Small Price to Pay?

I think there has been an appreciable shift of opinion amongst fans of TRFC recently.

 

Unlike the ‘invest: speculate to accumulate’ rhetoric featured in the press and by ex-players, the ordinary fans are coming to the realisation that there is no quick fix. There are even murmurings that there may never be a fix which involves their club becoming a competitive force.

 

Poor management of fan expectations has long been an accusation levelled at the TRFC board by SFM. It is possible though that many fans are beginning to manage their own expectations rather better. There are certainly justifiable criticisms of the manager, Mark Warburton, but alongside that is a realism about the limitations and constraints that he is working under.

 

There is a rather misguided, and possibly not accurate assumption that another liquidation for a team out of Ibrox would result in having to start ‘yet again’ in the bottom division; but in fact there is a growing acceptance that consolidation in the top league is a much better solution than gambling on huge borrowing simply to stop Celtic adding more notches to the goalpost.

 

Could it be that the fans are about to do the job that the board haven’t had the balls to do –accept the gap between themselves and (at least) Celtic, and settle for mediocrity on the field as a short term price to pay for continuity?

 

During the 1990s, in the middle of the Murray/BoS fuelled spending spree, and with Celtic in the doldrums, it seemed to many Celtic fans that their club would never be able to bridge that gap. Of course they did, but at the emotional cost of losing the exclusive 9IAR record.

 

TRFC now find themselves in pretty much the same position, but their road to bridging the current gap is a more difficult one.

 

There are similarities of course. Like the Celtic of the 90s, Rangers have major infrastructure challenges to meet. Celtic had a stadium to build, Rangers have Ibrox (and Auchenhowie) to fix and improve. Both required massive investment to improve the team, although I would argue that Rangers have a steeper hill to climb in that area.

 

Unlike RFC of the 90s, Celtic’s accrued wealth has nothing to do with an intravenous hook-up between their bank account and the chairman’s pals at the bank. Their baseline advantage over the current Rangers predicament is a combination of a stadium which holds 10,000 more fans than Ibrox, no debt, a burgeoning cash balance and the current inflow of European cash.

The Euro cash and the cash balance could be depleted, but the 10,000 extra seats won’t.

 

It also seems difficult to imagine how TRFC can obtain seed capital – even if they were inclined to gamble – given the combination of barriers to achieving that;

 

  • They have a PLC with no stock market listing
  • They have NO executive directors on the PLC board
  • The current chairman is a convicted criminal, convicted of offences involving money
  • The current chairman and vice-chairman are both directors of a previously liquidated club, and therefore associated with the financial mismanagement which brought that about.
  • In that climate, sponsorship deals are hard to come by. Major sponsors want to be associated with stability, success and integrity. TRFC don’t tick many boxes in that regard.
  • Banks do not lend to football clubs. Pre Murray/Masterton, football clubs were cash businesses with modest overdraft facilities to cover modest cash-flow peaks and troughs. The banks have returned to that model. 1987-2007 was the exception, not the norm.
  • They are at war with a powerful and substantial shareholder in Mike Ashley.
  • There is still litigation pending on more than one front which could even call into question the ownership of the club’s assets.
  • They are in debt already (estimated at around £15m).
  • The current onfield situation may require yet another write-off in terms of contracts.

Any one of those bullet points could be enough to derail any plan to get to the top. In combination, there may even be an existential question to answer.

That is why the fans are starting to look a lot smarter than the board, and ultimately the good sense of the fans may well help the board to find a way out of their current dilemma.

But even with realistic expectations from the supporters, is it possible that they can find a way? Is there for instance someone with a magic wand or bag of cash who could come in and turn it around? Perhaps, but who would risk money on a precarious venture like a football club when one of the most powerful businessmen in the country is in dispute with you?

 

In order for serious inward investment to happen;

  • Ashley has to be reconciled with the board (needs King and Murray to go).
  • The debt has to be written off .
  • The new investor(s) has to be given control of the club (and this would perhaps require another 75% special resolution where current shareholders would be asked to vote to dilute their own influence).
  • If they achieved that (and it is a pretty big if) the new investor cash would go into the club’s bank account – not used to pay off the debt –  and they would be free to pursue new and better sponsorship deals, improve the merchandising contract with an onside Ashley, and add new revenue streams.

Even then, any new board would need to see the infrastructure challenges as paramount. Having one eye squinting in the direction of Parkhead will blur the bigger picture.

Their priority should be to reduce the losses (whilst increasing wages for better players), fix the stadium and the training ground (both in need of repair and improvement), build a scouting and youth infrastructure, and free up a (relatively modest) wad of cash to improve the playing squad.

In defence of the current board, the challenges facing them are almost vertical in incline. No matter how skilful they are, nothing other than someone with a barrowload of cash and a very long term outlook can put any kind of fix in place.

£50m might buy the debt and equity, and repair the stadium, but progress requires on-field improvement. It also needs stability, and therefore Ashley’s cooperation. The price of that is the head of Dave King.

Rangers will bring in more at the gate than Aberdeen, Hearts or Hibs, but they have a considerably higher cost base than those clubs. With better players, recurring costs will be even higher – much higher.

To square this circle, however unpalatable it appears to be, peace has to be made with Ashley. That is the key to being able to embark upon a journey that has any chance of success. Otherwise, the clocks will have to be reset to 2022, and the end of the SD contract, before progress can be made.

However there is no chance it can go on that long. Rangers fans may be increasingly less demanding in what they expect, but they will need to see some signs – and not just words – that a plan is in place.

The board are getting ready to throw Mark Warburton to the hounds (the MSM lapdogs have already been armed with poison pens to effect that). This will buy them some time, but not enough.

 

We’ve said it before, and at the risk of sounding like a broken record, I’ll say it again;

 

For Rangers to have a fighting chance of competing at the top of football, King needs to be gone. If he does go, half of the barriers preventing the club raising cash are dismantled. 

So is King’s departure a price worth paying? If he really had Rangers in his heart, he would say ‘Yes’.

 

 

 

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John Cole

About Big Pink

Big Pink is John Cole; a former schoolteacher based in the West of Scotland, He is also a print and broadcast journalist who is engaged in the running of SFM . Former gigs include Newstalk 106, the Celtic View, and Channel67. A Celtic fan, he is also the voice of our podcast initiative.

1,627 thoughts on “Small Price to Pay?


  1. JOHN CLARK
    think you have the puppet bit spot on,but i have to wonder how mrray passed the sniff test considering he was a director of a club in liquidation


  2. HomunculusFebruary 25, 2017 at 13:05
    ‘….Maybe the lenders don’t actually want shares in the club after all. They would rather get their money back, now reality is seriously kicking in.’
    _________
    I rather fancy you may be right.
    The TRFCL folk were no doubt in a rage when their new club was not sweetly waltzed into the SPL, and probably had hard words to say to and about those who had quietly promised them that that would happen.
    But, I suppose, they reckoned ( as most people probably did) that TRFC would skite through the lower divisions, and emerge as serious challengers for European competition places this season, and begin to provide a decent return both ‘sporting-wise’ and ‘share-value wise’ by next season.
    Whatever about the possibility of TRFCL suffering an insolvency event, it looks likely that the hoped for access to European money might not be realised.
    Loyalty schmoyalty, once the idea grows that you’re chucking good money after bad( and getting precious few thanks for it) , common sense begins to assert itself. Lend another few million? Be taken for a mug by some useless toss-pot of a failed tax evader who cannot even lie convincingly?
    Even sensible, ordinary ,decent folk baulk at at that.
    Tack-sharp chancers in the world of business on the lookout for quick and easy money will be calculating that continuing to lend to such a shockingly bad ‘business’ as TRFCL is now more likely to cause them grief than to enrich them.


  3. OCNC or the Reality Rangers vs. Continuity Rangers.

    It matters as it represents the epitome of whether or not cheats are allowed to flourish in our game.

    They cheated, went bust and started again.

    I don’t need anyone else to agree with me for me to know they are not the same entity I endured previously.

    I very much want the relevant authorities to acknowledge this reality to a) make sure tax is collected from those that owe it, and b) no team is allowed to cheat the rest in the manner that the original Rangers clearly did.


  4. Definition : Club (inter alia)
    An association dedicated to a particular interest or activity
    An organization constituted to play matches in a particular sport
     
    An association (unincorporated entity/club.) has no legal status.
    A corporation (incorporated entity/club) has a legal status
     
    Incorporation is simply a change in legal status.
     
    I am now reliving my time at  Central College of Commerce and Distribution. Glasgow 1971 – 1974 14
     


  5. JOHN CLARK
    FEBRUARY 25, 2017 at 14:43
    ================================

    If they bought their shares at 20p*, and those shares went up in value to just half of what Celtic shares are currently trading at, then they would have doubled there money.

    Looked at that way it may actually have looked like a really good opportunity.

    Get re-listed and sell off quietly so as not to affect the price too much, job’s a good ‘un.

    *Rumour has it that by their actions the people who bought in, including King, may have been able to manipulate the price down to as low as 18p. I don’t know if that’s true.


  6. Just a thought…

    Apparently the English League Managers’ Association is involved in supporting Warburton’s issues with the Ibrox club…because he is a paid up member and is therefore afforded this weighty backing.

    So…

    with things still murky and unresolved WRT Warbs’ contractual entitlements, would the LMA strongly advise its members to keep well away from Ibrox until they are satisfied that Warbs has been paid up?
    An informal embargo on TRFC by the LMA.

    Ibrox could be effectively ‘barred’ from recruiting a current / ex English club manager, temporarily?
    I would also imagine McLeish is a member?

    Could be way off the mark here, but if the LMA is the managers’ ‘union’, then blacklisting is their ultimate big stick?


  7. SMUGASFEBRUARY 25, 2017 at 13:47 
    Said elsewhere that kings plan seems to have been to ride the succesful return wave, get as close to a presumably still dominant Celtic as possible, say as close as Aberdeen got this time last year and then quietly sell out at a profit before anyone really got s handle on the underlying finances.  A comfortable 2nd relative to 3rd (as opposed to this constant self harming comparison to 1st) would also hAve achieved it with a bit of luck but anything less coupled to a rediculously dominant Celtic and the wheels seriously come off his plan.  I agree I don’t think the shareholding is where the immediate action and battle lines are drawn.
       ——————————————————————————————————————————-
       I confess to being no businessman Smugs, but I can read quite well and understand what you are saying. However, this route is dependent on finding a buyer, either with money to burn, or with a new line in spivvery. Not 100% an impossible task, but how does DCK get his return?…After collapsing the share price it hasn’t picked up, so no real return there. 
       His only form of return that I can see, is to leave behind a couple of onerous contracts of his own. But where?…Everything to my knowledge is contracted to the hilt, (except possibly the I.P. outcome)
       I have thought long and hard about a way out for them, and even spending a pound less than they spend just doesn’t work IMO. Gate income would plummet. (On a plus side though, in a hunner years, they will have a hunner quid in the bank 06)
    but what would be on the park, and in what division? 
       I’m a believer that at the moment, at least a p in the £ deal gives at least some return to the lenders. They do not have the confidence to transfer it to 100% losses in shares. 
       A lot will come down to the “guarantees” provided to the auditors, and if they are legally enforceable. If not, was there any dishonesty involved in providing said guarantees, and what will be the auditors position regarding them. I assume their “disclaimer” in the accounts will be sound, but will they seek to enforce the guarantees.? Or possibly other board members take legal action? …I think that may be where they are heading…….Soon be March.


  8. It is now 15 days since the announcement by TRFC regarding the resignation of their first team manager and his associates which allegedly occurred 4 days prior.

    Now call me old fashioned but why have they not as yet got a new management team in place.  Given that in the weeks prior to MW’s mysterious departure there had been briefings against him by certain MSM scribes who spend their time doing little else than pushing the Rangers PR line of the day, you would expect succession plans to have at least been informally put together in the background.

    I find it striking that there does not seem to be any concerted PR in the MSM about the likely new manager.  For instance when Liverpool decided that things were not working out with Brendan Rodgers everyone new instantly that there was one, and only one preferred choice, namely Jurgen Klopp.

    In contrast the press speculation in the past two weeks re a new Rangers manager seems to follow a particular formula.  Out of work ex manager or currently in work manager is asked, “Would you consider it an honour to be offered the managers job at the world’s most successful football club (TWMSFC)” to which they respond politely, “Of course I’d take a call from TWMSFC, it would be very hard to turn down such an opportunity”. 

    To cover up this lack of progress there is talk of the first priority being to appoint a Director of Football who would then be in charge of the search for a manager.  Again, though I cannot see any clearly identified front runner.

    The whole situation speaks to division and chaos behind the scenes. 


  9. Corrupt official

    the answer is in the post two or three above whereby it is decreed that the Rangers share price could be half of celtics for no other reason than they’re just like Celtic aren’t they?

    thats not a dig at the author of that line by the way, it’s a view that I know exists and it demonstrates precisely the heart over head emotional investment that King presumably hoped to exploit.  

    Assuming he hoped to to get out of course.  But then for him to maintain the status quo he knew required funds.  Funds he clearly had no intention of providing “just” to be third.


  10. SMUGAS
    FEBRUARY 25, 2017 at 16:52
    ================================

    If you are referring to my post I used the figure merely to illustrate the point.

    Who would think that Rangers’ share price could not even reach half of Celtic’s. That being the case then investors at 20p or less would double their money when they sold on.


  11. I see there has been a couple of references to The Lawman.
    You do know that The Lawman is Steerpike? 
    Presumably the Law that he is a man of is Denis because it sure ain’t Scots.


  12. In short, whatever the plan was at Ibrox, or it might have been plans, with not everyone privy to everyone else’s, it is certain they are all flying by the seat of their pants now! 


  13. If Barry Ferguson leaves his current employment to manage Rangers does that mean he will end up writing a weekly column about Clyde?


  14. WOODSTEINFEBRUARY 25, 2017 at 14:52 
    Definition : Club (inter alia)An association dedicated to a particular interest or activityAn organization constituted to play matches in a particular sport An association (unincorporated entity/club.) has no legal status.A corporation (incorporated entity/club) has a legal status Incorporation is simply a change in legal status. I am now reliving my time at  Central College of Commerce and Distribution. Glasgow 1971 – 1974.
    —————————————————————————–
    I had been looking at definitions over the last few days because the OC/Nc debate was raging. The definitions above seemed most apt for the debate. So I concluded.

    A club is not an ethereal thing, it is an association. An association must involve people.

    Even though a club has no legal status and can be in a lot of forms it requires an association: that is two or more individuals.
    It follows that if a club has less than two members it is not a club anymore. Therefore clubs are not immortal and can come to an end.

    There is nothing to say that an association of people (club) cannot incorporate. An incorporated club is a Company.
    Rangers formed on 1872 and incorporated at a later date. It was an incorporated club ie company. The company (incorporated club) was put into liquidation in 2012.

    Charles Green bought the the assets of Rangers FC Ltd on failure of the CVA, not the debts therefore not the entire Company. People are not assets of a company, he didn’t and couldn’t buy them; some walked away as proof of this point.

    Sevco was formed by professionals with a view to acquiring the assets of Rangers FC Ltd. it had no members in common on formation with the existing club. The Administrators of the old club voted for the new club to be admitted to the SPL, if they are the same how can that happen ?

    Rangers FC Ltd and Sevco were not the same club. It was a marketing ploy (con) invented by Charles Green to fleece the gullible, it worked !

    Rangers Football club won a lot of major trophies but will win no more.

    The current club have some minor league titles and may win more.

     


  15. DenFebruary 25, 2017 at 21:16

    A good read, Den.

    ‘A club is not an ethereal thing, it is an association. An association must involve people.
    Even though a club has no legal status and can be in a lot of forms it requires an association: that is two or more individuals. It follows that if a club has less than two members it is not a club anymore. Therefore clubs are not immortal and can come to an end.’

    I’d been thinking along those lines myself the other day, but couldn’t think of a way to put it, or rather, hadn’t taken the time to find a definition of a club as Woodstein has done, but knew there had to be something in the FACT that a club is an association of PEOPLE, and cannot exist, in any other form.


  16. Den
    February 25, 2017 at 21:16
     
    ————————————————————————————————
    I agree
     
    as for the “OC/NC”   Presently,
     
    The Rangers Football Club Limited, SC425150,  Incorporated on 29th May 2012 as a new club,will  celebrate its 5th birthday this year.
     
    Rangers Football Club  SC004276 – Incorporated on 27 May 1899  at present is in liquidation and will in the near future cease to exist
     
    Or,  to rip off Monty Python:- 
     
    “Never mind that, my lad. I wish to complain about this parrot what I purchased not half an hour ago from this very boutique.
    Oh yes, the, uh, the Norwegian Blue…What’s,uh…What’s wrong with it?
    I’ll tell you what’s wrong with it, my lad. ‘E’s dead, that’s what’s wrong with it!
     No, no, ‘e’s uh,…he’s resting.
     Look, matey, I know a dead parrot when I see one, and I’m looking at one right now.” 15


  17. Everytime the Sevco caretaker is on the touchline he seems to hide inside his jacket. Is he working casual or something like the stewards?


  18. Sorry but again you’re not taking on board what appears to be the SFA’s arguement.  They do not claim any link between the member club (and again I highlight the little ‘c’) Rangers PLC and the new entrant member club Sevco Scotland Ltd.  incorporation, association and all the rest of it is spurious in this respect.  Think of a club with a little c as nothing more than a company that just happens to have the word club in the title.  What they are saying if I am to understand them properly is that whilst they each require a legal persona to be members they are members in so far as they are operating a football CCCCCClub (emphasis, not a sticky keypad, is mine).  We had all assumed that writing Rangers on the cup was a shorthand way of writing RFC PLC.  They now claim that “Rangers” was a separate entity, a Club as opposed to a club.

    but if that’s considered to be the case (and make no mistake I am it’s chief critic) then it does indeed render a Club immortal.  It has to.  But I repeat, I still don’t see how they could possibly argue that the on field success of the supposed Club was not underpinned by the off field success of the club.  And it turns getting ‘their’ name on a cup from an actual bona fide achievement into a billy big balls competition like who can order and consume the most expensive champagne.  It turns a beautiful game into a freak show complete with a ringmaster shouting roll up roll up.  


  19. The bold Bazza for TRFC manager?
    Shirley not?!
    Assistant at best to a highly experienced manager – possibly.

    …but IF true it would be desperate / cheap / sentimental / nuts / but the pressers would be  funny.

    And the Murray Park world class breakfast could soon be supplemented with kebabs and Monster Munch?

    (Shouldn’t gloat, too much.   15 )


  20. DenFebruary 25, 2017 at 21:16
    “……….It was a marketing ploy (con) invented by Charles Green to fleece the gullible, it worked !”
    __________
    Of course, Den, it ‘worked’ only because the Foootball authorities bought into it ,and fabricated a whole piece of nonsense about  SevsoScotland’ becoming the ‘new owners of The Rangers Football Club’, using the the fact that SevcoScotland were the owners of a new club first called  SevcoScotland which was renamed   ‘The Rangers Football Club Ltd’ in a childish, but malicious ,attempt to con people into believing that they were the ‘new owners’ of the 1872 club: which of course is manifestly not so.
    The sheer brazen effrontery of that attempt to deceive is still breathtaking, and as a ‘corporate’ cheating act it is far more significantly evil and wicked than anything any  former individual ‘Secretary of the SFA’  might have done in the relatively recent past in an abuse of his office.
    All the wordsmiths in the world, all the high falutin’ crap used in business and company speech, all the tortuous legal bumph, cannot change the truth that RFC of 1872 ceased to exist as a participating member of the Scotttish professional football community.
    The sooner those who manufactured, crafted, and continue to propagate  the Big Lie are called to account, the sooner our game can be restored to some semblance of Integrity.
    It is the perverse dishonesty of the guilty men in both the SFA and in TTRFC/RIFC that causes people to look for the collapse and disintegration of both of those entities.
    Just let the simple truth be acknowledged, and fences can be mended, the air cleared, and we can try to get on with enjoying our bloody games of football.


  21. Just in Ferguson btw he would strike me as a cheap attempt to try to bring some stoicism for the one game, the old firm.  Having seen Clyde this season that would appear far fetched and is hardly the long termism they say they need.


  22. While things are going well off the pitch, given the desire to play tica-taca, have lots of possession but do nothing up front and have a propensity to not win against teams below you are my Hearts (on the pitch) turning into the new new T”Rangers!! 🙁
    Certainly do not want Scottish football and Hearts in particular to play hoofball but given the way the league works re needing to take opportunities there is surely times in games or for certain matches when teams need to employ a more direct approach beyond continually passing sideways across the back 2 thirds of the park.
    Cathro  is probably right with regard to overestimating where Hearts are at present  but people also seem to underestimate that fit well trained players in other teams are all good enough footballers to do damage on the break or when opportunities present themselves. ICTs two goals on Friday night being a prime example.


  23. SMUGAS
    FEBRUARY 26, 2017 at 00:20
    I had dismissed the SFA argument as desperate drivel, made up for Lawyers tasked with defending the indefensible, and making laughing stocks of themselves
    Like yourself I am not in any way convinced. I have added in my comments.
    —————————————————————–
    Sorry but again you’re not taking on board what appears to be the SFA’s arguement.  They do not claim any link between the member club (and again I highlight the little ‘c’) Rangers PLC and the new entrant member club Sevco Scotland Ltd.
    ————————————————————–
    I am not taking it on board. We must be careful as we are getting a holy trinity thing going here; three clubs in one Club.
    ———————————————————
     incorporation, association and all the rest of it is spurious in this respect.  Think of a club with a little c as nothing more than a company that just happens to have the word club in the title.  What they are saying if I am to understand them properly is that whilst they each require a legal persona to be members they are members in so far as they are operating a football CCCCCClub (emphasis, not a sticky keypad, is mine).
    ———————————————————————————————————–The club is the club/ association (however constituted) in the definition provided by Woodstein.
    To my knowledge there is no definition of Club (apart from club with uppercase C), without some definition it can be anything or nothing. How is it manifest ?
    I believe that this Club has never been mentioned, far less defined, in the rules of any Scottish Football body.
    ————————————————————————————-
    They now claim that “Rangers” was a separate entity, a Club as opposed to a club.
    but if that’s considered to be the case (and make no mistake I am it’s chief critic) then it does indeed render a Club immortal.  It has to….
    —————————————————————————————-
    The separate entity/ Club is a fiction, neither mortal or immortal.

    If our authorities are wasting their time and ours in creating fiction, lying to us and insulting our intelligence it is time we were rid of them.

    We desperately need people in the game who will run it fairly and honestly otherwise the cynicism that has grown up around the game will lead to it’s death. 


  24. DenFebruary 26, 2017 at 11:44
    ‘…The separate entity/ Club is a fiction, ….’
    __________
    I heard with my own ears one of Her Majesty’s Counsel learned in the law make an arse of himself in open Court trying in effect to argue ( most un-lawyerally)  that a football club  can exist even when the clinical death of Liquidation has been pronounced, because although the body is dead , the spirit of the thing that’s dead lives on!!

    I could not believe my ears at the time that a QC’s best argument for ‘continuity Rangers’ was , basically, an appeal to the emotional attachment to RFC(IL) that so many people, quite understandably, have-and that, less acceptably, so many in BBC Radio Scotland and the SMSM generally  have allowed to turn them into apologists for the greatest act of Football corruption in Scottish Football history that took place when the 5-Way agreement was signed.
    RFC 1872  undoubtedly ‘lives on’ in the cherished memories of many of its supporters.
    But only in the same way that , say, Third Lanark lives on: as a relic of history.
    And those who deliberately try to subvert that truth are, essentially, telling lies for financial gain, or supporting those who do so or are incapable of ordinary everyday reasoning.


  25. JohnJames is stating as a fact that the Dundee Utd players have been told that they are going into administration on Monday. I really hope that he’s got this one badly wrong.


  26. NEEPHEID FEBRUARY 26, 2017 at 12:40

    JohnJames is stating as a fact that the Dundee Utd players have been told that they are going into administration on Monday. I really hope that he’s got this one badly wrong.

    Ah but who are they? The Club? The club? Or just the company?


  27. The SFA’s definition of a club is nonsense.
     
    Cambridge Dictionary
    noun
    uk /klʌb/ us /klʌb/
    club noun (GROUP)
    A2 [ C, + sing/pl verb ]
     an organization of people with a common purpose or interest, who meet regularly and take part in shared activities:
     
    For the Oxford law Dictionary.
    See the attachment above.


  28. neepheidFebruary 26, 2017 at 12:40
    “.. is stating as a fact that the Dundee Utd players have been told that they are going into administration on Monday. I really hope that he’s got this one badly wrong.”
    ________
    Well, think about it neepheid.
    Into Administration, a quick nod from the SPFL and SFA, go into Liquidation, shed your debt, and, hey presto you are up and running as Dundee United in the SPFL  sporting history intact.
    What Board of Directors are NOT going to go down that route, so carefully charted by the SFA for CG?
    Pick your Administrator wisely, set up a newco, buy the assets cheaply, etc etc…..
    If the CGs of the world can do it…..
    I, of course, hope that Dundee United are not in that kind of state.
    But if they are, I hope they force the SPFL and SFA to treat them as they treated RFC(IL) andTRFC.


  29. John Clark
    February 26, 2017 at 12:39
    John Clark
    February 26, 2017 at 13:08
     
    I must say John I like your style. Class (with a big C) 01


  30. It is now more than a fortnight since the reigning Professional Footballers’ Association Scotland Manager of The Year resigned/was sacked/joined the choir invisible and two weeks ago, with one eye to the congested March Court fixture list including the Supreme Court EBT Appeal Hearing, I asked what could possibly go wrong appointing Alex McLeish (£1,700,000.00) and Alex Rae (£569,000.00)? Since then the only decision made has been to leave the running of the football side to one Mr Murty (previously and possibly currently known as Who He?).
    Off the field Mr McLeish is still being pushed, most notably by himself on Sky and by Mr Rae on BBC Radio Scotland. If the people I am obliged to pay my licence fee to saw and see nothing wrong with paying people like Young ( a Chick) and Wilson (a Dick) to give Mr Rae a paid platform for thrusting his pal forward for a job knowing he would get the Number Two position I must be wrong in thinking it stinks.
    Some of the names in the hat look ambitious and some just look bizarre.
    There is however what might be a common thread.
    Ronald De Boer (not to be confused with his brothers Frank, Rupert and Teddy) (£1,200,000.00).
    Barry Ferguson (£2,500,000.00).
    I think this is simply a game of EBT Top Trumps.
    Now that I’ve sussed this out I’m off to the bookies (but not Coral-never trust someone who goes by the facts and not what Keef Says) to place the Deeds To My Plantation on the clearly best qualified candidate.
    Sir David Murray (£6,300,000.00).
    Or as Jabba would prefer you to refer to him: Sir David Auchenhowie.


  31. LUGOSIFebruary 26, 2017 at 13:41
    ‘…….. If the people I am obliged to pay my licence fee to  saw and see nothing wrong with paying people like Young ( a Chick) and Wilson (a Dick) to give Mr Rae a paid platform for thrusting his pal forward for a job knowing he would get the Number Two position I must be wrong in thinking it stinks.’
    _________
     BBC Radio Scotland is,  I believe, corrupt enough to allow guys like the supposedly retired , and basically wholly discredited,Chick Young and the motormouth Wilson to canvass for the likes of McLleish ( or anyone else) as next manager of TRFC.

    There is undoubtedly some kind of ‘all pals together’ conspiracy being pushed by the senior brass in the BBC ‘establishment’.

    Nothing new of course: the detestable Peter Thomson was at it when I was a boy.


  32. LUGOSIFEBRUARY 26, 2017 at 13:41

    ===================

    I think it is perfectly reasonable to ask whether they can afford to employ anyone at at all before the season book money comes in. The notion that they simply needed to save wages by getting rid of Warburton, Weir and McParland is not a fanciful one in my view. It always helps when they know for a fact the media won’t try and look under the bonnet. 


  33. I read the piece by Graeme Macpherson  in the Sunday Herald and was struck by this sentence .Where to start …..

    If professional football is the accountancy basketcase that allows clubs to go into liquidation and yet go on as before – and history shows us there have been various examples of such a practise throughout England and beyond – then the club from Ibrox have evidently not made the most of their resurrection.


  34. With the news about Billy McNeill being made public at last today, I think it is useful to illustrate the character of the man. Not a Celtic story at its core, but the story of how true sportsmen participating in team games think, and of their innate humility.

    The Lisbon Lions stand at Celtic Park was named after a fanzine named The Bhoyzone, edited by yours truly, ran a poll to suggest names for the newly built structure, fearful that it would inherit the epithet ‘Rangers end’.

    Billy McNeill was winning the vote by a country mile, but when I phoned him to tell him of this, he was very unhappy;

    I played in a team. I would be embarrassed and horrified to think that anyone would want to name such a thing after me and ignore the team I played in.

    I thought perhaps, judging the man by my own lesser standards, that he was displaying some false modesty, but he absolutely insisted, and told me that he would refuse any such honour if the club was to suggest it. So I asked him if he would approve if we got people to change their vote from him to The Lisbon Lions. He said he would.

    We then had an entertaining and humorous discourse about naming sections of the prospective Lisbon Lions Stand, including public conveniences and pie-stalls after his team mates 🙂

    Five minutes later, I made a call to Alan McDonald, the then Celtic CEO. I told him the story and he agreed immediately to name the stand after the Lisbon Lions.

    Billy McNeill, like all truly great sportsmen, had a fastidious need to maintain his humility and integrity. Whatever anyone else says of him, and few will say anything negative, the greatest of his qualities was that humility and integrity.

    Unfortunately we cannot hope for a recovery in this particular illness, but McNeill has left a legacy for this country that transcends Celtic and football.


  35. JOHN CLARKFEBRUARY 26, 2017 at 14:20    BBC Radio Scotland is,  I believe, corrupt enough to allow guys like the supposedly retired , and basically wholly discredited,Chick Young and the motormouth Wilson to canvass for the likes of McLleish ( or anyone else) as next manager of TRFC.

    ================================

    One of the best people I have heard challenging BBC Radio Scotland in recent years has to be the ex-Celtic Director Michael Kelly. Don’t get me wrong, he was wholly unfit for purpose along with the rest of the old Celtic Board, but I recall him severely ruffling the feathers of Jim Traynor and Chick Young one night.  As Traynor and Young led an onslaught against Celtic at the time of the Referee’s strike, Kelly reminded both of them they, along with much of the rest of the media and the SFA, found it acceptable when Rangers discriminated against Catholics. Chick Young retorted by saying ‘Rangers not signing Catholics is as relevant as children once being sent down chimneys.’ Traynor decided to allude to Kelly as ‘you and your type’.  If anyone wants to listen to it here is the link.
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-0MtnvD5n_0
    I have no idea whether there is any institutional religious bias at BBC Scotland these days.  There certainly used to be, which has often been revealed by Archie MacPherson. However, there seems to be a very strong case for thinking there is an institutional pro-Rangers bias among the presenter and many pundits of the weeknight Sportsound show. 


  36. paddy malarkeyFebruary 26, 2017 at 15:51
    I read the piece by Graeme Macpherson  in the Sunday Herald and was struck by this sentence .Where to start …..If professional football is the accountancy basketcase that allows clubs to go into liquidation and yet go on as before – and history shows us there have been various examples of such a practise throughout England and beyond – then the club from Ibrox have evidently not made the most of their resurrection.
    —————————————————————————————-
    Read the article earlier. Really is a shocker and not just for the above!!!


  37. Den @ 11.44

    dont disagree with any of your points Den.  I am simply trying to acknowledge what their arguement is.  They are (trying to) distinguish between club and (the previously unheard of) Club and it is important to understand which they mean before reacting.  

    The arguement is frankly made up pish for sure (and I’m not convinced CG is the creator for that matter).  What I’m trying to highlight is that their presumed logic doesn’t work. This fairytale to appease the masses has consequences.  It devalues the game and if anything actually encourages its own destruction.


  38. With apologies to those of a non Celtic persuasion, and I hope there are many on the site, I feel moved to express my sadness at the news about Billy McNeill. 
    I was fortunate enough to watch the man & his team mates in the  sixties and I suppose my outstanding memory was the European Cup Semi final against Dukla Prague. By some miracle I got a ticket & me and my best mate Des were in the Jungle well over an hour before kick off on that momentous night.
    A month or so later I watched the final on tv with my mum and dad. Action replays were a novelty then and I still remember my mum. bless her, saying “oh they’ve got another one” when they showed a replay of Tommy Gemmell’s equaliser.
    Eight or nine years later in my student days I got a summer job driving a milk truck and I was delighted to find that one of my deliveries was to the McNeill household and on occasion the great man himself would appear at the door when I came for the weekly bill. A more pleasant, grounded individual would be hard to find.
    My mum succumbed to the same illness that Billy has so I know that there is only one outcome and I just feel an overwhelming sense of sadness.


  39. The last time I saw Billy McNeil I was in Broadwood about ten years ago. A young boy asked for his autograph which was graciously given, his wee pal was perplexed by this and a whispered conversation followed the second boy then said to Mr McNeill ” He says you used to be Billy McNeill is that right?” After confirmation of the identity the wee boy asked for an got an autograph. Highly amusing at the time but it strikes me now as being thoroughly poignant, so it goes.


  40. BFBPUZZLED
    FEBRUARY 26, 2017 at 18:31
    =====================================

    That is of course every bit as real a moment in time as the current one is, and the next one is, and every other one is.


  41. While doing a bit of searching through the SFL Constitution and Rules I came across this – not what I was looking for, so back to my search. I’m not sure if this has been put up for discussion before, but I find it interesting in terms of whether or not a certain club was ‘relegated’! My bold to highlight the obvious!

    ‘RELEGATION FROM AND PROMOTION TO THE SCOTTISH PREMIER LEAGUE15.1Notwithstanding any other provision in these Rules, any football club which is relegated, in terms of the Settlement Agreement between the League and The Scottish Premier League, from The Scottish Premier League, shall automatically be admitted to full membership of the League and shall in the season immediately following that relegation participate in the higher or highest Division of the League.’


  42. bfbpuzzledFebruary 26, 2017 at 18:31  The last time I saw Billy McNeil I was in Broadwood about ten years ago. A young boy asked for his autograph which was graciously given, his wee pal was perplexed by this and a whispered conversation followed the second boy then said to Mr McNeill ” He says you used to be Billy McNeill is that right?” After confirmation of the identity the wee boy asked for an got an autograph. Highly amusing at the time but it strikes me now as being thoroughly poignant, so it goes.
    ——————————————————————————————————-
    Short as his time was as manager of the Dons Billy had a very good record (less than a full season before he was poached 06. Good, principled and honourable man. Hope he and his family cope well with the future.


  43. Allyjambo  February 26, 2017 at 19:37
    ====================
    I think you have to look at the settlement agreement between the SPL and the SFL when the SPL was formed in 1998.

    That agreement provided for the promotion/relegation of one club between the SPL and SFL Division 1, a process which was also conditional on the “candidate club” from the SFL meeting the entry criteria for the SPL, or more specifically having a seated capacity of 10,000.  That figure was reduced to 6,000 in later seasons.  Falkirk was the club most notably affected after winning SFL Division 1 in 2002/03, when a proposed ground share with Airdrie was voted down by SPL club chairmen, with Motherwell retaining their place in the SPL.

    A new settlement agreement was put in place when the Newco was admitted to the SFL, which included extra TV money for the lower leagues (aka bribery).


  44. NEEPHEIDFEBRUARY 26, 2017 at 12:40
    JohnJames is stating as a fact that the Dundee Utd players have been told that they are going into administration on Monday. I really hope that he’s got this one badly wrong

    How can I put this – complete and utter pish – like most of his output


  45. Homunculus
    That kind of metaphysics is what allows folk to believe in the eternal football club. 
    TS Eliot said something about that kind of view and the irredeemability of time I also am reminded of Dulan Thomas’ line”after the first death there is no other” 


  46. Would it surprise anybody if BF got offered a post at Ibrox? is it the cynical side of my nature to assume that he has been approached and resigned to save TRFC paying compo, surely that would be below their moral code, then again am I starting to sound like JJ and perpetrate conspiracy theories where none exist?


  47. SMUGASFEBRUARY 26, 2017 at 17:20
    I never thought you believed the myth.

    It is good to look at arguments (even ones as stupid as that) and formulate responses.

    The trouble with the Club is that there is no description or definition of it. The SFA clearly think that, in some ways at least, it outranks the club or Company. Surprising therefore that they have never mentioned it until now.

    Something as key as that should be preserved and protected. You cannot preserve and protect something which you cannot recognise.

    This argument could become relevant should the factions at Sevco, or any other club, find that they cannot get agreement for a CVA and want to start again with another Company, but find that other factions have exactly the same idea. Is the Club divisible.

    Without a lot more understanding of the nature of this Club entity/ non entity how do the SFA decide where it has landed and who is the true carrier of the flame. i think this scenario could arise if there is another insolvency event at Ibrox.

    Is it just Scottish Football clubs which have a Club, or is it every club.


  48. BFBPUZZLED
    FEBRUARY 26, 2017 at 22:05
    =================================

    If its good enough for Billy Pilgrim I can live with it.


  49. Den @23.33

    agreed.  If we all live happily ever after then their little fairytale works.  For a host of reasons, from Ravanelli’s Dundee, through Milesons Gretna to Greens basket case it won’t.  It can’t.  It’s quite an achievement to lift the lid on a Pandora’s box that didn’t, still doesn’t exist in the first place!


  50. Sad news about Billy McNeil who incidentally has the best win ratio of ANY Aberdeen manager in his brief spell.
    Terrible illness dementia.


  51. Homunculus 
    There are a lot of Billy Pilgrims unhinged in time is Scotland. I shall stop now there is too much potential for bad taste here.


  52. DEN

    FEBRUARY 26, 2017 at 23:33
    ———————————-

    The issue is that the SFA seem to have maintained a 19th century construct, ie the Club, that very gentlemanly & Corinthinan principle, into the 20th & 21st centuries. They’ve failed to move with the times, again.
     


  53. I note comment here and there re Barry Ferguson leaving Clyde.

    Like others I have had a fair pop at Bazza for using a fair bit of his media time to talk about T’Rangers.

    However, I must admit that when I did hear him of Sportsound actually talking about managing Clyde he was open and honest about the trials and tribulations of lower league management. His record may not be great but when you only have the lads a few nights a week and after spending time putting a game plan together then have three of your starters call you on a Friday night to say they can’t make the game,  it is all clearly a far cry from the lavishness of EBT heaven. 

    Not convinced he has what it takes to make it at a higher grade but I would suggest  a persons track record in the Scottish lower divisions is maybe not the best gauge given what managers most likely have to deal with on a day to day basis.


  54. WOTTPIFEBRUARY 27, 2017 at 11:50 I note comment here and there re Barry Ferguson leaving Clyde.
    Like others I have had a fair pop at Bazza for using a fair bit of his media time to talk about T’Rangers.
    However, I must admit that when I did hear him of Sportsound actually talking about managing Clyde he was open and honest about the trials and tribulations of lower league management. His record may not be great but when you only have the lads a few nights a week and after spending time putting a game plan together then have three of your starters call you on a Friday night to say they can’t make the game,  it is all clearly a far cry from the lavishness of EBT heaven. 
    Not convinced he has what it takes to make it at a higher grade but I would suggest  a persons track record in the Scottish lower divisions is maybe not the best gauge given what managers most likely have to deal with on a day to day basis.

    Wottpi, no disrespect,
    Do you have;a hangover ?


  55. parttimearabFebruary 26, 2017 at 21:14     
    NEEPHEIDFEBRUARY 26, 2017 at 12:40 JohnJames is stating as a fact that the Dundee Utd players have been told that they are going into administration on Monday. I really hope that he’s got this one badly wrongHow can I put this – complete and utter pish – like most of his output
    +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
    Not just pish, but totally untrue. That kind of rumour spreading can easily destabilise any business. Suppliers start to shorten their credit line, players look around and think, is it only me that hasn’t been told, minority shareholders get nervous—-.
    Utterly irresponsible, in my opinion.


  56. Is it not about time that pressure was put on SMSM to accurately depict DCK as the chair of RIFC , and that he has SFA to do with TRFC ?  I’ve asked BBC Scotland about this but am still awaiting a reply, though I did receive an acknowledgement .


  57. wottpiFebruary 27, 2017 at 11:50

    Being of the Bully Wee persuasion, I have to agree.  Don’t get me wrong, I’m very happy to see the back of Bazza, given our inexorable slide towards this season’s relegation play off, but am objective enough to say that failing at our current level is probably not a true reflection of a manager’s ability.

    Sadly, I get the impression that sheer brute force will always triumph over silky football at our level.  The requirements for a Div2 manager are completely different from a top league manager.  I suspect that this may be the reason that Iain McCall never makes it as a top level manager.  His skillset is ideal for lower league teams, where motivation is probably more important than the traits required for a tactical, nuanced approach.

    Sometimes, you get someone like Paul Hartley, who makes a success of it at the lower level (with Alloa), and continues that at the higher level, but it is rare. I suppose what I’m saying is that Ferguson may go on to prove himself at a higher level.  Equally, he may be as terrible at the higher level at he was with us, but it shouldn’t be set in stone that failure at us is the end.

    Having said all the above, TRFC would be mental to appoint him as their manager! I could see him getting the gig as assistant, if only so Chris Jack can write articles about him with the season ticket phone number at the end of them.


  58. valentinesclownFebruary 27, 2017 at 12:02
    ‘….
    s the truth or realization taking hold with the  fans of Ibrox club?
    https://t.co/PEKCqqaalQ
    ________
    That is an interesting link you provided, thank you, Valentinesclown.

    I particularly picked up ‘. “No board at Rangers Football Club should ever again be afforded the luxury of blind faith regardless of who they are or what they have achieved.”

    And I would say that no board of any club, should be accorded  ‘blind faith’.

    We can all have a go at the ,frankly, sheer stoopidity of folk who swallowed hook, line and sinker all the crap that came and continues to come from the TRFC/RIFC boards.

    But it behoves us to remember that Celtic plc still have not dealt with the Res 12  resolution of the 2013 AGM; it is still ‘adjourned’.

    I want them to explain why I should not pillory them as much as I am ready to attack the ‘Football Authorities’ for being deceitful and dishonest.

    Give me one accceptable reason why no challenge has been made to the SFA’s granting of a European competition licence to an ineligible club- an act which cost the loss of some millions of money to Celtic plc’s shareholders.

    I keep saying, in one way or another, that Truth is indivisible.

    If we are going after the bad guys in Scottish Football Administration, we have to include possible ‘collaborators’ in their badness.


  59. valentinesclown  February 27, 2017 at 12:02  
    Is the truth or realization taking hold with the  fans of Ibrox club?
    ——————————————————————————-
    VC

    I don’t often enter the fan forums for any club but have had a bit of a scroll around various Rangers sites over the weekend to gauge the mood of the Rangers support.

    Your link seems fairly typical.  There are many posts questioning the board/DCK and not many that I could find in support.  Questions being asked – about two years after they were asked on TSFM but being asked nonetheless.  Even talk of a season ticket boycott to force the board out.  It would be hilarious if DCK was hoist by his own petard.

    Keith Jackson’s piece today is again starting to ask some of the right questions just two years too late.  I think it is telling that he chooses this moment when there is a distinct shift in the mood of the support to change his tack.  Perhaps he takes his cue more from the mood of the fan base, not wanting to offend, than he does from any PR company?

    My other impression of the current mood of the support is that should things go badly against St Johnstone then the players can expect a very rough time at the final whistle.  Most ire seems directed at them not Murty. 

    Three weeks to the day from the phantom resignations and still no manager or director of football. 


  60. AMFEARLIATHMÒRFEBRUARY 27, 2017 at 13:19

    Thanks for the back up, from the horse’s mouth, so to speak!

    I too think it would be foolish to appoint Ferguson into any major role at Ibrox.

    The auld pals act has brought them more than their fair share of problems. However it appears to be in the Ibrox DNA that there has to be someone that has connections with the old club hanging around the place like a bad smell.

    Its all the ‘tradition’ nonsense that is holding them back from setting up a club fit for the 21 century.

    If Ferguson doesn’t get some kind of role at T’Rangers he could however have another bash at management somewhere else. He may end up needing the additional income should Hector come knocking 🙂


  61. Maybe two ex Clyde managers at TRFC as the nightmare team John Brown as DOF and Barry Ferguson as Head Coach. They both bring experience of working with low and tightening budgets (John Brown was quoted as saying his weekly budget for the Clyde team was £650 in total and that this was cut over the years)
    That might be the very thing for TRFC-but it may be an understatement to say that austerity would be a hard sell even coming from the realest of RRM.
    All joking aside if this is the ploy to sell season books it lies somewhere between ludicrous and suicidal. It might be an underestimation of the fans too far.


  62. Current thread on RM site;

    “Protest Ibrox 7pm unless we have an interim manager in”

    So, it could be chants of: “Sack the Board, Sack the Board…!!!”
    or
    someone / anyone in place – if only on an interim basis?

    Bazza’s resignation does look well timed…  14


  63. Is Ibrox going to be the setting for Back To The Future 55?

    ‘Join (John) Doc Brown & (Graeme) Murty McFly as they rev up Donald Park’s DeLorean & go back, back to the future in search of the elusive 55 & to stop the dreaded TIAR…’


  64. wottpiFebruary 27, 2017 at 15:02

    Exactly, Ferguson may turn out to be a good long term prospect (I’m thinking of Paul Lambert having a similar lack of success at Livi, but making a reasonable fist of things in England at bigger jobs), but I suspect not, and manager at Ibrox whilst you’re still learning your trade would be suicidal, given the unreasonable expectations that abound.

    I’ve seen it compared to Neil Lennon at Celtic, but he was already on the back room staff, knew the players, their limitations etc. and if we’re honest, he has a bit more about him than Bazza. One thing that seemed to come out of Broadwood was that the players never really knew what mood he’d be in, and he could be extremely non-communicative – not the ideal way to get your ideas across.

    As for John Brown, I don’t think the words exist to adequately describe his time at Clyde. The idea of him involved in any sort of DOF role is almost frightening.


  65. Has there been any news of the roofs of three stands at Ibrox failing ?  Any developments on the “stolen” water supply ? I get a feeling that these and other like stories were squirrels , set up to identify a mole and to undermine anybody who printed them .


  66. Must admit that was my first thought re the DUtd exclusive.  A honey trap to both out him/his source and discredit him simultaneously.


  67. AMFEARLIATHMÒRFEBRUARY 27, 2017 at 17:19
    I’ve seen it compared to Neil Lennon at Celtic, but he was already on the back room staff, knew the players, their limitations etc. and if we’re honest, he has a bit more about him than Bazza.
    ——————–
    For every Neil Lennon, there is an Ally McCoist. He knew the back room staff, knew the players, their limitations etc. He was even supervised by Mr smith. look how that turned out.


  68. This is not a celtic site but would be a well done from me if it was any other clubs fans also.
    After a fundraising campaign by the Green Brigade some of the remaining funds will be donated to Alzheimer Scotland in honour  of celtic’s greatest ever captain and On behalf of all those who contributed to the appeal 

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