in your board / previous boards?
I have a soft spot for the Pars – it goes way back to my childhood – I want nothing but the best for them.
Masterton was a dodgy dealer that dragged them into the mire. I want to see them succeed and prosper.
But I want to see them do so playing a game that is fair and on the level (as it were).
If my own team was complicit in any of this then I want to know and I want it dealt with under the rules.
No exceptions. None.
The thing that must be keep some folk awake at night (other than us mad bloggers), is the thought that it only takes one mistake, one e-mail, one recorded conversation, one tax return etc and the whole sordid works could be exposed and laid bare.
Who knows if the evidence currently in play is the loaded gun or not? Not me. However, I am increasingly convinced that there is a web of deceit waiting to be fully uncovered and that doing so will prove to be acutely embarassing for a large number of people in our sport.
This final revelation, should it eventually happen, has the potential to be Armageddon for those proven to be cheats and deceivers.
Tick Tock…
easyJamboAugust 8, 2017 at 23:22
http://kerrydalestreet.co.uk/single/?p=30492924&t=9124931 A bit more info.
http://etims.net/?p=11803 perhaps explains the above in terms of process.
(Res12 update)
ZilchAugust 9, 2017 at 00:45
Ah yes Bogs Dollox, the Bank of Rangers. A very good point!
The cynical hat is putting all sorts of thoughts into motion tonight.
For example, wasn’t it telling that one of the Bunnet’s first moves was to remove Celtic’s business from the Bank of Rangers?
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I thought this bit was widely known. According to my source it was common knowledge in Edinburgh that BOS back in the day did not employ many catholics except by mistake (this was the 80’s up to the 90’s). I also thought that via Masterton, Murray had the Bank put the squeeze on a badly run Celtic at the time. That much isn’t standard paranioa.
BOS was a basket case in a regulatory sense well before the crash in 2008. Their risky “off balance sheet” investments in commercial property were with the great and the rich whose surnames had the letters M, G and H and Uberior. Ask the auditors at the time how they perceived the risk.
Auldheid August 9, 2017 at 00:57
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Thanks for the links. I’d actually read the Etims article earlier yesterday, and the Kerrydale post very much reiterates my view of where we are.
ALLYJAMBOAUGUST 8, 2017 at 21:58
I’ve found this elsewhere and put it up for the benefit of those not on twitter. Upthehoops might note the amended date.
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I did indeed notice it A.J. The original date of 20th August was not an easy mistake to make. 7th or 9th of August I could understand, and many of us have made similar mistakes. The 20th was very strange though.
I am not close to the action on this but I do know CQN is a very reputable site, and is not run by stupid people. It has many fine, knowledgeable and intelligent contributors. I imagine any e-mails and tapes ‘seized’ by the SFA will not be the only copies around. Unsurprisingly the go to hack for Dunfermline was Keith Jackson, who has yet to utter a single word on the Supreme Court decision.
The most nauseating part for me was the Dunfermline Chairman saying he would ‘explain’ in the Ibrox boardroom. He seems to feel bad about his club not payng tax, while they maintain it was okay for theirs not to do so. Perhaps he should have a long hard think about that before doffing his cap to them.
His West of Scotland point scoring comments do him no favours either. There is only one guilty party – he should learn to live with that.
why would the SFA launch a probe in the first place, the SFA would not be on this this fast.Look at how long they take doing anything they usually have a meeting to set a date to have a meeting.And the DR is not shy in getting in on it.
All very quick from SFA, Dunfermline and the record. Yet very slow at other matters.All very strange
wottpiAugust 8, 2017 at 23:03
Sorry to say it guys but, at present and without further evidence, we are getting our knickers in a twist over nowt and looking rather foolish for it.The current Pars Board clearly have taken the moral high ground with regard to their own club by admitting they have had problems in the past but are trying to rebuild in the correct fashion.They seem an honest hard working bunch and if they had info on match fixing, that presumably would/could only have been arranged via Masterton and Murray, do you not think they would want to bring it to the fore so as to wholly distance themselves from the previous regime?While it doesn’t suit our agenda, given what they have gone through I fully understand why the folk in charge don’t give a fig about what other clubs are doing, or even the state of the footballing authorities. Their business plan and objectives will be focused on developing Dunfermline. That is what will probably be taking up most of their waking hours.It doesn’t make those in charge at Dunfermline bad people, just folk with differing views and priorities from people on here. Like I said earlier, until the ‘nuclear’ evidence comes to the fore I would advise severe caution and the fans best hope for justice is a level headed approach to try and get a JR, as opposed to getting carried away about back of the taxi cab rumours and gossip.
____________________________
WOTTPI,
Would you be happy if Ann Budge issued a similar statement on behalf of Hearts, mentioning the review of the Rangers Tax Case, then going on to state that Hearts can’t comment on it because we ended up in a similar situation? Would you accept it as OK for her to so blatantly suggest that Hearts’ shame somehow equates to Rangers’ cheating?
It appears to me that this statement has been issued as a reaction to the CQN ‘revelation’ of yesterday, but it barely tackles that matter, at all. In fact, anyone unfamiliar with yesterday’s ‘news’ might be forgiven for thinking that Dunfermline had decided to issue a statement written by Level5, such is the disconnect from anything other than the ‘administration’ of both clubs. Not only that, he, the chairman, seems reluctant to mention that Rangers have been found guilty, by the highest court in the land, of tax avoidance (cheating) by only referring to it as a ‘review’ of the tax case. It’s as if he just doesn’t fully understand the issue that the supporters of his own club have been writing to him about.
I can fully understand why the Dunfermline chairman might feel it necessary to issue a statement on yesterday’s rather sensationalist news to distance themselves from a very serious, unspoken, accusation. But not only has he not done this, he’s, instead, issued a statement designed to be more pleasing to TRFC supporters than the Pars fans.
Anyway, the anger/annoyance/incredulity that so many are expressing over this statement has nothing to do with Calderwoodgate, it is the fact that it conflates what happened at Dunfermline AFC (it’s administration) with the EBT use, administration and liquidation of Rangers! In that vein, it is much more supportive of Rangers (IL) than it is of Dunfermline!
Oh, and isn’t that a nice wee boost for our game’s governors at the end of the statement! I’m sure we can all agree that they are doing a fine job to promote our game
wottpiAugust 9, 2017 at 00:30
‘.While it may have been nice to see it in clear language, the implication is the Rangers similarly brought the game into disrepute and then some.
__________
McArthur quite clearly minimises, and wishes to minimise, the enormity of RFC’s ‘crime’ by suggesting that it is no worse than DAFC’s fall (no matter how shamed McArthur may feel about that) into Administration.
Grant you, he is making at least that level of criticism , which is rather more than any other club (except perhaps Celtic who have after all asked for a ‘review’).
But the attempt to ‘rehabilitate’ the dead RFC by minimising the evil it perpetrated is wholly misguided, and simply will not wash.
If cheating on the scale of Murray’s had been in the context of a poker game on a steamboat on the Mississipi, the cheater would have been gunned down in seconds and his worthless carcase thrown to the ‘gators. No post-mortem ‘rehab’ would have been considered.
And unlike gambling on a Mississipi steamboat ( or some cruddy ‘casino’ in Vegas) Scottish football was founded on principles of fair play and honesty and trust.
The likes of McArthur ( and there would seem to be not a few among his fellow football club owners/directors) would seem to wish to gloss over the deep betrayal of those principles by SDM and by the Football Authorities.
They must not be allowed to succeed.
Taking a holistic view, one that (with apologies to the current Dunfermline chairman) puts its energies into looking back, as well as forwards, Dunfermline is actually an interesting case study.
If memory serves they entered administration in 2012-13 and the points deduction was sufficient to relegate them (yes Rod, proper relegation) from what we now call the championship to Div 1.
In 2013-14 in Div 1 they of course met a club of sorts
coming the other way. (If you think I’m being malicious by the way google the Daily Record article confirming the administration in 2013. Amazing how “the Club” can get into such financial difficulties!). Resultingly they could only come second, cocked up the play off against Cowdenbeath(?) and indeed in 2014-15 didn’t even reach that level.
One has to wonder in that situation if a liquidation Ctrl+Alt+Del was not a more viable and cheaper alternative? I wonder if there’s a reason they didn’t go down that route? If for no other reason than it would have avoided the blue pound juggernaut going in the other direction. It might in fact be the case that catching said pound was the reason they went down the route they did, ironically then costing them another two years in the same division!
Any pars to clarify/comment?
Fergus didn’t move from BoS as a retaliatory measure either. Simply got a better deal from the Co.
“I can also confirm that there was never at any time, reference to former managers, other clubs or previous matches – this is totally spurious.”
Is the above quote just a little bit out-with the general vein of the statement? It’s like an add-on.
Still surprised that others are still surprised that elements of the Dunfermline statement are towing the party line.
All 42 SPFL clubs and the SFA are currently singing to the same hymn sheet.
In that they are aided by the SMSM, who apart from the odd bit of teasing here and there go along with the party line.
It really is that simple.
Regardless of what you think your own club may be doing (or not as seems obviously to be the case) behind the scenes, it is simply a case of those fans who have an interest in such matters versus the footballing authorities and clubs.
Even given the recent SC ruling it is clear that the authorities and clubs won’t change their view unless some form of JR or other outside mechanism slaps them about the face and tells them to sort it out.
Smugas @09.57 9 Aug wrote, “One has to wonder in that situation if a liquidation Ctrl+Alt+Del was not a more viable and cheaper alternative? I wonder if there’s a reason they didn’t go down that route? If for no other reason than it would have avoided the blue pound juggernaut going in the other direction. It might in fact be the case that catching said pound was the reason they went down the route they did, ironically then costing them another two years in the same division!”
If I understand you correctly, you ask why Dunfermline exited administration via a CVA rather than opting for liquidation. I venture that the reason is very simple and not at all what you suggest as possible.
A CVA (even one in which creditors received 0p in the £) allowed the Pars to continue as the same club with its history intact. Liquidation would have ended the club. There was no reason to suppose a new club would have played senior football. In fact, there was no guarantee a new club would have formed.
The CVA allowed the Pars to survive. That is all that mattered!
Smugas, I hope you will withdraw your implication.
wottpiAugust 9, 2017 at 11:05
.
All 42 SPFL clubs and the SFA are currently singing to the same hymn sheet.
In that they are aided by the SMSM, who apart from the odd bit of teasing here and there go along with the party line.
It really is that simple.
Regardless of what you think your own club may be doing (or not as seems obviously to be the case) behind the scenes, it is simply a case of those fans who have an interest in such matters versus the footballing authorities and clubs.
Even given the recent SC ruling it is clear that the authorities and clubs won’t change their view unless some form of JR or other outside mechanism slaps them about the face and tells them to sort it out.
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Agree 100% WOTTI.
The clubs clearly want to move on (yes all of them!). Money, skeletons in cupboards, the 5WA and probably other reasons.
Fans? Not ENOUGH of them (of any club) care ENOUGH to put pressure on them.
Will we get what is being referred to as a JR? I certainly hope so if that is possible and I would gladly subscribe to a funding appeal if one was to be made.
At this point in time my glass is more than half empty about justice ever being done and seen to be done.
Whatever their reasons for doing so,Celtic did publicly call for a review.
A small and embarrassing (for the rest of the clubs) fact that should’nt be whitewashed over.
I haven’t posted on here for some time. I’m a Hamilton Accies fan of some 36 years standing. I contacted chairman Les Gray in 2012 and told him that I would stay away from games at NDP if he decided to lobby for New Rangers to be placed in the Championship. He did, he would explain to fans later he was under immense pressure from Accies sponsors to do so. I kept my word, kind of, only going to one game that season – a Scottish Cup quarter final against Falkirk, which we managed to mess up in typical Accies cup fashion. To get my fix of football I had a pleasant season visiting grounds of clubs who had voted to make New Rangers start in the fourth tier – Albion Rovers, Alloa, Clyde, Stenhousemuir, Stirling Albion, East Stirlingshire. I actually witnessed one of the best games of football I’d ever seen, an amazing 4-4 draw between Albion Rovers and Stenny, featuring two of the best goals I’ve ever seen!
Fast Forward to this summer and I’m one of the first in the queue for the incredibly cheap season tickets – only £180 (no discount for pensioners though, those old bastards get enough apparently!). Then the Supreme Court judgement happens. Brilliant! Oh, oh, seems the SPFL board, now featuring Mr Gray, have no appetite to see justice done and strip the biggest sporting cheats this country has ever seen of the honours they won from 1999-2010. Shite! I write to Les Gray enclosing my newly purchased season ticket. I keep it fairly brief but make it clear exactly why I’m taking this stance. No reply as yet, almost two weeks later, but I didn’t anticipate one. I feel like walking away from Scottish football completely. All the clubs are complicit so there will be no repeat of 12/13 for me. One more empty seat at NDP will make little difference but it’s all I can do. I would love to see empty stands up and down the land when New Rangers come calling – 400 at Accies, 1500 at Dens, 5000 at Hibs – that would send out a message that couldn’t be ignored. But it won’t happen. More power to those setting up a Judicial Review, I will contribute to any crowd funding. We need to see The Asterisk Years. Then we can move on.
While I’m on, I see some comment again about the infamous (to some) Rangers-Dunfermline game in 2003. I watched this game live on TV. Dunfermline actually played pretty well for at least 45 minutes. Jason Dair scored a screamer to, I think, equalise. Rangers ran over the top of them in the final thirty minutes. I respect Chris Sutton very much now as a pundit but he went down in my estimation that day with his “lying down” comments. His team had just won by four goals away from home while Rangers had won by five goals at home. Nobody was suggesting Killie laid down, just as nobody would seriously suggest they would lie down in a cup to lose five goals to Celtic Reserves last night. When the Old Firm (sorry!) get the bit between their teeth in those situations, they can be unstoppable. Like in 1985/86 at Love Street. I once saw Accies lose 0-8 at home to Celtic. No lying down. It was 0-0 after 25 minutes then Celtic went up a gear and we were completely overran. We one the return 2-0 though. Typically I missed that one!
I do not know anything about what happened to Dunfermline with regards their administration, however in a general sense the important thing about exiting administration via a CVA is that it can only be done with the agreement of the people you owe the money to. They might not like it but they can either accept it or reject it.
In Rangers’ case the people they owed the money to did not agree they could exit via that method, so the only option was the liquidation of the club.
We should also consider, as a separate issue, that Rangers were involved in aggressive, unlawful, tax avoidance which cost the UK taxpayers tens of millions of pounds. This has been proven in the highest Court in the UK. It is unequivocal.
We should also consider, as a separate issue, that Rangers were involved in cheating in football terms, by concealing players contracts from the SFA. They were found guilty of this and fined £250,000. I believe the term “just short of match fixing” or something similar was used.
The notion that other people could also have stolen money and lied to the authorities so there was no sporting disadvantage is just silly.
I am therefore at a loss to understand why a Chairman would suggest that his own club had been as bad as Rangers and as such he didn’t really want to speak out against them. Does he really just want to insult his own club and it’s support.
BOBFERRISAUGUST 9, 2017 at 12:24 ……. I write to Les Gray enclosing my newly purchased season ticket. I keep it fairly brief but make it clear exactly why I’m taking this stance. No reply as yet, almost two weeks later, but I didn’t anticipate one. I feel like walking away from Scottish football completely. All the clubs are complicit so there will be no repeat of 12/13 for me. One more empty seat at NDP will make little difference but it’s all I can do….
…More power to those setting up a Judicial Review, I will contribute to any crowd funding. We need to see The Asterisk Years. Then we can move on……..
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Your post really hits a nerve Bob.
If the supermarkets or banks treated customers or shareholders the way most clubs, The SFA, The SPFL etc treat us their stakeholders there would be uproar.
Les Gray isn’t worthy of fans like you.
We the stakeholders in Scottish Football need to tell them what is acceptable to us and will probably have to fight politically for a code of conduct that is imposed on them from above.
Scottish Football needs more Bob Ferrises
HomunculusAugust 9, 2017 at 12:56
I am therefore at a loss to understand why a Chairman would suggest that his own club had been as bad as Rangers and as such he didn’t really want to speak out against them. Does he really just want to insult his own club and it’s support.
________________________________
Exactly, Homunculus. I wonder if any of our members would act in a similar fashion if they were to find themselves at the centre of some conspiracy claims.
Would they choose to remain silent?
Would they give an outright denial of the conspiracy, and leave it at that?
Or would they issue a statement that barely mentions this conspiracy and, instead, concentrate on excusing the other party to the supposed conspiracy, saying they are, themselves, just as bad as the other party with regards to something more or less unrelated to the immediate problem, especially when, in reality, there is no comparison between the actions of the two bodies?
The only excuse I can find, or mitigation, for the release of this statement is that the chairman felt under pressure from what was released yesterday, and panicked into a badly worded, rushed and ill thought out statement he would rather not to have needed to make.
Re: DAFC story.
It seems that there could be two possible motivations for how this is unravelling ;
1) It’s a squirrel.
Very quickly of the back of crazy bears’ claims to recognise ‘World War’ league titles being widely reported in the SMSM, we have the current mocking of the this ‘DAFC Conspiracy’.
From what I have seen so far in the SMSM, the reporting seems to be getting a bit farcical, to perhaps totally p!ss off footy fans, and to encourage them mibbees to just focus on the football, and ‘move on’?
Who would generate this squirrel,
and how could CQN be taken in ?
Who benefits ?
Seems a bit far fetched, IMO, as I’m sure CQN must have received info on plenty of other squirrels in recent years.
2) There is a fundamental truth to the story – but could be difficult to prove ?
For CQN to be relatively bullish about the story ‘developing’, you would think they must be fairly confident about their sources and quality of the info.
So, mibbees they are playing that old trick, when you feed just enough rope…
The SMSM / DR / club[s] / ‘SFA sources’ are publicly ridiculing the story…and then CQN drops the bomb to make them all look foolish – and outright fibbers – in a very public manner ?
I’m thinking that co-operation from an ex-DAFC player involved in that game – and who has provided a detailed statement – could be the smoking gun ?
Not too sure what to really think, but would have preferred it if we could get the JR position clarified first.
This DAFC story could have been kept on the back-burner for a while longer – you would think ?
I’m beginning to think that Masterton might be key to unravelling this Gordian knot . Apart from David Murray , who was at the time small-fry , I would imagine that the great and good of the Scottish Establishment would also have benefited from BoS largesse wrt loans and other acts, and are happy that there is no investihation . More to this than football, in my opinion . Who’s in charge of that institution now, and can we ask questions ?
Does anyone know if Doncaster has actually met with any fans groups yet like he promised to do?
As a complete neutral, I hope D Utd win tonight. They are too big to be out of our considerations. C’mon the terrors.
Good evening
I’ll start with a little story, told my an ex-neighbour or ours in Fife, many years ago. Bill was a Glaswegian, a south-sider, and used to go and see the Spiders at Hampden. In those days, the home fans were allowed on the terraces, and Bill had his regular spot, beside another, older guy. They knew nothing of each other, they just watched the football. Of course, life moves on, and Bill’s career took him away from Glasgow, first to Fife and then to the North of England. Trips to the football became rarer and certainly there was no likelihood of travelling back to Glasgow. Decades passed before one Saturday afternoon Bill found himself at a loose end in the vicinity and took himself along to the old stadium for the first time in years. He found his old spot on the terracing, and there was his old buddy. No words were exchanged – no “where have you been all these years?”, no “it’s yourself, how are you?” – they simply nodded at each other, and watched the football.
I used to be an avid reader of this site (and its predecessor). I logged in every day (often more than once), I once attended a Tax Tribunal where I had the pleasure of meeting a couple of posters (Finloch, and John Clark before he lost his “e”, I think). I even posted on occasion, though sometimes my views seemed unwelcome. However, I got bored, looked at the site less and less, and eventually drifted away. I don’t think I had been on for years until yesterday. If you don’t mind me saying, little seems to have changed.
This morning I wondered if I would wake up to nuclear war. Yesterday, I woke up to something more apocalyptic – allegations of match-fixing, and thinly (very) veiled accusations against my own club, the Pars.
I remember the dark days, before administration, during and after. Sometimes it was like a car-crash in slow motion. You knew what was coming, but you were powerless to do anything about it. I remember long, solitary walks wondering if I would still have a club to support, and what I would do then. After 40 odd years, their absence would leave an enormous gap in my life. It was like an impending death in the family. That trip to Kirkcaldy – would that be our last ever game?
But the fans rallied round, raised money, and somehow, some way, managed to save the club. It wasn’t easy – I attended the EGM where the CVA was agreed and where fans and local businesses willingly wrote off large sums of money. Others invested even more – money that might have been destined for their retirement or their families went in the pot. Success wasn’t assured – we were seconds away from death, when Lord Woolman made his judgement. Oh my, I have tears in my eyes just thinking about it – it was like a match-saving penalty in the 8th minute of stoppage time. (And to answer the question – did we ever consider going down the liquidation route? No, not for a second. If we were liquidated, that was it. No way would we be afforded the same latitude as others. Maybe a new club would be started – maybe in the juniors, maybe the East of Scotland league – maybe not.)
We survived. But we never forget that we spent money we did not have, and taxes due went unpaid. Now I know all businesses live on credit at some point, and that cash flow issues have caused many a good business to fold. Where do you draw the line between bad luck, bad management, bad advice and bad faith? I’m not going to attempt to answer that now, but I know that there is a strong feeling that our behaviour was disgraceful, and shameful, and embarrassing. We should never forget that.
The new board adopted a policy of not commenting on the affairs of other clubs, and I respect that. They wish to keep a relatively low profile and concentrate on their club. Don’t forget that many will have other lives to lead and families and other businesses that are being neglected as they devote their time to putting the club back on a stable footing. We are only part way along the road to redemption. And their policy is not a new policy, by the way; two or three years ago I asked the previous chairman if they believed they should get more involved in the governing bodies and received a consistent answer.
Yesterday I wanted my club to make a statement, Ross McArthur did that on its behalf. (By the way, no need for an apostrophe in “its” there). I do not believe he equated our problems with those of others, but merely drew parallels. He explained the board’s position, explained the background to his statement and attempted to rebut some of the more lurid allegations that saw light (again) yesterday. I think that is a satisfactory and welcome response and what I was looking for. Some other responses to his statement have been out of order however, and cannot be helpful.
The Hamilton Accies V Aberdeen job is a little bit more Difficult. Hamilton’s development of youth players id very commendable. BUT…. I played in the Beach Ballroom below Pittodrie and I feel connected. C’mon the Sheep!
Rangers V Dumfermline, what can I say? After all the allegations of match fixings, I hope it is a noscore draw and the ref is sent off for match fixing.
Finally, Ross County V Mudderwell. ( My Lanarkshire buddies!)
But really Ross County what do you bring to the game? Weather?
No Thanks! Ya big teuchtars.
Jimbo, with love
UPTHEHOOPSAUGUST 9, 2017 at 18:45 7 Votes
Does anyone know if Doncaster has actually met with any fans groups yet like he promised to do?
———————-
I’m still waiting on the date for independent review concerning the way in which Scottish football’s authorities have dealt with non-payment of tax by clubs.
Oh! And what punishment was given to the ibrox club for fan running onto pitch and objects thrown at celtic players at the TRFC v celtic game at ibrox last season.
Maybe they have still to arrange a meeting to have a meeting
Someone has pressed the ‘nuclear’ button (not Trump!) – Sevco have an away cup-tie ?????
I’m a regular reader of this site and occasionally comment. I’m a Pars fan.
Ross McArthur is a Pars fan, as are all of the people on the board of Dunfermline Athletic. Almost all of the people working at the club are volunteers. The club is run as a Community Interest Company and lives within its means. The current set up at Dunfermline Athletic could well be the ideal set up for provincial clubs in Scotland. When Dunfermline Athletic nearly died, I donated all of my life savings (a fairly small amount) to help to keep the club alive.
I would like Ross and the club to be more vocal about governance of the game. However, I totally understand their decision to focus on getting our house in order and keeping it in order. There was no love lost during the process of wresting control of the club away from Gavin Masterton. Dunfermline Athletic was hours away from liquidation, but was saved. Gavin Masterton nearly killed us.
The statement that Ross made acknowledges that the previous regime brought the game into disrepute by the way in which they ran the club. Other clubs in Scotland have been close to oblivion. Some have died. Not many have been as open about how shameful the actions of their predecessors were. The Pars have just been beaten 6-0 by a team where the previous board are back in charge of a new club. The contrast between the two clubs could not be clearer.
When you parse the statement made by Ross, please look at it from the perspective of a fan who fought to keep his club alive and is now working tirelessly, on a voluntary basis, to rebuild its reputation through actions and not words. Dunfermline Athletic is solvent and fan funded, with fans involved in the decision making at all levels. This is still the very beginning of the story of the rehabilitation of Dunfermline Athletic, but it’s a story that’s worth a look, if you believe that the future of the game in Scotland needs to have fans at the centre.
Two posts on one night. Suddenly I’m prolific!
I noticed that “Five men have appeared in court to face criminal charges relating to the deaths of 96 people at Hillsborough, more than 28 years after the disaster.”
A lesson in the value of persistence in the face of dishonesty, corruption and establishment cover ups.
CAUSALUDENDIAUGUST 9, 2017 at 21:55
————-
As close to home as you could get for an away tie
Over 10yrs ago I was a street hawker, selling fish from a van. I used to sell fish to a guy in a quiet wee Fife village just outside of Dunfermline. He told me at that time that a certain Mr Masterton would be the architect of DAFC’s destruction. At the time I was reliant upon the normal media channels (‘MSM’ is a term that irks me) and had no idea how to look for my own information (if blogs were even available then?). But this guy was passionate and he knew, even back then that Masterton was a ne’er do well.
On a different day (actually two days a week), in a completely different part of Fife, I would see a die-hard Rangers fan. He was ‘in the know’ and always had exclusives and a lot of his narratives turned out to be amazingly accurate. I’ve wondered a few times in the last couple of years whether he continued his affection onto Sevco, but comfort myself in not having the van anymore as more likely than not he will be a continuationist and that would have led to unbelievable conflict. Back to my point on this guy, he told me way back when that Jimmy Calderwood would be the Rangers manager as that was why he was brought back from Holland.
To be truthful, the way I remember it, it seemed every man and his dug knew that Calderwood was brought back to Scotland as a step towards Ibrox. However, when I asked the question of a man closer to the Ibrox action than most as to the reasons for this being a false dawn, the response I got was along the lines of ‘have you seen the perma-tanned idiot on the TV?’ It seemed his grasp and mangling of the English language did for him for the Ibrox hotseat.
Whilst reading about the pars i found this wee story interesting
“Playing career Ian McCall was born in Dumfries, Scotland. In his boyhood, he was a regular on the Palmerston terraces watching Queen of the South. His hopes of playing for his home town club were dashed, though, by then chairman Willie Harkness.Managerial careerHis spell at Clydebank took place against the backdrop of an abortive scheme to relocate the club to Dublin.
In 17 games in charge at Morton, McCall achieved five wins and 9 defeats.
This was followed by a move to Airdrieonians. Airdrie challenged for promotion to the Scottish Premier League before the club’s extinction in 2002, making McCall the last manager in the club’s history. McCall won 23 of his 65 games in charge.”
Airdrie extinction and clubs history…did Airdrie not have an engine room?
HomunculusAugust 9, 2017 at 12:56
” I do not know anything about what happened to Dunfermline with regards their administration, however in a general sense the important thing about exiting administration via a CVA is that it can only be done with the agreement of the people you owe the money to. They might not like it but they can either accept it or reject it.
As i understand it in business the reason your creditors are allowed to hit you with a winding up order is that you will not be in business again using that name and you will definetly be barred from being a director for a considerable period of time. What happened to Dunfermline and hearts and Livingston and others was they exited without been wound up, Rangers did not and you cannot buy from a winding up order history, you can buy assetts and trinkets but the name and business goes to protect the creditors been laughed at, humiliated or totally ripped off with no recourse. Rangers died and Dunfermline and others did not, in my earlier post Airdrie died killed by creditors, David Murray, ironic aint it.
I don’t have anything on Calderwood’s potential move to Rangers or the corruption that (may have) supported that, though ‘perma-tanned idiot’ is a good one. My own personal experience is just that he was an a*se.
My son played under-10s through under-12s for the Norrie McCathies, a team set up and managed by ex-DAFC player Graeme Robertson in memory of the deceased club captain. When Jim Leishman was manager at DAFC, he was a strong supporter of the boys as he knew and worked with Graeme (Graeme still called him Gaffer).
Calderwood had no interest whatsoever. Only once did Graeme get him to do something – he attended the boys’ Christmas party one year (held at East End park, so no big hardship!) and handed presents to each boy (provided by parents, not DAFC, just to be clear). Calderwood struggled even to smile and say Merry Christmas. Graeme then asked him to give a short speech to the boys – you know the “You’re doing well. Stick in, work hard and some of you might make it” sort of meaningless nonsense. In front of those boys and parents, Calderwood out loud refused to say anything to encourage those boys to do their best and push themselves for the sport they loved.
I never rated him after that.
With Jimmy Calderwood being such an inarticulate, over-tanned, buffoon, I wondered why it was that he got so many TV gigs, it’s not as though his team was Rangers
, like so many of the current mob of ‘Rangers protectionists’ that the BBC, in particular, think we should all listen to and allow to help form the narrative of Scottish football.
Having read Causaludeni’s earlier post, it may well be that his sinecure with the media was at the behest (rather like the ‘recommendation’ that got Calderwood his Dunfermline gig) of his prospective employer in Govan. An extension, perhaps, of his managerial audition to ensure he was able to handle the media side of the ‘biggest job in football’!
Assertive headline in today’s DR;
“I’ll make Rangers a selling club reveals new Ibrox director of football Mark Allen.”
Erm…has nobody told him that TRFC is already a selling club…?
Was the Arsenal shares that belonged to the Rangers Football Club 1873 purchased in the assetts sale from the company or the club. Known fact EUFA does not allow a club to have shares in another club although a company may have shares if it is a company like Sports Direct was.
EUFA allowed this club Rangers to have shares in another club Arsenal because they were purchased and some given later as a thank you and done as a goodwill gesture, but the shares nevertheless belonged to the club or EUFA would have no objection and SFA would not have had to let EUFA know of the arrangement.
So when Rangers were liquidated did Charles Green get to buy the shares and if so how can this be possible if the claim is made of two entities, the shares belonged to Rangers Football Club, so who owns the shares. Rangers Football Club 1873 incorporated and liquidated 2012.
McCaig`s TowerAugust 9, 2017 at 19:23
Good evening I’ll start with a little story, told my an ex-neighbour or ours in Fife, many years ago. Bill was a Glaswegian, a south-sider, and used to go and see the Spiders at Hampden. In those days, the home fans were allowed on the terraces, and Bill had his regular spot, beside another, older guy. They knew nothing of each other, they just watched the football. Of course, life moves on, and Bill’s career took him away from Glasgow, first to Fife and then to the North of England. Trips to the football became rarer and certainly there was no likelihood of travelling back to Glasgow. Decades passed before one Saturday afternoon Bill found himself at a loose end in the vicinity and took himself along to the old stadium for the first time in years. He found his old spot on the terracing, and there was his old buddy. No words were exchanged – no “where have you been all these years?”, no “it’s yourself, how are you?” – they simply nodded at each other, and watched the football. I used to be an avid reader of this site (and its predecessor). I logged in every day (often more than once), I once attended a Tax Tribunal where I had the pleasure of meeting a couple of posters (Finloch, and John Clark before he lost his “e”, I think). I even posted on occasion, though sometimes my views seemed unwelcome. However, I got bored, looked at the site less and less, and eventually drifted away. I don’t think I had been on for years until yesterday. If you don’t mind me saying, little seems to have changed. This morning I wondered if I would wake up to nuclear war. Yesterday, I woke up to something more apocalyptic – allegations of match-fixing, and thinly (very) veiled accusations against my own club, the Pars. I remember the dark days, before administration, during and after. Sometimes it was like a car-crash in slow motion. You knew what was coming, but you were powerless to do anything about it. I remember long, solitary walks wondering if I would still have a club to support, and what I would do then. After 40 odd years, their absence would leave an enormous gap in my life. It was like an impending death in the family. That trip to Kirkcaldy – would that be our last ever game? But the fans rallied round, raised money, and somehow, some way, managed to save the club. It wasn’t easy – I attended the EGM where the CVA was agreed and where fans and local businesses willingly wrote off large sums of money. Others invested even more – money that might have been destined for their retirement or their families went in the pot. Success wasn’t assured – we were seconds away from death, when Lord Woolman made his judgement. Oh my, I have tears in my eyes just thinking about it – it was like a match-saving penalty in the 8th minute of stoppage time. (And to answer the question – did we ever consider going down the liquidation route? No, not for a second. If we were liquidated, that was it. No way would we be afforded the same latitude as others. Maybe a new club would be started – maybe in the juniors, maybe the East of Scotland league – maybe not.) We survived. But we never forget that we spent money we did not have, and taxes due went unpaid. Now I know all businesses live on credit at some point, and that cash flow issues have caused many a good business to fold. Where do you draw the line between bad luck, bad management, bad advice and bad faith? I’m not going to attempt to answer that now, but I know that there is a strong feeling that our behaviour was disgraceful, and shameful, and embarrassing. We should never forget that. The new board adopted a policy of not commenting on the affairs of other clubs, and I respect that. They wish to keep a relatively low profile and concentrate on their club. Don’t forget that many will have other lives to lead and families and other businesses that are being neglected as they devote their time to putting the club back on a stable footing. We are only part way along the road to redemption. And their policy is not a new policy, by the way; two or three years ago I asked the previous chairman if they believed they should get more involved in the governing bodies and received a consistent answer. Yesterday I wanted my club to make a statement, Ross McArthur did that on its behalf. (By the way, no need for an apostrophe in “its” there). I do not believe he equated our problems with those of others, but merely drew parallels. He explained the board’s position, explained the background to his statement and attempted to rebut some of the more lurid allegations that saw light (again) yesterday. I think that is a satisfactory and welcome response and what I was looking for. Some other responses to his statement have been out of order however, and cannot be helpful.
__________________________
Hi MT,
Nice to see you back posting with such a well constructed post in defence of your club’s chairman.
I have to admit to being one of his statement’s biggest critics, not because I disagreed with him defending the conspiracy claims aimed at his club, but because he seemed to be comparing the Rangers Tax Case with his club’s own fall into administration.
If we ignore Masterton’s connections to Murray, and at this stage we cannot know for sure how dodgy they may, or may not, have been, and look only at the two clubs’ fall from grace into insolvency, we can see how Ross McArthur can be justified in saying his club should not comment on the other’s profligacy, or matters surrounding what caused Rangers own particular demise; but, by mentioning the Rangers Tax Case, then moving seamlessly into DAFC’s insolvency, he seemed to conflate the two.
On re-reading, however, I can see that he, perhaps, didn’t mean that, though could have made it clearer that he was (I presume) only meaning that his club wasn’t in a position to comment, critically, on any other club’s failings/shameful actions. In fact, I think it was a mistake to even mention the ‘Rangers Tax Case’, at all, and he’d have served his club, and more importantly, the supporters, better by sticking to the recent accusations (something I think the ‘club’ itself would be innocent of, even if there were any shenanigans between the three men at the centre of the claims, for, if anything has gone on, such as match fixing, Dunfermline AFC would have been victims too – at least in my opinion).
One last thing, MT. We, or rather our clubs, share a rather unwelcome bond of shame, one we have to accept as the cost of striving for an unachievable success, but we, and our clubs, should never use that as an excuse to renege on our duty to call out those who would commit far greater wrongs, indeed lawbreaking! If our clubs cannot call such wrongdoers out, then I think silence would be better than offering succour to those wrongdoers with statements equating failure with unlawful acts!
BigBoab, the MBB had already sold them and anything else that wasn’t nailed down.
BigBoab:-
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/football/teams/rangers/9098640/Craig-Whyte-sold-Rangers-historic-shareholding-in-Arsenal-to-Alisher-Usmanov.html
https://www.theguardian.com/football/2012/feb/24/rangers-ally-mccoist-shares-arsenal
Extract from DR / Darren Cooney piece today about how money was ruining football.
[My highlighting.]
“…
The greed machines of UEFA and FIFA must act. That may well be a fanciful notion given the latter awarded a World Cup to Qatar, a state that has appalling human rights. And all in the name of the mighty dollar.
But football’s governing bodies have a duty to act or the game will be a bogey.
Try broadcasting that on Sky.”
==============================
An SMSM sports ‘journalist’ demanding action – from others – to protect the game ?!
And by “governing bodies” I presume he means “except the SFA and SPFL”
ALLYJAMBOAUGUST 10, 2017 at 15:58
===============================
For me the worst part of the Dunfermline Chairman’s statement was the almost apologetic tone he adopted towards the Rangers board, and how he would ‘explain’ things to them. From his statement he clearly believes his own football club not paying its bills and taxes is something to be ashamed of. Why then even bother with men who have yet to show any signs of shame over the financial carnage their club inflicted on society.
Reserve Goalies.
I’ve often thought what it must be like for a professional player to sit on the bench for weeks on end. I know they get paid wages I could only dream of. But on many courses I have been on, when asked, what is the satisfaction from your job, it’s rarely money.
I thought this was touching from Logan Bailly – but it applies to a lot of goalies:
“He said: “I knew from the off it wouldn’t be easy. To be a regular over there, it was a big challenge, and I’m the one who wanted it.. When you receive an offer from a club like Celtic, obviously you don’t hesitate, and I didn’t.“That, no one can take it away from me. Few footballers can say they spent two years in that kind of club, winning trophies along the way. Until my dying day, I will be happy to have been there. Even when you’re not on the pitch, Celtic remains a brand known around the world.”
Describing his two years with Celtic in Glasgow as ‘incredible’, Bailly loved every bit of his time there, and won’t let anyone take his medals away from him, even if he didn’t play all that much: “We win together and we lose together.”
Now to get to the point.!
SFM reserve Goalies:
Auldheid – 1 star
Easy Jambo – 2 stars
John Clark(e) – 3 stars.
Btw, this is on fitness skills omly, not literreary competence.
I love Alan Archibald’s words:
“He added: “So we need to make sure we are at our best and we are aggressive in the right way, that’s making tackles not being silly but making sure we don’t stand off them too much and play our own game”
Hope that is how the Jags play it. Seeing as at is them, I’ll settle for to beat them with a single goal. 7.45pm
Auldheid @Auldheid 39s40 seconds ago MoreDelinquent, Deceitful, Dishonest and Disingenuous. Our SFA.
http://kerrydalestreet.co.uk/single/?p=30495626&t=9124931 …
McCaig`s TowerAugust 9, 2017 at 19:23
‘….I once attended a Tax Tribunal where I had the pleasure of meeting a couple of posters (Finloch, and John Clark before he lost his “e”, I think).’.
___________
So you did, McCaig’s Tower, and I well remember the occasion. (There were one or two other SFM posters-I think Aj might have been one?)
And I see from Aj’s post this afternoon[ Allyjambo August 10, 2017 at 15:58 ] that he says what I was going to say late last night but got diverted by a famiy matter:
a) that was a superb post of yours and reading it was quite an emotional experience, and actually drove home to me the real damage done by SDM’s cheating, in that it will be a long time before we can learn to trust out football administrators again
b) that McArthur’s statement would have been fine as a defence of his own club, against not so much actual allegations as mere insinuations of misdeeds done by a former DAFC board.
It was his apparent readiness to defend the cheating of RFC that irritated me.
He seemed to be equating RFC’s ruthless and long-term cheating with the much less serious fault of ‘going into administration’ committed by a former DAFC board
Indeed, in confessing his shame at the fact that DAFC went into Administration and apologising for that, he seemed also to be saying ” We at DAFC are ashamed, but we have tholed our assizes and are getting things restored, so please let us and Rangers who, like us, went into Administration, get on with things, and let us all move on ”
I have no idea why he thought to include that and I was exasperated enough to be provoked into wondering why he felt it necessary to mention them at all particularly as he himself said that his interest is the affairs of DAFC, and not the affairs of other clubs!
Not for all the world would I wish to cause unwarranted offence to any DAFC supporter by getting things wrong, and if I have misinterpreted what McArthur was trying to say, I am heartily sorry for it.
But maybe he should get someone to read over his ‘statements’ with the degree of care that the statement of any club these days gets read with.
Maybe see you at a Judicial Review………?
Valentines Clown was there too McCaig’s Tower and others too.
We are all RTC.
http://www.heraldscotland.com/sport/football/15465142.Survey_finds_football_to_be_least_honest_sport/
This survey was mentioned on the radio today and although it relates to the UK as a whole, rather than Scotland specifically, it’s a sad indictment on the governance of the game that so many fans believe football to be utterly corrupt.
STEVIEBCAUGUST 10, 2017 at 15:10 17 Votes
Assertive headline in today’s DR;
“I’ll make Rangers a selling club reveals new Ibrox director of football Mark Allen.”
Erm…has nobody told him that TRFC is already a selling club…?
————————
Nobody told him we heard all this before?
Rangers Int F.C. PLCBusiness Review and Strategic Plan Update
RNS Number : 5425FRangers Int. Football Club PLC25 April 2014
https://www.investegate.co.uk/rangers-int-f-c–plc–rfc-/rns/business-review-and-strategic-plan-update/201404251100045425F/
Strengthen the Club’s Football Operations – With the creation of the new position of Chief Football Operations Officer, with specific responsibility for developing best in class football operations support. This new role will support the Football Manager and the Board and will concentrate initially on developing player talent identification, scouting and recruitment capability.
Develop Player Asset Management – Developing playing talent is one of the major challenges at any football club. The Chief Football Operations Officer will also have the remit to develop the Club’s player asset strategy which will build a long term structure and plan to deliver playing talent for the Club and maximize value from player trading
Earlier this evening as Mrs C and I were having the (the everyday!) discussion about what we should/could/can-what’s in the fridge? have for dinner, an excited voice came over the Radio Scotland airwaves telling us [ I can’t quote the actual words used] that Peter Lawwell might be on his way to being elected as chairman of the European Club Association(ECA)
It appears that Karl-Heinz Rummennigge , the current Chairman of the ECA ,is not standing for re-election.
And the ..seholes at Radio Scotland think that because Lawwell is in there as a representative of Celtic ( Celtic being an ‘ordinary member’ of the ECA) he could conceivably be elected.
Well, or lawwell, of course he could-as could several dozens of ‘ordinary members’!Including a rep from the other Scottish ‘ordinary member’-Aberdeen!
Now, I have great grievance against that Association.
And I felt constrained to air that grievance, as I sat here. ( comfortably fed: we went for chicken, peppers and onions on creme-fraiched tortillas, with a crust or two of garlic bread, washed down with a nice wee Orvieto Classico- peasant fare, but delicious!!!)
I aired that grievance by writing to Karl-Heinz Rummennigge.
This is what I wrote. I will print it out tomorrow, and send it snail mail.
‘
Mr Karl-Heinz Rummennigge,
Chairman,
European Club Association,
Route de St-Cergus 9
1260 Nyon,
Switzerland
Dear Mr Rummennigge,
I learned today that you are not going to stand for re-election as Chairman of the European Club Association (ECA)
Before you demit office, I feel obliged to remark that under your Chairmanship a great act of sporting deception and dishonesty perpetrated by a national football association was accepted and ‘authorised’ by the ECA.
This occurred when the Scottish Football Association (SFA) instituted and perpetrated the untruth that a new club,founded in 2012, which they had admitted into membership of the SFA as a new club, was the same club as the club known as Rangers Football Club, founded in 1872.
You will be aware of the facts, but I will summarise them:
Rangers Football Club was founded in 1872.
In more modern times it ran into debt over a number of years.
In 2011 faced the prospect of a huge tax bill running into many millions of pounds.
The owner eventually sold the club.
The new owner ran the club into Administration.
The Administrators could not find a buyer.
They tried to get the creditors to reach a Company Voluntary Agreement, so that the club could be saved, and brought out of Administration.
No buyer was forthcoming.
So the Administrators sold some of the assets to a newly set up company-SevcoScotland Ltd.
This company applied for admission, as a new club,to the then Scottish Premier League (SPL).Their application was rejected.
They applied for admission into the First Division of the then Scottish Football League (SFL).That application failed.
They applied for admission to the Second Division of the SFL. That application,too, was rejected.
Finally, they were admitted as a new club to the Third Division of the SFL, under the name “The Rangers Football Club Ltd”(“TRFC”)
Being thus a member now of a recognised Football League, they became entitled to membership of the SFA.
[Meanwhile, Rangers Football Club ( founded in 1872 and now’ in Administration’) was renamed as Rangers 2012 plc, and sank into Liquidation in 2012, where it still is, awaiting the final dissolution]
Under commercial law and usage and under the ordinary rules of the SFA and the SPL/SFL, “The Rangers Football Club Ltd”, founded in 2012, is not, cannot possibly be, the very same football club as the still-existing Rangers Football Club( In Liquidation)
This means, of course, that “The Rangers Football Club Ltd” is not, cannot be, and could not possibly have been, a ‘founding member’ of the ECA.
It was Rangers Football Club founded in 1872 that had the honour of being a ‘founder member’.
The decision that the ECA arrived at , namely, that TRFC should be regarded as the same club as the founding member was and is therefore perverse, and contrary to fact and law and sporting truth.
And is (actually)an insult to the memory of a club whose long history came to a dead stop on Liquidation!
TRFC is not entitled to be regarded as a ‘founder member’ of ECA
And is therefore, now that it is in the SPL, obliged to seek membership of the ECA , as a new applicant.
Those are the facts.
Facts that under your Chairmanship of the ECA were clearly swept aside for very base reasons.
Regrettably and regretfully, I have to say that your thrillingly superb achievements as a footballer are not enough to absolve you, as Chairman of the ECA, from blame in the ‘crime’ of allowing the SFA to get away with what many of us regard as a monstrous lie, of which the full consequences for Scottish Football are yet to be fully felt.
Nevertheless, on a personal level, I thank you for the pleasure you footballing skills gave me, and on that account, I wish you well’
Yours sincerely
FinlochAugust 10, 2017 at 21:24
‘…Valentines Clown was there too McCaig’s Tower and others too.
We are all RTC.’
_________
Yes.
There was a kind of leap of faith involved in declaring ourselves as pursuers of truth!
I can’t be sure, of course, but there was a chap there among us who spoke to me, who didn’t volunteer his name or his blog name.
And I have often wondered since whether he might have been ‘RTC the person’.
I like to think so, and I shall at this very moment 11. 58 pm raise my auld pensioner’s wee dram of Asda £16 per litre Bell’s to salute RTC… and SFM.
(Bugger, it’s now midnight plus one!)
Get tae bed John ?
I see that JJ claims to have been ‘liaising’ with Charles Green about the five way agreement.
I’ll make no comment about fantasy or delusion, as that would require speculation on my part, but I can’t help but notice that JJ states that Charles Green signed the five way agreement. Considering that JJ has consistently reported as fact that Green didn’t sign the agreement, it is inexplicable that no apology or explanation is given for getting his facts wrong and doing a complete u-turn.
SFA ready to attempt a cover-up to protect cronies
Hard hitting article from Paul67 on CQN
http://www.celticquicknews.co.uk/sfa-ready-to-attempt-a-cover-up-to-protect-cronies/
So Darryl (I am the SFA) Broadfoot has been brought back to help out!
Hi all,
I like many others have become impatient for movement against the cheating years. However, as time passes, I am totally convinced that the Government and the Banking Establishment, will not allow the wrongs to be righted.
Any Politician who sticks there nose into this mess, know full well that that the wrath, which will descend on them, means that votes will be lost. Therefore, rather than do anything to restore Justice and Integrity to Scottish Football, they will ignore doing what is morally right as they are all cowards!
The real Sevco fans who I believe are in the majority, are also scared, to take on wrongdoers.
We all know why this continues in Scotland as no one has the courage to take on, and defeat, the cancer killing our game.
It is embarrassing to hear the hatred and bigotry, is it not time in 2017, to say enough is enough?
How do we change? Scrap the current SPL and SFA leadership, and somehow bring democracy back into the game. Stop the embarrassing chants, not by arresting people, but deducting points! This will have to be governed by honest, and reasonable people, certainly not those who are in place currently!
Fear is what is damaging our game! Fear of telling Sevco fans, yes you really are a new club! Fear of deducting points, each and every time the bigoted songbook is heard, by any side!
I try to remain optimistic that the guys, who are far more knowledgeable than myself, can succeed in the courtrooms.
2017, hopefully this will be the year that the FEAR is overcome?
FinlochAugust 10, 2017 at 21:24
Valentines Clown was there too McCaig’s Tower and others too.
—————— ——————————————–
Ah back in the day. I was also at High Court watching Craig Whyte’s (pathetic trial) on a few occasions and witnessed Mr Murray (in his first stages of Dementia). It was strange how many things he could not remember of which I can recall and I am no spring chicken.
From Jimbo above (Paul Brennan blog)
When you have prima facie evidence of a governance issue, presented by your own league, involving your own past-president, you are obliged to open up to independent analysis. Failure to “promote and protect ethical standards and good governance” put the Scottish Football Association in breach of their duty as a member association of Uefa.
Fans will not accept anything less; clubs will not accept anything less. The matter will go to Uefa. It will go to government. It will go to media in England and beyond. It will go to court; those turning their heads today will be called to account. It cannot and will not be accepted. It will not go away.
There will be no cover-up to protect the guilty.
————————————–
I believe if this actually got covered correctly in the English media it would make a massive difference, but it would have to be reported by someone like Mr Alex Thomson (again) and then we would have an audience who would show more interest than a large percentage of our population. This is IMO the lack of smsm reporting this story correctly (always one sided to protect this Ibrox club). If you are not on social media then you may not be aware of the other side of this story. As mentioned above it cannot go away as it was cheating that was simply off the radar. I want all heads to roll regardless of who they are. I want all trophies to be taken away from the history of the old Rangers and I want it to be known and accepted by all smsm, SFA, and SPFL that the team playing at Ibrox are a new club, which I have accepted as it is the truth of the matter.
Scotland is what it is and any club playing out of Ibrox has always been protected ( as an example, for close to 100 years they as a club openly discriminated against one religion to the extent of not signing a player of that religion till 1986. Just think about that, what country in the world or FA would allow this). Now is the time to make changes, we have to and we all need to want this as it is the only way we can call our game a sport. Who would we not want this, we all know the answer to that, but they are a minority, we have the power. Fan power is an absolute force and we have to be listened to. I love my football and I only want it to be a fair sport, not much to ask for unless sadly your football is played in Scotland.
JimmyBeeJayAugust 11, 2017 at 13:12
‘…Any Politician who sticks there nose into this mess, know full well that that the wrath, which will descend on them, means that votes will be lost”
____________
Our wee Scottish government is insistent on ignoring the huge volume of public dissatisfaction with the idiotic ” Offensive behaviour at Football”, while turning deaf ears and blind eyes to the truly offensive behaviour of our cheating Football Administrators!
A jaw dropping piece from the dude who masquerades as the rangers* blogger in the record http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/sport/football/football-news/rangers-can-put-down-marker-10968571
A piece that blatantly fails to acknowledge any wrong doing carried out in the 5 year old club he defends with vigour, his faux pas horror of the admittedly unacceptable behaviour of certain ‘fans’ among the Celtic, Aberdeen, Dundee Utd support is an exercise of abject futility when he utterly ignores the weekly hate fest that eminates from the stands down Govan way, along with the out and out bigotry, racism and homophobic utterances that pollute the site he feels honoured to be a member of beggars belief.
For the daily record to give this imbecile a platform to voice his hatred speaks volumes of their editorial staff, maybe I’m missing something here and it is just a big wind up, if that is the case I have turned into a grumpy old git way before my time.
Back in the late nineties I was working in Dublin. Great times! Used to get a lot of visitors coming over and had plenty of nights out with them in Temple Bar. Bit touristy for my liking normally, but definitely good craic.
One memorable night we were out on the town and we bumped into a small group of South Africans. Turned out it was a delegation of politicians from both the ANC and the Afrikaner National Party coming to Dublin to attend the Sinn Fein Ard Fheis. This was at the time of the Good Friday Agreement and there was a strong desire to learn from the South African experience of conflict resolution and specifically their Truth and Reconciliation process.
So I spent a very interesting hour or so chatting to these folks, including the National Party bloke who was clearly having to adapt very rapidly to massively changed circumstances.
What struck me most about the conversation was the importance that each of them placed on the process of revealing the truth, coming clean on what had been for many people a very dark period in their lives.
It was not a carte blanche for forgiveness. People had to participate in the process fully and to identify the damage done by their actions in order to move into the reconciliation phase.
To this day it remains one of the outstanding examples of an attempt at serious conflict resolution and one that could usefully be emulated in many areas of public life on these islands.
If we are going to resolve the problems that beset our sport and have done for at least fifteen years, we are going to have to engage in a process that recognises previous failings and and in some cases negligence and serious dishonesty. The calls for various types of review are effectively looking for that sort of transparency.
The people resisting these calls are the ones who have most to hide. They are the ones who took the bungs, the succulent lamb, the brogues, the blazers, the dodgy deals etc.
However, the truth WILL out.
Those resisting the process now should realise that we are at a point of no return.
If at this stage, when the cheating has been clearly identified by the Supreme Court, you decide to remain on the side of cover up and prevarication – then you have chosen your side and will have to abide by the consequences of that.
I mentioned earlier this week that there is a strong possibility that there are skeletons in closets for a whole lot of our clubs. That we know for certain that there were extremely dodgy characters operating at clubs outside of Ibrox.
I do not apologise for that, though I understand the anger and hurt that was subsequently expressed and wish there was a way to express this without causing such pain.
The truth is, we are all going to have to get used to the idea that some (all?) of our clubs have very dirty laundry, in some cases potentially far worse than failure to pay all creditors the full pound they owed.
If I find out that my club was complicit my reaction is not going to be to defend them. I will get stuck right into them. And they know it. They know that their fan base will not accept lying down to these cheats in any form.
The time for our clubs to get on board the process of uncovering the truth and moving towards a better future where our game is protected against the cheating of the past is right now.
Reconciliation is possible when previous damage is recognised and, where it is possible to do so, reparation is made. Yes – titles must be stripped if they were won by cheating.
Anyone who does not get on board now, and who is subsequently found to have cheated or helped cover up the cheating should be thrown to the dogs. Banned sine die for bringing the game into disrepute.
For some of them that should just be the start of their troubles.
ZILCH
AUGUST 11, 2017 at 17:49
…
Reconciliation is possible when previous damage is recognised and, where it is possible to do so, reparation is made. Yes – titles must be stripped if they were won by cheating.
…
==============================
Yes indeed ZILCH.
And it also begs the question: where would the Scottish game be currently – if it had been fortunate to have had a competent and honest SFA in place, over the last 20 years or so ?
We last qualified for a finals in 1998, and whilst fans’ expectations were low then, just to be involved was amazing – and playing Brazil in a WC will always be special.
With decent governance, would the national team have qualified for more finals since ’98 ?
Would our senior clubs be making more of an impact in Europe today ?
Mibbees aye, mibbees naw.
Whilst we can’t say for certainty where the game would be, IMO, one can assert that having an incompetent and corrupt SFA over the last 20+ years has definitely NOT helped to protect and develop the Scottish game – at all levels.
…to state the bleedin’ obvious.
We wouldn’t be a million miles from where we are now imho. The only real difference is that the fans of one club would have accepted some inescapable wee technicality re their old club but were glad the wider Scottish fanbase had more or less accepted their new one as the old one.
And I might have been looking forward to this weekend’s fixture with the kids. Instead I’m almost grudging them it.
StevieBCAugust 11, 2017 at 18:05
Yes indeed ZILCH.
And it also begs the question: where would the Scottish game be currently – if it had been fortunate to have had a competent and honest SFA in place, over the last 20 years or so ?
We last qualified for a finals in 1998, and whilst fans’ expectations were low then, just to be involved was amazing – and playing Brazil in a WC will always be special.
With decent governance, would the national team have qualified for more finals since ’98 ? Would our senior clubs be making more of an impact in Europe today ? Mibbees aye, mibbees naw.
Whilst we can’t say for certainty where the game would be, IMO, one can assert that having an incompetent and corrupt SFA over the last 20+ years has definitely NOT helped to protect and develop the Scottish game – at all levels.
…to state the bleedin’ obvious.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
With proper governance Rangers would not have been able to sign the Big Ticket players they did, thus forcing other clubs to try and compete by signing what they thought were better but more expensive players from overseas.
Lack of governance meant Scottish talent was pushed to the fringes as the money for development went to pay inflated wages. That in my opinion is why the national team continually fails.
Not enough money goes into youth development at the earliest stages – school football, youth football, etc. The SFA care only about the money and developing youth talent is seen as an unecessary cost (Bonuses have to be paid – Anyone know how much Reagan has received in bonuses since his installation?). How much do you have to pay the SFA to be in a position to be “qualified” to coach a youth team?
They say the coaching school at Largs is world class. Why? The Scottish team isn’t.
One final point and I know it is talked about on here a lot but why are the cabal of old failed dinosaurs allowed anywhere near a microphone.
Its like a Lodge meeting when “biscuits”, Dense Derek, Smiffy, Preston etc gang up to protect tried and failed cliches and the traditional Scotch approach to the game. Is this really the best we can expect for our licence fee?
Its’s just not the Dinos banter but their attitude to the game and hounding of new thinking (i.e Cathro). They were on his case from day one and roped in Baldy Boyd and others in the early days to what amounted to character assasination long before his coaching skills were put to the test.
ZilchAugust 11, 2017 at 17:49
The problem is facing the truth. Has been for a long time but was covered in March 2011(just 8 days before Rangers had accepted (on QC advice) they had done wrong and owed HMRC £2.8M.
http://celticunderground.net/nothing-to-see-here-timmy-move-on/
It seems that its only wrong if it can be proved and has no chance of being discounted if it goes to court.
Its the mind set of the Pharisees. Woe betide them.
Not trying to play the man here, Jimbo but wis ye at the game tonight , ? What is the relevance of pro-IRA songs wrt Partick Thistle ? What did we do to deserve that shite ? Playing up for the cameras were they, the Celtic fans ? And the wee boys with the smoke thingies ? And CFC fans have the cheek to complain about TRFC fans ?
On a football level, your mob didn’t get out of second gear , and yet again , we were lucky to get the nothing . And the refereeing was appalling for both teams . I still think we should be awarding the contract to professionals from respected leagues outwith Scotland.
And well done for your team’s performance and victory – unfortunately away from Parkhead, a lot of your fans are abysmal, same as the other cheek , and impact negatively on the match experience for what I would term, normal people . I could expand and post videos , but the behaviour of some of your younger fans was reprehensible, and I say that as someone who has a daughter and many family members who are CFC season ticket holders Nae hard feelings at all .
PADDY MALARKEYAUGUST 12, 2017 at 01:07
Why do CFC not do anything about the disgraceful behaviour of our away support, surely in this day and age when tickets are sold it is not beyond their ken to be able to identify these half wits, what do our English based players think when they hear this nonsense coming from the support. I feel that the buses that are run to these games must also take a harder line on the singing of songs that in no way represent the majority of fans that refrain from such nonsense.
I have grandparents who were involved in both the uprising and the following civil war and I can assure you these halfwits have no idea what it was all about if they think that spouting this baloney makes them patriotic or for that matter a better supporter, they are sadly misled, this was a time of bravery, sacrafice, grief and loss that my forefathers found hard to talk about and rarely did and for these idiots to use their cause to sully the name of the team I love troubles me greatly.
The club was set up not as a political weapon but as a charitable organisation to help the needy regardless of creed or colour, let’s have some respect and keep it that way.