The Existence of Laws

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A Blog by James Forrest for TSFM

I am a socialist, and as a socialist I believe in the fundamental goodness of people. Some people find that hard to believe when they read the stuff I write.

I published my first novel recently, on politics and the corrupting nature of it, and it is a deeply cynical book, a book where no-one has clean hands come the end. What has surprised some of those who’ve read it is that I didn’t focus on the lies and smears of the right, but the hypocrisy and deceit of those who claim to be of the left.

Corruption, you see, doesn’t respect political boundaries or points of view. It’s like rainwater. It finds every crack, and gets in there.

My political beliefs revolve around two apparently paradoxical elements; the belief in the inherent decency of people and the need for a strong, and powerful, state. I believe the second underpins the first, and this brings me into conflict with a lot of people, some on the left and some on the right. Too many people see the state as inherently evil, as something that interferes too much in the lives of ordinary people. As something suffocating.

Yet the state exists to protect us. It exists to provide a safety net. It exists to regulate and to oversee. If the state is made up of bad people, if the gears of society are captured by those with malicious or selfish intent, the results are obvious; war, corruption, chaos.

The vast majority of our problems in the modern age can be neatly summed up in two lines from Yeats’ poem “The Second Coming”, which I used to open my novel. “The best lack all conviction, while the worst are full of passionate intensity.”

We live in a time when those who are protecting their own interests have assumed such power that they’ve cowed the rest of us. They have become a law unto themselves. They have changed the nature of the game, because they have sapped our will to the extent some barely put up a fight anymore. The weak get weaker, and the strong use their strength to crush the rest even more. It is a vicious struggle, a downward spiral.

Society is held together not only by the endeavour and common interests of its citizens but by a collection of laws. We elect the people who make those laws. They do so in our name, and we can remove that right every four years. That is a powerful thing, and we do not appreciate it enough. The present corruption exists because we allow it to exist.

The people around me continue to puzzle over my uncommon interest in the affairs of a football club on the west of Glasgow. My own club plays in the east end. I tell those who ask that my primary interest in the goings-on at the club calling itself Rangers is no longer about football; how could it be, after all? With promotion this year they are still a full two divisions below us, emasculated, skint, weak and unstable. If we were fortunate enough to draw them in cup competition the match would be over, as a tie, by the halfway point … in the first half.

In footballing terms they are an utter irrelevance.

Rangers is more than a football club to me. They are a symbol. Their unfolding calamity is an on-going outrage. What is happening there, what is being allowed to happen, is an offense to decency. It is a stain on the face of our country.

In short, it is a scandal. It is a scandal without parallel in sport.

Yet it’s not just a sports story either. If it was, I might not be so focussed on it. What is happening at Rangers is a colossal failure of governance. It is a damning indictment against the very people who are supposed to oversee our game. It is a disgraceful abrogation of responsibility from those at the top, those who claim to be “running things.”

If this is not a failure of governance it is a result of corruption at the heart of our national sport. It says they are bought and paid for, and I will say no such thing here.

So let’s give them the benefit of the doubt. We’ll say instead that what they are is weak, indecisive, inept and disconnected from reality.

It reminds me of our political class, which has become insular and ignorant about what the public wants, and what it needs. It’s not a wonder parties like UKIP can achieve national vote shares of 25% at local elections. Nigel Farage strikes me as a dog-whistle politician, the kind who knows how to appeal to a select group of voters. He is little different to Charles Green, the man who beguiled Rangers fans into handing over large amounts of money, because he was “standing up for the club.” It is easy to do what he did, easy to do what Farage is doing.

Real leadership requires toughness. Say what you like about the Tories, but they have that in spades. Yeats was right about the worst being full of passionate intensity. Green was. Farage is. Cameron and Osborne personify it in their political outlook.

It is easy to be cowed by blunt force politics, and by “tough talking Yorkshire men” and venomous speeches about “strivers and skivers.” The politics of divide and conquer is the oldest form of politics there is, and it’s no surprise to see it practiced by some of the vested interests in the game here in Scotland. Yet, lest we forget … something significant happened last year. The maligned and the ignored, the weak and the voiceless found something they never realised they had. They discovered that, in a very real sense, the power was in their hands.

Last year, the fans rose up when the governing bodies and the media went all-out to save Rangers from the self-inflicted wounds caused by a decade of cheating, malpractice and ineptitude. I have no problem calling that what it was.

What happened at Rangers seemed incredible, but it was all too predictable, and some of us had been talking about it for years before it hit. The Association seemed caught in the headlights but it would amaze me if they really were as insular and ignorant as they appeared. They must have known how bad the outlook was for Rangers. They just chose to ignore it.

They were aided and abetted by a thoroughly disreputable media, a collection of cowards and compromisers, charlatans and frauds, masquerading as journalists, but who long ago laid aside any claim to be bold investigators and settled for commenting on events as they unfolded. More often than not, with their ill-informed opinions, sometimes due to weaknesses in intellect and others wilfully ignorant, they failed even in that.

Entire newspapers became PR machines for crooks and swindlers. They aided in the scam because they didn’t do their jobs, some because they were lazy, some because they were incompetent and others because they wanted a seat at the table and were willing to sacrifice whatever integrity they once had in exchange for one.

That all of this was embraced by the Rangers fans is amazing to me. They trusted when they should have been asking questions. They closed their eyes, covered their ears and sang their battle tunes at the top of their voices so they wouldn’t have to hear anything they didn’t like. As incredible as I found it then, and still find it now – and now, even more so, when they have already seen the results of it once – I find it pathetic too, and I do feel pity for some of them.

A lot of these people are genuine football fans, and nothing more. They have no interest in the phony narrow nationalism, or the over-blown religion, or the notion of supremacy which manifested itself in a ludicrous statement from McCoist when interviewed recently on Sky.

Some of the Rangers fans look at their team of duds, kids and journeymen, they look at a boardroom of cowards and crooks, they look at a failing manager in his first (and last) job in the game and at a dark future and are not in the least bit impressed by, or interested in, the chest-out arrogance espoused in those ridiculous words “we are the people.” They know full well that their present crisis was made by men like McCoist, and they understand that pretentious posturing is not an act born of strength, but a scrambling around in the gutter, and a symptom of weakness.

They understand their position, and they hate it. And because they care about Rangers, because they value the club, because they cherish those things that made it a great Scottish institution, they want that back. They understand that before the Union Jack waving, Sash singing, poppy wearing, Nazi saluting, Orange element became the public face of their support Rangers meant something else, and that, above all things, is what pains them the most.

People do not hate Rangers. When the country appeared to turn its back last year, they were turning the back on favouritism and the bending of rules. Yet it would be a lie to say that there is not an element of dislike in the gleeful mockery of many rival fans.

But they don’t hate Rangers either. They hate the version of it around which a certain section of the support continues to dance. They hate the version which hates, and so too do many, many, many Rangers supporters, and they definitely deserve better.

David Murray chose not to openly challenge that version. Indeed, he encouraged certain strands of it to flourish and grow, with his “Britishness Days” and his effort to turn the club into the “team that supports the troops.” Other clubs have done as much, if not more, for the British Army than the one that plays out of Ibrox. Other clubs have given more money. Other clubs have lent their support to those on the front lines. They just chose to do it with respect, and with class, and with dignity. They chose to do it in private, understanding that there eventually comes a tipping point between looking after the ends of the soldiers and using them to promote your own.

The army has not battened on to Rangers. Rangers has battened on to them, and although it is unclear when an altruistic motive became darker, what started out as a gesture of solidarity is now used to entrench division and promote a notion of superiority.

Craig Whyte took over from Murray and immediately understood the lure of the “dog whistle.” He knew too that the media would accept whatever he told them, without question, and as he spoke up for “Rangers traditions” he made sure the lunatic fringe was well onside. He met face to face with the hard-core extremists in the support first and made them his praetorian guard. They spoke up for him until the day the club entered administration.

So, whereas Murray pandered to them and Whyte used them to further his own ends, it was only a matter of time before someone suggested to Charles Green that he could use the same tactics to win over the support. He went even further and blatantly promoted and encouraged this mind-set, and stoked the hate and nonsense to frightening new heights. The same people who cheered Whyte to the rafters jumped on board the Big Blue Bus and the results are clear.

Through all of it, the ordinary Rangers fan has seen his club buffered against the rocks, battered, broken, smashed to smithereens and sunk. Now there’s a big hole in the side of the lifeboat, and they are terrified that further tragedies await.

They are right to be concerned. Much of the media is still not telling them what they need to know. The people in charge of their club – the owners who have lied, the former hack who covered up the truth about Whyte and now acts as a mouthpiece for Green, the “club legends” who are content to sup with the devil and take his greasy coin when they should be standing toe-to-toe with the fans – are trying to silence those members of the press who do have facts to present.

How many times now have media outlets been banned from Ibrox for daring to report the truth? The manager who demanded the names of a committee last year defends those inside the walls who are desperate to keep secret the things that are going on. He is either an unprincipled coward, or he is, himself, bought and paid for. The fans suffer for it.

The “inconvenient truth” is still being kept from them, and this denies them any chance to play an active role in their club. Indeed, it is all too possible that they’ve passed a point of no return, and that their club is heading for a new liquidation event and it can no longer be stopped.

In either case, their power has been eroded to the point at which they must feel they have nothing left to do but stand back and watch what happens next.

They are wrong. I am a socialist. I believe in the inherent good of people. I think the ordinary decent Rangers fans are the only people left who can save their club … and the means by which they will do it is as simple as it could be.

They must stand up for “big government.” They must embrace the need for a “strong state.” They must lobby the SFA, and they must trust the SFA and they must get the SFA to follow its own rules and thereby save them from any further harm.

There is a tendency amongst some Celtic fans to see our governing bodies as pro-Rangers. If it is true then those running our game are ruining Scottish football without benefiting the thing they love more. The incalculable harm that has been done to Rangers in the last 20 some months is a direct result of the subservient media and the willingness of the football authorities to be “deaf, dumb and blind.” Those who believe this has actually helped the Ibrox club have not been paying attention in class. It has irrevocably scarred them, and it may yet have played a hand in destroying them once and for all, as a force if not as a club entirely.

For years, the SFA sat and did nothing as a club in their association operated a sectarian signing policy. They did nothing whilst the fans sang sectarian songs. In their failure to act they strengthened those elements of the Rangers support, instead of isolating, alienating and eventually helping to eliminate those who saw that club as a totem pole of division and hate. Their failure over EBT’s, and their lack of scrutiny, led to one of the greatest scandals in the history of sport, and I say that with no equivocation at all. The testimony of their registrations officer in the Lord Nimmo Smith investigation was a disgrace and in years to come it will rank as one of the most disreputable and damaging moments in the association’s history.

The most egregious failures of all were the failures in the so-called “fit and proper person” tests, which allowed first Whyte and then Charles Green to assume controlling positions at Ibrox. They will pass the buck and say the responsibility lies with the club itself, in much the same way as they are content to let the club investigate itself at the present time, but any neutral who looks at this stance knows it is unprincipled and spineless. It’s like letting the defence set the terms at a trial. It is foxes investigating the chicken coop.

It is a blueprint for corruption, and a recipe for disaster.

It is now too late for the SFA to declare Green “unfit”, as it was too late when they finally slapped that title on Craig Whyte. He and his allies own Rangers, and they control its destiny. They can push the club to the wall if they choose, in the final extremity, if that gets them what they want. The time for changing that is past. The damage has already been done. The barbarians are not at the gates. They are inside the walls, and sacking the city.

The SFA will be forced to punish Rangers for the sins of the owners, for the second time in as many years, and whilst it is right that the club face up to that, all the better to send a message to other clubs and other owners, the SFA cannot be allowed to slither off the hook here as though this was none of their doing. Green will skip off into the sunset. Craig Whyte has yet to pay his fine. These people never cared about Scottish football and they don’t care now.

The SFA are supposed to. Our governing body is supposed to govern, for the good of the whole game, and not as a support system for a single club. What they have allowed to happen on their watch is absolutely shameful and if the people responsible were men at all, with any sense of accountability, they would resign en masse.

They can pretend ignorance, but only the truly ignorant would accept that. Craig Whyte was not inside Ibrox a week before RTC and other sites were dismantling his entire business history, with some of the people here doing the work the SFA would not. Whyte himself claims to have made the governing bodies aware of the scale of what was facing the club, and they did nothing at all. Heads should have rolled a year ago.

In October of last year, on this very site, I posted an article in which I wrote:

“Which isn’t to say the due diligence matter isn’t worrying, because, of course, it is. Again, no-one is going to convince me that the SFA has conducted proper due diligence on Charles Green and his backers. No-one will convince me they are satisfied that this club is in safe hands, and that the game in this country will not be rocked by a further implosion at Ibrox. They failed to properly investigate Craig Whyte, because of lax regulations requiring disclosure from the club itself, regulations which are just a joke, but they can be forgiven for that as the press was talking sheer nonsense about him having billions at his disposal, and a lot of people (but not everyone!) were either convinced or wanted to be convinced by him.

To have witnessed what Whyte did, to have witnessed the Duff & Phelps “process” of finding a buyer, and having Green essentially emerge from nowhere, with a hundred unanswered questions as to his background and financing, for the SFA to have given this guy the go ahead, only for it to blow up in their faces later, would annihilate the credibility of the governing body and necessitate resignations at every level. There would be no hiding place.”

There are times when it is fun to be right, but this is not one of them. It is dispiriting and disquieting to have been so on the nose. It scares the Hell out of me, as someone who loves football in this country, to have seen this matter clearly when the people running our game apparently either did not or chose to ignore very real, very obvious, concerns. The Internet Bampots had no special insight or access to information that was denied those at the SFA. We just weren’t prepared to ignore it and pretend that it wasn’t there. There was too much at stake.

I have become convinced that things will never change until the Rangers supporters join us in demanding the full and unabridged truth here. They need to come out from under the bed, and confront their fears. They need to be willing to take the consequences, so that their club can emerge clean from this, and start again, with all this behind them.

And it can all happen with one simple thing. The application of the rules.

The existence of laws comes down to a simple principle; they protect society from those elements within it who are interested only in their own selfish ends. We may cry out at those rules and regulations we see as “restrictive”, but the law was not made to restrict our freedoms but to protect them. Had the SFA years ago acted against Rangers sectarian signing policy, and the songs from the stands, the club would not have mutated to the point where there was no help on hand when they needed it the most. Let’s not kid ourselves about this; Whyte and Green were only able to grab control because the club itself has a dreadful image which put off respectable and responsible buyers. The SFA could have helped change that perception years ago and did nothing.

The SFA could have conducted its own investigation into who Craig Whyte was. They could have asked David Murray for full disclosure when he was running up £80 million of debt, a sum of money that is beyond belief for a single club in a small provincial backwater league. Had they had the guts to do that the club would never have spent itself into oblivion and forced the hand of Lloyds, which led indirectly to their ignominious end.

The SFA could have fully investigated Charles Green and the means by which he took control, instead of rushing through a license. His emergence at the last minute was transparently suspicious and designed to force them into a quick decision, but they did not have to bow to that pressure by making one, without being in possession of the facts, as it is now 100% clear they were not.

Had they asked for every document, had they insisted on legal affidavits and personal securities from investors (and this would have been perfectly legitimate and is common place in other licensing areas) none of this would have come to pass. After Craig Whyte they had a moral responsibility to the rest of the game to get this one right and their failure is without parallel in the history of Scottish football.

As the club hurtles towards a new abyss, names are cropping up which should send a shudder down the spines of every honest, genuine supporter of not only Rangers but every team in the land. The SFA claims that a strong Rangers is essential for the sake of Scottish football, but they have been extraordinarily lax in protecting that club, and therefore the game, from destructive elements. Craig Whyte and Charles Green had dubious personal histories, and the acquisition of the club itself was mired in controversy and scandal. Yet it was allowed.

Neither Green nor Whyte were known to have operated outside the law, yet neither was worthy of trust or stood up to scrutiny. Neither man should ever have been granted the status as fit and proper persons to assume a role in our national sport, and if it is true of them what can we say about the three men who are, presently, being touted as the Great White Hopes for a bright, new Rangers future; Dave King and the Easdale brothers?

King recently cut a deal with the South African government over an on-going dispute over taxes. In other words, he pled guilty and accepted the central plank of their argument; that for years he was engaged in wilfully with-holding vast revenues from their Treasury. The media does not like to put it like that, and the SFA seems willing to ignore it utterly, and this would be scandalous enough. But it does not stop there. HRMC rules – as well as the SFA’s own governance documents – actually bar him from serving on the board of the new club.

Last but not least, aside from being an admitted tax cheat, King is also awaiting trial in South Africa, having been indicted for corruption, forgery and fraud – 300 charges in total. Yet as recently as last week, we were told that the Association was willing to look at him and consider representations from his lawyers. This is almost beyond belief.

If Dave King’s position is untenable, and he is yet to be convicted of a crime, what can we say about the position of the Easdale’s? One of the two brothers, Sandy, has already served jail time. He is a convicted criminal, a fraudster nonetheless, who’s “victim” was the same Treasury who are appealing one case involving the old club and liquidated it entirely over another. This is precisely the kind of “businessman” the fit and proper person test was supposed to weed out, and if the SFA holds its nose here the reek will stink out the halls at Hampden for decades. If King or the Easdale’s are judged fit and proper, then who exactly is the test for? What exactly do you have to do to fail it? How do we explain the existence of laws, when these are not applied?

Pascal says “Law without force is impotent.” The SFA’s weakness has allowed one version of Rangers to destroy itself, and has allowed an existential risk to another. If the next power at Rangers resides in South Africa or Greenock I can say with some certainty that the Association is engaged in an even more dangerous roll of the dice, because the surfacing of fresh scandal will be an ever present risk, and will be of the sort no-one will survive.

The damage to Scottish football will take years to heal. The Scottish game has been through enough trauma. It does not need more. It barely survived the last calamity to hit Rangers. The rest of us should not be forced to pay the price of the next one.

The greater damage will be done to Rangers itself. If the Green crisis ends in another collapse – as it well might; another administration event is a certainty, and another liquidation is a much more likely prospect than it was before 14 February 2012 – the club will once again have to start from the bottom, and this time the reputational damage will be impossible to repair. The club faces internal strife, sporting sanctions, and criminal investigations. The last takeover might be declared a fraud. the Whyte takeover will almost certainly be. The share issue might be invalid, as well as criminal, and the people involved may well end up in jail. Lawsuits could follow from investors, there could be as yet unknown consequences from the Upper Tier Tax Tribunal (thank you Brogan Rogan for pointing out what those might be) and a host of other issues.

Rangers fans must be the loudest voices here. How do you want the world to view your club in years to come? Do you want one to be proud of, or one forever associated with the shame and disgrace of these days gone by? The one which bailed out on its tax obligations. The one with supporters who disgrace your very name. The one which allowed Whyte and Green to take you to the cleaners and send you to the wall. The one which handed over control to one convicted criminal and another awaiting trial. Do you want to be reborn clean, or mired in the muck?

David Murray destroyed your financial stability. He made it so no bank would issue you a line of credit and no investor of note wanted to buy. Craig Whyte liquidated you. Charles Green has cast the future of the Newco into doubt and acted in a manner which has annihilated your credibility with the financial markets for decades to come.

Between these three men, they have taken everything from you, and the press and the people who run the game here, as well as some of your own blindly ignorant fans, have allowed them to do all this and more. Now they conspire to hand the keys to Ibrox to other men of questionable character, who will wreck further havoc on the reputation of the club.

The Scottish Football Association has damaged the game it was supposed to protect, but above all else their greatest failure of governance was a failure to protect one of its biggest clubs from its own excesses and those of its owners.

Rangers fans, the SFA have betrayed your trust, more than the trust of any other club. What you must insist on now is full disclosure and transparency from the powers that be in Hampden. The SFA has to end the charade of allowing your club to handle this in-house. They must hand everything over to an outside agency – whether a legal one, or a footballing body like UEFA – and they must demand co-operation and answers, and threaten to withhold the license if they don’t get them.

You must not be afraid of that. You must embrace it. The men with their hands on the gears at Ibrox are motivated by money, and nothing more. If the license is withdrawn their “investments” are worthless. They cannot risk that.

You must demand that the rules on fit and proper persons are applied, and where necessary even made stronger, to prevent your club falling into unclean hands. You must demand that they protect your reputation from further damage, by getting this all out there and acting accordingly, even if that means your club does not play football for at least a year.

You must be willing to suck it all up, knowing that what will emerge is a Rangers which has been cleansed and moves forward with honour, and dignity, led by custodians who treasure it rather than those who know the cost of everything and the value of nothing.

The Rangers Standard has recently emerged as a genuine voice for those in your support who are sick and tired of what Rangers has become, and want it restored to something that is worthy of the love and respect in which you hold it. On that website, there are discussions about the kind of club you seek to be and about whether the institution of Rangers is about more than just football.

If that’s how you feel about it then you know it is about more than how many titles the club can claim, about more than just results on the park, about more than just the game. Rangers, like Celtic, is an idea. It has to be something you are proud of.

I am a socialist, but one with a fevered imagination and a tendency to write very dark things. This piece won’t have been good reading for some of you (perhaps all of you haha!) but I think there’s more hope in here than in other things I’ve written.

In spite of everything that’s come to pass, I still believe. I believe in Scottish football. I believe in our system of football governance, even if those who are working in it are failing on some level.

In society, as much as we strain against them, laws exist for our protection. To fail to enforce them is to leave us at the mercy of those elements who would do us harm. The rules of football ensure the protection of all clubs, not just a few.

The failure to enforce the rules has never had graver consequences than here in Scotland.  The irony is that bending and breaking them has hurt the one club those violations were designed to help. It cannot be allowed to happen again.

The rules must be applied without fear or favour.

The best must find their conviction, and their passionate intensity once more.

James is a co-editor of the On Fields of Green Blog http://www.onfieldsofgreen.com/

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About Trisidium

Trisidium is a Dunblane businessman with a keen interest in Scottish Football. He is a Celtic fan, although the demands of modern-day parenting have seen him less at games and more as a taxi service for his kids.

5,802 thoughts on “The Existence of Laws”


  1. Re holmedownstud.com being NE England registered, there’s another with a similar name down in Devon.

    Maybe an oldco and a newco? 😉


  3. Forgot to mention about yesterday’s article in the DR.

    Written by our esteemed, ‘Scottish Sports News Journalist of the Year’ – Keith Jackson;

    “…Now would-be investors the Easdale brothers…have launched another attempt to remove Murray by calling for an extraordinary general meeting to be held next month…”

    Does he never review the mince he writes ?

    A ‘would-be investor’ calling for an EGM ? 🙄

    http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/scottish-news/rangers-boardroom-war-hits-new-1901882


  4. macfurgly says:

    Wednesday, May 22, 2013 at 21:46

    Auldheid (@Auldheid) says:
    Wednesday, May 22, 2013 at 20:23
    ——————————-
    Good luck with William Hill, sponsors are one of the few means of exerting influence.
    However, their CEO was Chair of the SPL when, this time last year, Dungcaster went onto SSound and told a cooing Traynor and Young (paraphrased),” There is no mechanism for relegating them to the SFL. It’s the SPL or nothing”.
    With hindsight this was an early version of the Bryson Doctrine, using the absence of a mechanism as a means of avoiding having to take action against the chosen ones, which in itself is a hostage to fortune that all club secretaries should be observing carefully.
    ++++++++++++++++++++++++

    I knew about Topping but the very fact he is CEO puts him in a position to inform his Chairman why there is supporter concern. WH risk being charged with hypocrisy if they ignore the issue. They also risk being derelict in following their own policy viz:

    ” The integrity of sports betting is vital both to William Hill and our customers. We will
    continue to work with our trade associations and regulators to identify potential sporting
    integrity issues. We provide the Gambling Commission with information we suspect may
    lead to the making by the Commission of an order to void a bet. In addition, we take
    reasonable steps to be familiar with the rules applied by certain sporting bodies and
    provide the relevant sport governing bodies with any information we suspect may relate
    to a breach of a rule applied by that sport governing body.”

    http://www.williamhillplc.com/~/media/Files/W/William-Hill/documents/fair-open-gambling-policy.pdf

    If they do not at least look into SFA’s relegation of sporting integrity were it not for Scottish football Supporters.


  6. John Paul Fraser, as detailed above is the registrant for

    http://www.otterhouseireland.com/

    as well as holmedownstud.com

    as in Charles Green <cgreen@holmedownstud.com

    Is Charles Green <cgreen@holmedownstud.com a real email address, or a fabrication as in c.monk@giruy.com

    Or is it a real one, in which case, what is holmedownstud.com and how is Charles Green linked to it.


  7. newtz says:
    Wednesday, May 22, 2013 at 21:48

    “was ok with that, then tead Paul McC topic on this…(disapplication of pre-emption rights)”.
    —————–

    I know almost nothing about company law but if your brain’s stuck in neutral I’ll throw in tuppence to see if it will kick back into gear.

    The pre-emption rights are the rights of existing shareholders to be offered a new allocation of shares before they are offered for wider sale (I read briefly). So the disapplication is presumably a circumvention of this right.

    If Green wanted to dilute Sevco 5088 shareholding so he could take control (by allying with a purchaser of the new shares), then not telling CW/IA via the disapplication would alllow this to happen surreptitiously I presume. The document on Paul Mc’s site link has the two critical resolutions blanked out so the detail is obviosly obscure.

    Not sure if that is of any assistance. I have no insight to this topic, just a simple working of logic for you to nibble on.


  8. Please. No addresses of individuals on the site. Totally unacceptable, and will result in a ban, not just moderation.
    Thanks


  9. Starting to think that in this internet age, the only thing that has really changed; is that we now think we can change the establishment just by talking about it.

    CF won’t reveal anything that implicates CW, by extension nothing really will be shown/released that can’t receive a damn good ignoring by those that it implicates.

    Maybe time for a new hobby.


  10. btw the above W Hill policy could apply to every bookmaker in the UK who take bets on outcome of Scottish football emphasising why commercially, sporting integrity HAS to be king.

    So other Bookmakers might have a view too, although only W H sponsor the SFA.


  11. I’ve just watched John Hewitt head home a cross from Mark McGhee to win a European trophy for one of Scotland’s provincial clubs. I was an acne riddled Celtic daft teen when I first saw it, but I celebrated that goal as well as I’ve celebrated any of Celtic’s. That year we had a three horse race for the title, I remember that fairly well too as I had an Arab schoolmate whose Dad had actually played for DUFC years before. The Scottish cup final was between AFC and RIP, I mean RFC.

    During the documentary the memories came flooding back, but I don’t have any feelings of misty eyed nostalgia – All I feel is anger.

    How many years like that have we football fans been denied by the cheating of that fabric of society? How many years will it take to redress the balance?

    To those scumbag hacks and scumbag administrators who champion the return of that scumbag team, the reason why Scotland doesn’t need a strong Rangers is that we, the fans of all the other clubs have been punished enough, and it will be years before OUR punishment ends.


  12. briggsbhoy says:

    Wednesday, May 22, 2013 at 21:03

    Auldheid (@Auldheid) says:
    Wednesday, May 22, 2013 at 20:23

    Whilst I appreciate the effort and the purpose of doing such a letter to William Hill I do feel that taking this approach could have a counterproductive effect if WH decide to walk away from Scottish Football. Once you have lost a sponsor or a customer it is very hard to get them back.
    ==========================
    Indeed. So all the more reason for the SFA to respond in a meaningful way. It is also an opportunity for the sponsor to endear his company to Scottish supporters by taking up the cudgels on their behalf.


  13. TSFM says:
    Wednesday, May 22, 2013 at 23:16

    If you are referring to my posts, and apologies if you are not, then it is public knowledge information, which the person has posted on the internet himself.
    Are you seriously threatening to ban someone from your blog for duplicating that information.

    Again, apologies if you are not referring to my posts.


  14. Someone above mentioned the SFL AGM at which League reconstruction is bound to be discussed, so I’d like to go a bit off the common topic of the CF stuff and comment on this.

    In my view, the SPL proposals were never intended to be accepted by the SFL. The money that is to be transferred down will only go to SFL1 clubs, i.e. the level a current SPL club might imagine falling to. The clubs in SFL2 and 3 therefore see no financial benefit from the proposal. Indeed the SPL “vision” opens the trapdoor for these clubs via a pyramid system beneath them. To top it off, the clubs in the lowest tier would have no say in the decision-making process of the unified League body.

    Why should any SFL2 or 3 club vote for that? The SPL strategy is clearly one of driving a wedge between the SFL1 clubs (who stand to benefit from the cash and for which they are clearly so desperate, they are willing to sell out the other SFL clubs) and those below.

    Other aspects of the plan provide further evidence of the Self Preservation League philosophy: the financial distribution is there to cushion them, the new SFL1/SPL play-off breaks from the SFL model to protect them, voting will be heavily weighted towards them.

    (I see this latter point as pointing to a degree of payback to the “wee clubs” for having the temerity to tell the SPL/SFA axis to stuff it when they tried to shoehorn poor wee Rangers into SFL1 last summer. It would also mean that they could not use their vote to place future Newcos [I mean Hearts and Killie there] into SFL3 or lower!)

    Should the proposal be rejected (and 22 of 29 need to agree to this poisonous project for it to pass), the situation of the SFL1 clubs (i.e. desperate) will be used as a lever to generate SPL2. Remember that from last summer? And how likely is it that an invitation will be extended to TRFC to help bulk up the numbers to two Divisions of 12? Our pal Graham Speirs has been pimping this line for some time and interview after interview in the yellow press has pushed the same angle: accelerate Rangers up the Divisions. An obvious benefit of SPL2 of course, would be that never again would the “big teams” have to face a fall of 3 Divisions should the financial mismanagement for which they are correctly famed result in liquidation…. It would, at worst, be the scenario they had planned for Rangers: a single Division drop.

    The SPL proposal is not a merger with the SFL, but rather a take-over of the SFL or a cherry-picking exercise. Regardless, the strategy is designed for the sole purpose of protecting the SPL clubs (and potentially accelerating TRFC through the roadblock of a year in SFL2 should they travel the SPL2 route). It is a 12-team solution (which happens to suit a minority of current SFL clubs) masquerading poorly as a 42-team solution.

    That a number of current SFL1 clubs are keen to throw their hat (and any residual principles) in with this is depressing, particularly given the stance taken by Raith Rovers and Turnbull Hutton last summer. From there to capitulation inside a year….

    Of course, had the SPL been a resounding success, even in commercial rather than football terms, they might have some grounds for their “take-it-or-leave-it” stance, but their project has been a failure by any measure.

    In the inglorious 15-year history of the SPL, the national team has failed to qualify for a single tournament. Meanwhile, two clubs (Gretna and Rangers) have been liquidated, another four have been in administration (Motherwell, Dunfermline, Dundee and Livingston, the latter two twice) and others teeter on the brink with unsustainable debts: Hearts, Kilmarnock, Aberdeen and Dundee United in that order. Other clubs (many now in debt and in the SFL) have impoverished themselves investing in stadium improvements to meet the criteria which were originally designed to maintain the exclusivity of the SPL “club”.

    The insistence that the SPL “vision” for the future of Scottish football is the one that must prevail is nauseating given the horrendous mess that this organisation has made of Scottish football. Reading Ralph Topping’s mince in the Herald the other day was sickening: possibly even worse than the dross spouted by Regan and Doncaster last summer.

    The SPL is comprised largely of a group of Chairmen and apparatchiks who are serial failures yet see themselves as the smartest guys in the room; it’s the banks in microcosm.

    It should really be time to dissolve the SPL, but sadly it is the SFL and with it any vestige of principle and integrity in Scottish fitba that is more likely to disappear.


  16. chipm0nk says:

    Wednesday, May 22, 2013 at 23:33 (Edit)

    If you are referring to my posts, and apologies if you are not, then it is public knowledge information, which the person has posted on the internet himself. It is freely available using whois.

    Are you seriously threatening to ban someone from your blog for duplicating that information.

    Again, apologies if you are not referring to my posts.
    ____________________________________________________________________

    I was referring to your posts – and public record or not, there will be no publication of any addresses on this blog.

    And that was no threat, but I am serious.


  18. I was copying an pasting public information from whois, as provided by the person themselves. As such I did not think I was doing anything wrong. I was not “outing” anyone who had sought privacy. I was merely copying information they themselves had made public.

    However as I have said before, it is your blog and as such your rules. Thank you for clearing the position up.

    I will take your warning in the spirit intended, I won’t do it again.


  21. jagsman

    Well spotted. The spl proposals are essentially about extending / preserving full time professional football to 2 leagues and to freshening up the lower leagues via a pyramid system. The proposal has nothing to do with helping Rangers , Hearts or Kilmarnock if they indeed need or want to jump a division or 2.

    The SPL will need to completely revamp it’s rule book re FFP and minimise the involvement of the SFA who are well the SFA.

    The record of the Scottish Football is one of managed decline with a few highlights during the Spl life , however the SFL existed during this same period and just existed.

    The SPL will get its own way and there will be 2 leagues for the betterment of the full time sport , nothing to do giving clubs a leg up.

    Anyway looking forward to the Glasgow derby next season


  22. Broadsword – Gaun yersel’

    Jagsman. Agree with the sentiment but would add:

    “The SPL strategy is clearly one of driving a wedge between the SFL1 clubs”

    Well it worked getting the 10 to go along with the 2 didn’t it!

    ” It would, at worst, be the scenario they had planned for Rangers: a single Division drop.”

    At no point did the authorities plan any such thing IMHO. It was in fact an option they deliberately ignored (as literally unthinkable) until too late and to the ultimate detriment of the very club they were trying to save.

    Apart from that I agree with what you say but would add that I would be genuinely surprised if the Shambles on Ed street got an invite now. Surprised. Not shocked, but surprised nonetheless.

    Finally just on Topping. I remember rumblings last year that William Hill were potentially compromised in so far as CW informed the SFA that RFC were polo mint. Meanwhile in the next office down the corridor the SPL Board member was gaily telling his WH staff to accept all bets on the league outcome. Did anyone in the MSM not think this was a tad strange at all?


  23. chipm0nk says:
    Thursday, May 23, 2013 at 00:01

    There but for the grace of god go I, I had just copied the who is page and was going to post when I saw you did

    TSFM – noted also. but there is a flaw in removing posts (you may or may not be aware of it) – if you have signed up for the RSS feed, you get the comments as they post and subsequent deleting does not affect those. Not sure if wordpress can cope with that scenario without moderating all posts? can you have the RSS feed only moderated?


  24. chipm0nk says:
    Wednesday, May 22, 2013 at 23:12

    John Paul Fraser, as detailed above is the registrant for

    http://www.otterhouseireland.com as well as holmedownstud.com as in Charles Green <cgreen@holmedownstud.com

    Is Charles Green <cgreen@holmedownstud.com a real email address, or a fabrication as in c.monk@giruy.com. Or is it a real one, in which case, what is holmedownstud.com and how is Charles Green linked to it.
    ===========================================================

    The link that Charles Green has to Holme Down is through HFG Ltd and hfg Ltd (both dissolved) whose company address was: Holme Down Estate, Exbourne, Okehampton. I realise that doesn't answer whether the email address is real or fake but it certainly establishes a link with 'Holme Down'.

    There is also a HolmeDown Highland Ponies run by Wendy Bridges which may well be near or in the estate but maybe not and it obviously might have absolutely no connection with Mr Green.

    I note the Newcastle address given by John Paul Fraser, the registrant of Holmedownstud.com, has recently seen a new company registered there on 12/03/2013: DIDDIU Ltd has two directors: Mrs Katherine Fraser, 27, and Ms Ugne Jekentaite, 29. The name is interesting 🙂


  25. 100bjd says:
    Wednesday, May 22, 2013 at 19:23

    “Simply Stockbrokers obviously having the ability to transfer the cash to Sevco 5088…or Sevco Scotland. Either way Ahmad had this deal totally stitched up from day one”.
    ————–

    So Simply Stockbrokers could have taken receipt of the monies for the Sevco 5088 shares detailed in Charlotte’s latest tweets, distributed the shares then failed to deposit the money with Sevco 5088? So if there was a Sevco 5088/Scotland switch then it might have been executed by Ahmad?

    Could they legitimately do this? Silly question in the circumstances but would this be theft of monies rightfully due to Sevco 5088 if it did happen? In which case I suspect Sevco 5088 would still be able to pursue Simply Stockbrokers for the money.

    Your knowledge of these matters overwhelms mine so I need make numerous requests for clarification.


  26. ecobhoy says:
    Thursday, May 23, 2013 at 00:43

    “…and Ms Ugne Jekentaite, 29. The name is interesting”.
    ————–

    Do you mean interesting or stupid?


  27. mullach says:
    Thursday, May 23, 2013 at 00:48

    ecobhoy says:
    Thursday, May 23, 2013 at 00:43

    “…and Ms Ugne Jekentaite, 29. The name is interesting”.
    ————–

    Do you mean interesting or stupid?
    =========================================

    I meant the name of the company which now appears to be most apt viz DIDDY U
    Sorry – I just couldn’t resist that 🙂

    However it would appear there is a Ms Ugne Jekentaite, who is probably Latvian, now living in the UK, who is a lawyer – probably trained in Latvia – and speaks Russian which was very common in the former Soviet Baltic Republics especially if you were an ethnic Russian. Of course the new company might be apropos of nothing.


  28. mullach says:
    Thursday, May 23, 2013 at 00:45

    100bjd says:
    Wednesday, May 22, 2013 at 19:23

    “Simply Stockbrokers obviously having the ability to transfer the cash to Sevco 5088…or Sevco Scotland. Either way Ahmad had this deal totally stitched up from day one”.
    ————–

    So Simply Stockbrokers could have taken receipt of the monies for the Sevco 5088 shares detailed in Charlotte’s latest tweets, distributed the shares then failed to deposit the money with Sevco 5088? So if there was a Sevco 5088/Scotland switch then it might have been executed by Ahmad?

    Could they legitimately do this? Silly question in the circumstances but would this be theft of monies rightfully due to Sevco 5088 if it did happen? In which case I suspect Sevco 5088 would still be able to pursue Simply Stockbrokers for the money.

    Your knowledge of these matters overwhelms mine so I need make numerous requests for clarification.
    +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

    If that is what happened I believe you are right to suggest that Sevco5088 could pursue Simply Stockbrokers for the money on the basis that they didn’t own it as well as asking the Police to investigate a fraud.

    I don’t recall what debt Sevco Scotland showed in the flotation prospectus – can any one answer this. Would Charlie and Ahmed have used Whyte’s money to buy the assets? or would they have borrowed from their own “investors” in the Far East and maybe that is where Orlit fit in. They were the replacement funders after Whyte was stiffed (if indeed he was)


  29. jings – if it wasn’t bad enough with the squirrels we’ve now got highland ponies running around here 🙂


  30. mullach says:
    Thursday, May 23, 2013 at 00:45

    On the wider issue we should always be careful of wording as I am sure there is no evidence that anyone has acted in anything but a professional manner.

    I am a bit puzzled by the paperwork in the sense that Barrington is meant to be an alias for CW and therefore I can see why he would have the letter from Sevco 5088 signed By Green.

    But I am not clear as to how he would have a copy of the letter to Blue Pitch Holdings who ended up the biggest shareholder in the original group of investors that bought the assets from D&P. That is a real puzzle.

    But there is another point. Would Barrington through Korissa Capital have been able to raise and remit £2.5 million as requested because if they had then they would have been a bigger % shareholder in the original consortium than Blue Pitch and they weren’t unless the information given out publicly a year ago was false or incorrect because Blue Pitch was only supposed to remit £2 million.

    And then we have Mr Ahmad’s position in that he could not instruct Simply Stockbroking to switch the money away from Sevco 5088 as he was not a shareholder of that company and did not become a shareholder of Sevco Scotland until 29/06/2012. The money was supposed to be transferred on 23/05/2012 and at that time the only director of Sevco 5088 (listed at Companies House) was Green.

    Green also incorporated Sevco Scotland on 29/05/2012 and it then becomes important to know not only to know if the money promised by Barrington/Korissa and Blue Pitch was ever sent but the date on which that happened.

    It’s possible that if Barrington/Korissa defaulted then Blue Pitch might have had to make-up the shortfall and that could well have caused a delay that took the deal past the 29/05/2012.

    And thereby lies the knub of the problem – if CW defaulted on paying the money them perhaps Green saw that he might need to protect himself through the use of a new company and a Scottish one rather than a Welsh one which also added a separate legal wall. Then we don’t know for sure that Green knew Whyte was Barrington/Korissa.

    We have tapes where Green tells Whyte he is Sevco when there was only Sevco 5088 but we don’t know as far as I am aware whether Green also knew that Whyte had another identity.


  32. broadswordcallingdannybhoy says:
    Wednesday, May 22, 2013 at 23:29

    Top post – sums up how I feel about the whole sorry episode. It gets to me that people will conspire to cheat. Ultimately we are dealing with common low life cheats.

    I have a free(ish) weekend coming up – must make some time to put in a FOISA request to the Scottish charity regulator OSCR to understand when the report into the RCF will be finalized: important that the public understand that this matter will be investigated and the outcomes published.

    There is also a very nice statutory instrument – the Environmental Information (Scotland) Regulations 2004 – they make FOISA tame in comparison – it is very difficult to withhold information under the EIRs. Every exception in the Regulations can only be applied after application of a public interest test – Regulation 10(b) and exceptions have also to be applied narrowly – and applied with a presumption that favors disclosure Regulation 10(2)(a) and (b).
    http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ssi/2004/520/regulation/10/made

    What type of environmental information would be of interest to internetbampots? I’m interested in whether there is a public safety risk of asbestos from a stadia that may be in need of repair. Now, that category of information would fall nicely into the second strand of the definition of environmental information as provided for by Regulation 2(b) of the EIRs.
    http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ssi/2004/520/regulation/2/made

    I am sure most clubs have invested monies to keep their stadia safe, and that has meant a sacrifice taking funds away from the team on the park to make the environment comfortable and safe for fans.

    Keep digging bampots, otherwise the truth may not see the light of day.


  33. scapaflow14 says:
    Wednesday, May 22, 2013 at 14:38

    Now Tom English is raising another potential issue with Charlotte’s material

    “Tom English ‏@TomEnglishSport 25s @TheTributeAct
    Can @CharlotteFakes ensure us that these documents were obtained legally?”
    ______________________

    Danish Pastry says:
    Wednesday, May 22, 2013 at 15:13

    True. The audio clips have more impact in that they’re easier to verify. If CW is doing this through Charlotte, isn’t it then just about trying to show how strong his position is to his rivals?

    It is sad that it has absolutely nothing to do with any of the higher motives of those who follow the case so closely via the blogs. But if bampots are indirectly helping his current cause perhaps he could be nice enough to help reveal the corruption in Scottish football governance! Then he might just become a hero, of sorts … you can always hope 🙂
    _______________________

    Can some of our bampot Twitterers ask Tom English ‏@TomEnglishSport if he [or any of his esteemed (sic) colleagues] has contacted the senders and recipients of the documents published by Charlotte to ask if those documents etc are genuine and if they are aware of how the documents etc came to be in her hands?

    If the RTC Twitter account did not TUPE over to TSFM what would it take to set up and maintain one to expand our reach?


  34. MICK DERRICK (@DERRYMICK) says:
    Wednesday, May 22, 2013 at 21:53
    7 0 Rate This

    Re the Hearts Scandinavian takeover. This of course has been mooted before. I seem to remember a guy called Kai Isaksen being involved. This guy also was responsible for getting 3rd div. Norwegian team mjøndalen a fake irn bru sponsorship deal which lost the club 50000 pounds. His company was SportConsulting under a holding company Sport strategy group based in Luxembourg.

    Norwegian link: http://dt.no/sport/mif/mif-utsatt-for-sponsorbloff-1.5342594

    Just thought I’d mention as I see easyjambo’s post mentions a similarly named company Crest SportConsulting.
    Worth checking out Kai.
    ————–

    Very odd story Mick. The team emphasize that they did not pay out any money to Isaksen but did end up with a £50,000 loss on their books from the expected income that had already been budgeted. According to the article, their loss was also due to them not seeking alternative shirt sponsorship, since they believed they had the NOR 500,000 deal with AG Barr in place. Funnily enough, Mjøndalen only found out because they personally contacted their new sponsor AG Barr!

    Isaksen’s side of the story, in a cross-linked article, is a little bit woolly – apparently the whole thing was part of some consultency training exercise.

    If he, or one of his sub companies is part of the Hearts’ Scandinavian connection someone had better be careful. After all, the SFA and SPL can not be relied upon to vet these people.

    What is Isaksen’s previous with Hearts?


  35. ecobhoy says:

    Wednesday, May 22, 2013 at 19:39

    100bjd says:
    Wednesday, May 22, 2013 at 19:23
    ——————————————————————

    You know this is getting more like Groundhog Day – we were here almost a year ago speculating and now we are actually seeing the documents that reinforce a lot of those speculations.

    Amazing how close we were – can you just imagine how easy it would have been for the MSM with its resources to have cracked this wide-open last year . But they didn’t want to know and that’s still their status quo. They truly ought to be ashamed of their unprincipled position
    —————————————————————————————————————————–

    Could not agree more Eco…


  36. Squirrels here, Squirrels there, Squirrels f…… you get the point. the MSM @TomEnglishSport being among them are being strangely pedantic about the CF releases, “are they legal” – from a court point of view – entirely reasonable question, but from a NEWS point of view – it does not matter even if they were stolen at knife point from someones Granny – does not make them less true! – the only question for the media is “are they fake?” everything else is the usual squirrel herding, so the better question from @TomEnglishSport is – are they legitimate?


  37. Hi Danish
    Thursday, May 23, 2013 at 06:47

    Isaksen has no previous with Hearts as far as I know however his name has been linked with the Scandinavian consortium in the past.

    The reason for the 50000 pounds loss was simply that Isaksen had asked that Irn Bru be the main sponsor on the back and front of the strip. The club then asked their main sponsor at the time if it was possible to step aside and make way for the Irn Bru logo. They agreed thinking that Mjøndalen would receive more money than they were willing to put in. The sponsorship lasted the whole season and no money was received. Basically loss of income from their legit sponsorship deal. – source head of the Mjøndalen supporters club.


  38. MICK DERRICK (@DERRYMICK) says:
    Thursday, May 23, 2013 at 07:16
    1 0 Rate This

    Hi Danish
    Thursday, May 23, 2013 at 06:47

    Isaksen has no previous with Hearts as far as I know however his name has been linked with the Scandinavian consortium in the past.

    The reason for the 50000 pounds loss was simply that Isaksen had asked that Irn Bru be the main sponsor on the back and front of the strip. The club then asked their main sponsor at the time if it was possible to step aside and make way for the Irn Bru logo. They agreed thinking that Mjøndalen would receive more money than they were willing to put in. The sponsorship lasted the whole season and no money was received. Basically loss of income from their legit sponsorship deal. – source head of the Mjøndalen supporters club.
    ———–

    Cheers Mick, I understood they were looking for a new sponsor after promotion, the bit about dumping the previous sponsor I didn’t read, but if true, that only makes things worse. So did they actually play with the Irn Bru logo for a full season?

    The article says that the then importers of Irn Bru to Norway were also duped. Seems incredible.


  39. the money promised by Barrington/Korissa and Blue Pitch was ever sent but the date on which that happened.

    It’s possible that if Barrington/Korissa defaulted then Blue Pitch might have had to make-up the shortfall and that could well have caused a delay that took the deal past the 29/05/2012.

    And thereby lies the knub of the problem – if CW defaulted on paying the money them perhaps Green saw that he might need to protect himself through the use of a new company and a Scottish one rather than a Welsh one which also added a separate legal wall. Then we don’t know for sure that Green knew Whyte was Barrington/Korissa.
    ——————————————————————————————————————-
    Eco,
    I am with you on this. CW as usual did not stump up and thought they could not change horses from 5088. Ahmad risked (and we have seen his history plus his recent shocking behaviour) circumventing Whyte with the Sevco Scotland tactic. Whyte then waited for the ultimate time to strike back which was at the IPO launch. Sevco had committed to the IPO (they needed to as they were running out of working capital) so Craigy basically said pay me or I am going to expose what you have done.
    This tactic seems to have failed, surprisingly, although any large amount of “recompense” claimed by Craigy would have been the subject of a board discussion and agreement. I will leave the conjecture there at that point!
    Charlotte seems to be continuing to tease RIFC PLC along the same lines as the alleged previous tactic with presumably the end game being “pay up and I will not release the really important documents that might get you a free pass to the Bar L. This tactic can only in a winning scenario for Craigy, be serviced/agreed by the people at RIFC or who were at RIFC who have something to lose……THE SPIVS…..which is a possible answer for why Stocksbridge is declaring himself neutral when he is patently Ahmads man and we see an EGM requisition to replace two non Green/Ahmad figures with two pro Green/Ahmad people. They need to control the board and shut Charlotte up.

    As ever Eco we will see although we have made progress and I am sure truth will prevail.


  40. “Tom English ‏@TomEnglishSport 25s @TheTributeAct
    Can @CharlotteFakes ensure us that these documents were obtained legally?”

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

    Tom me boy, think of Charlotte as Scottish Football’s version of Wikileaks, now show some cojones and publish.


  41. sanoffymessssoitizzhizzemdyfonedrapolis says:
    bayviewgold says:

    Done!

    Exiled Celt ‏@The_Exiled_Celt 9s
    @TomEnglishSport @paucoyle @TheTributeAct @Barcabhoy1 @CharlotteFakes Tom – have you asked any named in the docs if they are fake or not?


  42. georgiovasari says:
    Wednesday, May 22, 2013 at 21:55

    I seldom post on this wonderful symposium but felt I had to respond to a commentary at around 18.24 by Night Terror? Ridiculous observation and zooming of the highest order ;

    ‘The SFA or any governing body would have an impossible job in vetting prospective owners of football clubs. Investigating their past record, wealth, moral fibre, associations with other people of note etc – it’s just not possible for them to do that.’

    This is 2013 for goodness sake! Of course it is Possible to probe and investigate if the custodians of our game adhere to the policies and rules they are the pioneers of.

    Aye,… it’s an ‘impossible’ job,… when convenient right enough.

    No offence, but I read the NT post in Ricky Fulton styleee which took me back to the days when I was naïve enough to believe mostly everything that emanated from the Blazered cloistered corridors of power down Hampden way and we thought the irony was funny!
    Not any more.

    Everything is possible if you want it enough so get the flaming truth out now!

    Glad I managed to lure you out of the woodwork, giorgiovasari.

    And you know what? You’re right. It is 2013, and it is Possible to probe and investigate. Ricky Fulton was good and everything is possible if you want it enough, and I am prone to zooming – like a jet fighter!

    I will have to have a rethink.

    BRB


  43. jagsman says:
    Wednesday, May 22, 2013 at 23:34
    …………………………

    Jagsman…..they didn’t fall 3 divisions….the situation was that a new club had to apply for entry to the SFL..

    Unless they create a new rule that states a new club can take the place of a liquidated club..at the same level the liquidated was positioned…then any new club will still have to apply for entry and will still have to start at the bottom if granted…as long as they meet the qualifying criteria for entry…which SEVCO did not!

    I would not be surprised if any new changes to the rules are designed to assist the new club should a liquidated event happen to them..


  44. I have sympathy with the SFA in regard to “fit and proper person” tests and pronouncements of “what they should have done” in the light of what we now know.

    The SFA or any governing body would have a very difficult job in vetting prospective owners of football clubs. Investigating their past record, wealth, moral fibre, associations with other people of note etc – it’s just not possible for them to do that without access to infinite time and resources.

    It is not realistic to expect the SFA to do such detailed background checks – buying shares in a football club is not like you’re applying to run MI6 – and if such a test was in place, the SFA could be opening themselves up to legal problems if it turns out a bad egg slipped through their seive. If they did happen to sniff out a bad egg in the course of some comprehensive “fit & proper” vetting and prevented the reputed billionaire from investing in Scottish football, imagine the uproar.

    If a club is prepared to get involved with people of questionable history, that is up to them. So long as they are liable for the full efffects of their mistakes rather than being insulated from them by an overly accommodating governing body, that’s the only way I can see it working.


  45. Great story carried on yesterday’s SSB podcast about ‘Martin’, the Dortmund-Celtic fan who members of a Celtic forum arranged a CL Final ticket for. I’m sure Celts fans are aware of this but it was news to me. Seventy fans giving £10 each to buy this lad a ticket from ebay is superb. Feel good story par excellence.


  46. Danish Pastry says:

    Wednesday, May 22, 2013 at 20:12

    100bjd says:
    Wednesday, May 22, 2013 at 19:23
    12 0 Rate This
    ————-

    Fascinating stuff @100bjd, also your previous blog that you linked to a few posts back. Thanks for that.

    What’s you’re overall take on CF’s docs as of now? Authentic or authenticity in doubt?
    ———————————————————————————————————————

    Authentic


  47. In defence of NT, many employers out there ask you to sign forms to say you have no criminal record and have never declared bankrupt, bad credit etc – especially when working in financial places.

    Now how many of these folks actually verify that what you have signed is correct?

    I can tell you – not many!

    I can tell you a story of someone who signed this (said no) when he got a job after getting out of jail the prior month and this past was only discovered when he got into bother again.

    Most of these items are to cover the employer who – as Ticketus said in court – they expected CW to tell the truth. Their signature is enough – no one actually does background checks or runs credit reports on anyone being hired. Even your references are seldom checked – because they are limited in what they can say anyway.

    Just say SR called around and spoke to a bloke who claims he saw CW/CG say – in Zurich (as our friend Corsica attested to) – would he have the right to tell a member club – sorry you cannot have him as the CEO? Would the TRFC fans not go nuts? This whole argument of SFA being the watchdog is laughable – they themselves said once you do something, it cannot be undone even if proven illegal.


  48. easyJambo says:

    Wednesday, May 22, 2013 at 20:19

    Rate This

    I see that Vicast Ltd (directors include ex RFC directors and employees) posted a RES01 and SH01 at Companies House in the last few days. Can anyone with access tell us if there is anything of note in these documents?

    Type Date Document Description
    SH01 17/05/2013 15/05/13 STATEMENT OF CAPITAL GBP 1891.86

    LATEST SOC 17/05/2013 17/05/13 STATEMENT OF CAPITAL;GBP 1891.86

    RES01 17/05/2013 ADOPT ARTICLES 15/05/2013

    AP01 12/04/2013 DIRECTOR APPOINTED MR JOHN FERGUSON MCCLELLAND

    SH01 11/02/2013 08/02/13 STATEMENT OF CAPITAL GBP 1342.86

    RES11 11/02/2013 DISAPPLICATION OF PRE-EMPTION RIGHTS

    AP01 08/02/2013 DIRECTOR APPOINTED MR PAUL MURRAY

    SH02 24/10/2012 SUB-DIVISION
    17/10/12

    RES01 24/10/2012 ADOPT ARTICLES 17/10/2012

    RES13 24/10/2012 1 ORD SHARES OF £1 BE SUB DIVIDED INTO 100 ORD SHARES OF £0.01 17/10/2012

    SH01 23/10/2012 17/10/12 STATEMENT OF CAPITAL GBP 1000

    CERTNM 23/10/2012 COMPANY NAME CHANGED LEMAC NO. 6 LIMITED
    CERTIFICATE ISSUED ON 23/10/12

    RES15 23/10/2012 CHANGE OF NAME 17/10/2012

    NM01 23/10/2012 NOTICE OF CHANGE OF NAME BY RESOLUTION

    AP01 23/10/2012 DIRECTOR APPOINTED NICOLA YOUNG

    AP01 23/10/2012 DIRECTOR APPOINTED MR MARTIN EDWARD BAIN

    TM01 23/10/2012 APPOINTMENT TERMINATED, DIRECTOR PETER WATSON

    NEWINC 09/10/2012 CERTIFICATE OF INCORPORATION
    GENERAL COMPANY DETAILS & STATEMENTS OF;
    OFFICERS, CAPITAL & SHAREHOLDINGS, GUARANTEE, COMPLIANCE
    MEMORANDUM OF ASSOCIATION

    MODEL ARTICLES 09/10/2012 MODEL ARTICLES ADOPTED: PRIVATE LIMITED BY SHARES


  49. bjd

    So what we are looking at is Korissa making this one appearance (yesterdays leak), not putting the money up and then dissappearing ?
    I assume if that is the case, the claim by CF that RBarrington was in fact CW becomes irrelevant.

    As mentioned by Eco, the shortfall may have been taken up by BPH which could help explain why they currently hold 4M shares (according to Rangers official website), opposed to the 2M mentioned in the placing document released yesterday.

    The Simply Stockbrocking link with Ahmad is there but it proves nothing.

    So unless anyone can clearly point to a specific from yesterday´s leaks, they were more pieces in a jigsaw but alone were not particularly significant.

    I say this after seeing that David Low tweeted that yesterday´s leaks were ‘dynamite’ (if genuine). So if I´m wrong can someone point to the significant please.


  50. chipm0nk says:

    Wednesday, May 22, 2013 at 22:22

    I see there is an email address – Charles Green <cgreen@holmedownstud.com

    What is holmedownstud.com, does anyone know.
    ————————————————————————————————————————–
    This was Charlies farm in Devon where he lived with his wife (now ex) Ashley and lots of horses. Now lives in France with lots of horses.


  51. Exiled Celt (@The_Exiled_Celt) says:
    Thursday, May 23, 2013 at 07:54

    Thanks!

    I’m looking forward to his reply 🙂


  52. Night Terror says:
    Thursday, May 23, 2013 at 08:02
    1 0 Rate This

    … If a club is prepared to get involved with people of questionable history, that is up to them. So long as they are liable for the full efffects of their mistakes rather than being insulated from them by an overly accommodating governing body, that’s the only way I can see it working.
    ————-

    @NT
    The lack of confidence in the governing bodies notwithstanding, I reckon it’s perhaps more difficult to get on the scent of really dodgy businessmen in 2013 because they are now so good at hiding behind a number of companies and disguising their motives. Dodgy business is a business. The story about Kai Isaksen above and Mjøndalen is a good example. And some of the stuff in England is very odd too.

    I agree with you that clubs must be less naive and get involved. Although the new reality of the ‘business that owns the club’ has thrown up the bizarre situation where the ‘football club’ has been distanced from the financial side. It’s an utter nonsense of course, as though a club can exist in a financial vacuum, but a convenient interpretation for some. In theory, a club could win five championships in a row on the back of the proceeds of drug trafficking and racketeering, and when discovered there would be no sporting consequences. In times past, a club may have given up titles won out of a sense of honour and fair play. Would that happen today?


  53. Danish Pastry
    Thursday, May 23, 2013 at 07:25
    Yes Danish, they sponsored them for the whole season. It is bizzare and I really don’t know what Isaksen would have gained from this scam- Walter Mitty?


  54. 100bjd says:

    Thursday, May 23, 2013 at 08:27

    Rate Up

    Quantcast
    chipm0nk says:

    Wednesday, May 22, 2013 at 22:22

    I see there is an email address – Charles Green <cgreen@holmedownstud.com

    What is holmedownstud.com, does anyone know.
    ————————————————————————————————————————–
    This was Charlies farm in Devon where he lived with his wife (now ex) Ashley and lots of horses. Now lives in France with lots of horses.
    **********

    And lots of money (allegedly)


  55. ecobhoy says:

    chipm0nk says:
    Wednesday, May 22, 2013 at 23:12

    John Paul Fraser, as detailed above is the registrant for

    http://www.otterhouseireland.com as well as holmedownstud.com as in Charles Green <cgreen@holmedownstud.com

    Is Charles Green <cgreen@holmedownstud.com a real email address, or a fabrication as in c.monk@giruy.com. Or is it a real one, in which case, what is holmedownstud.com and how is Charles Green linked to it.
    ===========================================================
    ecobhoy

    The link that Charles Green has to Holme Down is through HFG Ltd and hfg Ltd (both dissolved) whose company address was: Holme Down Estate, Exbourne, Okehampton. I realise that doesn't answer whether the email address is real or fake but it certainly establishes a link with 'Holme Down'.

    There is also a HolmeDown Highland Ponies run by Wendy Bridges which may well be near or in the estate but maybe not and it obviously might have absolutely no connection with Mr Green.

    I note the Newcastle address given by John Paul Fraser, the registrant of Holmedownstud.com, has recently seen a new company registered there on 12/03/2013: DIDDIU Ltd has two directors: Mrs Katherine Fraser, 27, and Ms Ugne Jekentaite, 29.
    ==============================================================

    Having slept on this one I've realised that the connection between John Paul Fraser being the domain registrant for otterhouseireland.com and holmedownstud.com might lie in the fact that Otterhouse and Holmedown Estate are both prestigious very expensive properties which have dedicated websites advertising them for sale although in the price range involved they don't 'advertise' if you get my drift.

    So it could be that Mr Fraser is incidental in the affair – I know, I know it still doesn't prove whether Green's email address is fake or real but at least it has led us to a connection between Green and Holmedown.


  56. broadswordcallingdannybhoy says:
    Thursday, May 23, 2013 at 07:52
    ——————————————-
    There are two questions that a journalist needs to ask – is a document genuine and was it obtained legally? If the answer to either is “no” or simply not known, a good journalist will not run with it.

    Only recently a top firm of accountants got into serious bother when it was found to be holding records of telephone conversations regarding the bidding war between Spurs and West Ham. Whilst the records were genuine, they had been illegally obtained and passed to a partner at the firm who I think were acting for West Ham at the time.

    I am willing to stand corrected but I believe the partner concerned is no longer with that firm – being in possession of something obtained illegally rarely does anyone any good.

    As things stand, more people have read/are aware of CtH than would ever be the case if the Scotsman had the story as an exclusive. Ignore the MSM, they are increasingly irrelevant and they know it. Hence their lashing out and determination to resurrect the corpse, as if it could suddenly start playing “like it’s 1999…..”

    In the words of the Jule Styne song (a Frank Skerritt favourite) “The party’s over, it’s time to call it a day….”

    54 (hours from Tulse Hill)


  57. mullach says:

    Wednesday, May 22, 2013 at 23:13

    newtz says:
    Wednesday, May 22, 2013 at 21:48

    “was ok with that, then tead Paul McC topic on this…(disapplication of pre-emption rights)”.
    —————–

    I know almost nothing about company law but if your brain’s stuck in neutral I’ll throw in tuppence to see if it will kick back into gear.

    The pre-emption rights are the rights of existing shareholders to be offered a new allocation of shares before they are offered for wider sale (I read briefly). So the disapplication is presumably a circumvention of this right.

    If Green wanted to dilute Sevco 5088 shareholding so he could take control (by allying with a purchaser of the new shares), then not telling CW/IA via the disapplication would alllow this to happen surreptitiously I presume. The document on Paul Mc’s site link has the two critical resolutions blanked out so the detail is obviosly obscure.

    Not sure if that is of any assistance. I have no insight to this topic, just a simple working of logic for you to nibble on.
    —————————————————————————————————————————–

    Guys the dissapplication of pre exemption rights works as follows-; If Newtz and Mullach have a company with two equal shares they will usually have pre emption rights.Therefore if any new shares need to be created in the business the existing shareholders must be offered the right to buy the shares thus preventing them from being diluted. When you and newtz start a company specifically to raise finance, this is usually referred to as an SPV or special purpose vehicle, then you are not interested in being diluted. You actually need to be diluted to raise funds by creating more shares in the company. Hence you need to cancel the original dilution protection clause in your shareholder agreement which is the famous “disapplication of pre-emption rights”.

    Hope this clears things up


  58. 100bjd says:
    Thursday, May 23, 2013 at 08:27

    chipm0nk says:

    Wednesday, May 22, 2013 at 22:22

    I see there is an email address – Charles Green <cgreen@holmedownstud.com

    What is holmedownstud.com, does anyone know.
    ————————————————————————————————————————–
    This was Charlies farm in Devon where he lived with his wife (now ex) Ashley and lots of horses. Now lives in France with lots of horses.
    =========================================================

    Have you noticed that on Companies House the director details for Ashley Ryder refer to Mr Ashley Ryder. You can imagine my surprise when I googled the name – I won't give the game away but I nearly fainted 🙂

    I'm sure Companies House as usual have got it wrong but at some stage today I'll pull up one of her directorship forms just to make sure – checking and double and then triple checking is the key here.

    Btw 100BJD what do you think about what I said at:

    ecobhoy says:
    Thursday, May 23, 2013 at 01:44

    about the issue over CW apparently having the Blue Pitch letter. It initially made me feel 'fake' but could CW actually be involved with Blue Pitch because if he is then I would say that is an absolute killer blow to Green and Ahmad and the SFA – much more so than legal technicalities over who did what, when and how with Sevco 5088.


  59. Slim
    As things stand, more people have read/are aware of CtH than would ever be the case if the Scotsman had the story as an exclusive. Ignore the MSM, they are increasingly irrelevant and they know it.
    ————————–

    What you say doesn´t really stand-up.

    If you asked the majority on here if they´d rather see Charlotte´s output appear as it has or published with accompanying verification and anaylsis in a newspaper, quickly spreading amongst all and sundry provoking responses from the main players, then it would be the latter.

    The MSM are a lot of things, mostly negative but they are not yet irrelevant.


  60. This should be simple for the SFA.

    Did the Ibrox Club lie to them? If so, the consequences should be severe, and it doesn’t matter who it was that was speaking for the club when they made a porky.

    If the SFA think the IC lied to them, they should be doing everything in their power to find out rather than waiting for the IC to admit it or someone else of whatever agenda revealing it.

    It’s not a matter of looking up the rulebook. It’s a matter of lying. Did they or didn’t they?

    If the SFA can’t handle that then they are in a very bad way.


  61. MICK DERRICK (@DERRYMICK) says:
    Thursday, May 23, 2013 at 08:33
    2 0 Rate This

    Danish Pastry
    Thursday, May 23, 2013 at 07:25

    Yes Danish, they sponsored them for the whole season. It is bizzare and I really don’t know what Isaksen would have gained from this scam- Walter Mitty?
    ———–

    There are a few scenarios that suggest themselves.

    * The local Norwegian importers of Irn Bru were not as duped as they say. Maybe chancers hoping for a big distribution deal with a major chain that would have made money available to pay the bogus sponsorship

    * Isaksen was hoping to skim off an arrangement fee or hoping AG Barr would pay, after the fact, out of a sense of moral responsibility

    * It all happened as he said because they were all hopeless amateurs

    The story says the import of Irn Bru was too expensive and is no longer distributed in Norway. The lesson for Hearts fans is to check the guy’s track record. Bit I’m sure they are already doing that.


  62. Danish Pastry says:
    Thursday, May 23, 2013 at 08:33

    Night Terror says:
    Thursday, May 23, 2013 at 08:02
    1 0 Rate This

    … If a club is prepared to get involved with people of questionable history, that is up to them. So long as they are liable for the full efffects of their mistakes rather than being insulated from them by an overly accommodating governing body, that’s the only way I can see it working.
    ————-

    @NT
    The lack of confidence in the governing bodies notwithstanding, I reckon it’s perhaps more difficult to get on the scent of really dodgy businessmen in 2013 because they are now so good at hiding behind a number of companies and disguising their motives. Dodgy business is a business. The story about Kai Isaksen above and Mjøndalen is a good example. And some of the stuff in England is very odd too.

    I agree with you that clubs must be less naive and get involved. Although the new reality of the ‘business that owns the club’ has thrown up the bizarre situation where the ‘football club’ has been distanced from the financial side. It’s an utter nonsense of course, as though a club can exist in a financial vacuum, but a convenient interpretation for some.

    I agree.

    If the clubs are aware that a poorly vetted owner, shareholder or board member could have dire consequences for the club and that the national association or league will not help them, that is the biggest realistic deterrent to unquestioningly accepting money.

    I’m not sure it will stop clubs making such poor decisions, certainly not all of them, but I don’t see any other workable alternative.

    The negatives of such an approach is that you could and probably will see large clubs plummeting down the leagues or disappearing, only to be reanimated in a similar guise at the bottom level and working their way up. Some safeguarding against the circumstances that brought Airdrie Utd to life at the expense of Clydebank could be in order to prevent a big club averting the consequences of a liquidation by buying a small club and rebranding it.

    The plus side is that it’s a relatively simple approach and pushes the responsibility for doing things correctly and thoroughly down to those who stand to lose most if they don’t do their job properly – the club. In particular, I would like to see fan groups, preferaby in supporter trust form, being inside this process, rather than on the outside shouting “Don’t ask questions, just take his money and spend it!”.


  64. greenockjack says:
    Thursday, May 23, 2013 at 09:00
    ——————————————–
    “The MSM…………….are not yet irrelevant.”

    That’s your view and you’re entitled to it. It is not one I share.

    35 years ago, when I started buying papers, nearly everyone I knew bought one – mostly the Record, a few the Express or Mail and a few the Herald (this was the west of Scotland and in those days no-one from these parts bought the Scotsman and neither the Sun nor Mirror published north of the border).

    Today I can count on one hand amongst a wide circle of family, friends and acquaintances, those that buy a daily newspaper and few if any look at the tabloid websites. I would only view the Herald website if it paid me (rather than the other way round) though I occasionally flick through the Scotsman site.

    My experience is similar to others I have spoken to so in that sense my perspective on what is going on in Scottish football is formed entirely without reference to anything that the discredit bunch of hacks may print or publish.

    The newpaper businesses in Scotland are on as sound a financial footing as the club presently playing out of Ibrox.


  65. ecobhoy says:

    Thursday, May 23, 2013 at 08:41

    ecobhoy says:

    chipm0nk says:
    Wednesday, May 22, 2013 at 23:12

    John Paul Fraser, as detailed above is the registrant for

    http://www.otterhouseireland.com as well as holmedownstud.com as in Charles Green <cgreen@holmedownstud.com

    Is Charles Green <cgreen@holmedownstud.com a real email address, or a fabrication as in c.monk@giruy.com. Or is it a real one, in which case, what is holmedownstud.com and how is Charles Green linked to it.
    ===========================================================
    Eco,
    I knew that Green lived in Devon with Ashley and had lots of horses, including of course the legendary Blue Nose! I therefore concluded sloppily that Holmesdown Stud was his home. Obviously I need to get a whole new career in the MSM. However one of Charlie's adresses was

    COOMBE FARM JACOBSTOWE
    OKEHAMPTON
    UNITED KINGDOM
    EX20 3RH

    Coombe Farm and Holmesdown Stud are 20 miles apart. Coombe Farm is now up for rent!


  66. Night Terror

    The SFA failed completely in their oversight of ownership at Rangers..

    Look at the timeline.

    Look at what the SFA knew or should have known as absolute fact

    1 David Murray had been trying to sell for a number of years. By Murray’s own admission this dates back to 2007.

    2 On 9th June 2010 Rangers reported to the stock market, Andrew Ellis was in negotiation to buy the club. On the 16th June 2010, Murray reported the deal was off and the club wasn’t for sale.

    Conclusion ……..despite Murray making it very publicly known Rangers were for sale, there wasn’t a buyer (credible or otherwise) for over 3 years . This despite the fact Rangers are a well known brand in football, and have some wealthy and successful and credible supporters. That should been Red Flag #1 at the SFA

    3 Craig Whyte appears on the scene in 2011. A 5 minute( literally 5 minute) check of his company history would have revealed involvement , either as Director or Owner or Both, with a very large number of failed business’ . Whyte also is unable to demonstrate where and how he earned “billionaire status” and in fact his holding company is based in he BVI, where it is completely hidden from scrutiny. That was Red Flag #2

    4 The board at Rangers , chaired by Alastair Johnston, made very public comment over Whyte’s lack of suitability. This board included individuals, who themselves had been former members of the SFA and SPL. That was Red Flag #3

    Having ignored 3 very obvious red flags over Whyte , the SFA approved him as fit and proper when he buys Rangers for £1 on May 6th 2011. Less than a year later , they have banned him for life, demonstrating clearly the lax and casual nature of their previous decision to approve him as fit and proper.

    Move forward to Greens ownership. The pattern is very similar , that should be alarmingly similar to the SFA.

    1 The credible potential buyers , including Bill Miller and The Blue Knights either walk away from the opportunity or can’t get close to it. Red Flag #1 for the SFA

    2 Exactly as with Whyte, Green appears out of nowhere. His business credentials are every bit as patchy, vague and as lacking in any obvious financial success as Whyte’s were . Red Flag #2 for the SFA

    3 The ownership of Greens consortium is hidden in various impenetrable offshore domains , in exactly the same way Whyte’s was. Red Flag #3 for the SFA

    4 The acquisition vehicle changes from Sevco 5088 to Sevco Scotland. Was this questioned by the SFA and if not this is yet another potential red flag.

    Yet despite 3 obvious Red Flags the SFA deem Green fit and proper. Less than a year later he is embroiled in multiple scandals including racism, deception , and evidence mounts that there may a serious case to answer over every aspect of his involvement with Rangers.

    The SFA are now reported to have approved Dave King as fit and proper, and have made no comment or taken any action over the moves by a jailed fraudster and his brother to gain control .

    All of this in an organisation headed by David Murray’s EBT beneficiary. The same individual who claimed not to know of side letters in players contracts, despite being company secretary and responsible for managing all matters between Rangers and the SFA.

    Anyone see a flaw in a strong legal defence , if investors in the IPO come looking for their money back


  67. Eco,
    Yes I know what you mean about Ashley Ryder! Please be assured that Ashley is a nice girl who apparently found a new love at some stud or other! As far as Blue Pitch is concerned Whyte may or not be involved although my educated guess would be in the negative. I am still on the Ahmad sevco 5088/Sevco switcheroo plan with CW (Charlotte) trying to get a piece of the action. I am working from home ( ie not so hard) hence my appearance this morning. Hope you are well


  68. ecobhoy says:
    Thursday, May 23, 2013 at 01:44

    “…if CW defaulted on paying the money them perhaps Green saw that he might need to protect himself through the use of a new company and a Scottish one rather than a Welsh one which also added a separate legal wall”.
    —————

    Thanks foe the note of caution concerning my speculative remarks.

    I notice further posts on this but will address your points independently.

    I can see the logic of your thought process concerning Blue Pitch Holdings becoming a larger shareholder than Charlotte’s latest documents suggest. I don’t have the same grasp of this as you appear to have. One point concerning the dates though and the companies House entries which are suspect with regard to currency. I quote yoo :

    “The money was supposed to be transferred on 23/05/2012 and at that time the only director of Sevco 5088 (listed at Companies House) was Green”.

    However the following documenti genuine, has CW and Aidan Earley as directors on 9th May 2012.

    http://www.scribd.com/doc/142190916/Board-Meeting-9-May-2012

    Not sure how this would affect your scenario.


  69. Has CO paid back his EBT?

    It has just occurred to that technically the EBT was a loan.

    If he still owes the trust money then this might help explain his lack of action


  70. Another day in Sevco land
    And things no clearer where we stand.
    Walter has not walked the walk
    And Charlotte has not talked the talk.
    Guff & Help are in the clear
    Can BDO, to us, endear?
    TSFM has much espied
    Still we know not who has lied.

    The MSM have gone to seed
    They know not how to pull the weed
    Can we expect a bit of news ?
    We can, but hope, to gain amuse
    The SFA have gone all quiet
    Perhaps they fear a Summer riot.
    Another season to which we head on
    A big long Hedge, and Armageddon.


  71. Slim

    I don´t dispute that newspapers are on the slippery slope but you gave a specific example regarding Charlotte and the current state of play which IMO was more wishful thinking rather than accurate.

    This is manifested by many on this site being frustrated that the MSM don´t act on CF´s leaks. I cite you the example of the tweet to Tom English asking him if he has asked those named for comment.

    If the MSM were so irrelevant, they wouldn´t be mentioned on here so much.

    Generally (not only Scottish Football), they maintain an influential role and will do until the time when the majority realise how the ‘game’ is played and how they are being manipulated.
    The day that happens, I´ll eat my hat.

    Even if people did wake-up, the real power would find ways to adapt.


  72. slimshady61 says:
    Thursday, May 23, 2013 at 08:44

    broadswordcallingdannybhoy says:
    Thursday, May 23, 2013 at 07:52
    ——————————————-
    There are two questions that a journalist needs to ask – is a document genuine and was it obtained legally? If the answer to either is “no” or simply not known, a good journalist will not run with it.

    Only recently a top firm of accountants got into serious bother when it was found to be holding records of telephone conversations regarding the bidding war between Spurs and West Ham. Whilst the records were genuine, they had been illegally obtained and passed to a partner at the firm who I think were acting for West Ham at the time.

    I am willing to stand corrected but I believe the partner concerned is no longer with that firm – being in possession of something obtained illegally rarely does anyone any good.
    ====================================================================

    A really good journalist if he is given a document which he establishes as false will go to the person, company or organisation being the subject of ‘attack’ and ‘sell’ them the idea it’s better to get it all out in the open with a story sympathetic to them. Even if they say no it’s still a good story revealing the machinations and hopefully being able to identify the perpetrator into the bargain. So it’s not the case that false documents stories don’t run.

    Also with information obtained illegally, whether in a criminal or civil sense, there is no bar to using the information especially if it meets the public interest defence. Many ‘whistleblowing’ stories fall into that category and it wouldn’t make sense to think they shouldn’t be published.

    Where a problem can arise is if the media organisation itself has directly stolen or commissioned the stealing of info and gets caught such as in the recent phone-hacking cases. The organisation concerned must, under these circumstances, have had a very strong public interest defence.

    In reality things are much simpler because a little game is played between the media and police. Both want the info and both want to use it for their own purposes. So the media organisation hands over the info – which an anonymous phone call to the office had tipped-off the location – to the police after having copied everything. There will be a little horse-trading with the police over things they want kept secret and sometimes an agreement over timing of publication. But that is often more observed in the breach because the journos know that the usage window for the info might be short if the police make an arrest and charge someone.

    So the story tends to be run quickly accompanied by platitudes about the media organisation handing over its file or when being very pompous its ‘dossier’ as part of its public duty. The other thing is that the informant can often get twitchy if the story doesn’t immediately appear as they have no idea of the actual mechanics involved so they might go elsewhere to a rival.

    In the old days it was the ubiquitous brown envelope and then became a stuffed Tesco bag but in the age of global warming it’s more likely to be a memory stick 🙂

    That’s the reality rather than the theory and sports journos just don’t have a clue how to tango and don’t have either the necessary police contacts or be trusted by the police. Bottom line is this is an information ‘game’ and serious operators play it.

    The Charlotte fakes material is being blocked at high levels – it’s nothing to do with sports journos suddenly deciding to be the guardians of public morality. This story since Day 1 has been left to sports journos – news reporters, investigative journos and serious business reporters have been kept well away.

    The reason is quite simply that 99% of sports journos are incapable of fully understanding the story let alone carrying out an in-depth forensic investigation into it and the 2 or three in Scotland that are, know it would be the kiss of death to their careers as they would just be shut-out of the loop in future. No more spoon-fed succulent lamb and as most can’t find their own sports exclusives that’s a serious threat to their lifestyle.

    The word is coming from the Establishment to the editors and possibly even above them and it’s to back-off although the odd tit-bit is allowed to preserve the fiction we have a free press. I actually feel sorry for the likes of TE – he’s a decent-enough duffer and he knows there’s a story out there he can’t touch so he tries to cover his shame with puerile nonsense. Others of course are only too happy not to have to write stories about their club – but that’s another matter.


  74. myself and aweeboydiditandranaway will be in Barcelona over the holiday weekend and i wondered how easy/difficult it would be to see the Scottish Cup Final…

    i can’t imagine the place will be agog with excitement in anticipation of our showpiece final although if, for example, a team with a 500m worldwide fan base were contesting said game things i’m sure would be very different…

    our accommodation is close to las ramblas, which i know is a long street, but if anyone on here could point me in the direction of a friendly hostelry in the general area in which to watch the game i would be very grateful…


  75. greenockjack says:
    Thursday, May 23, 2013 at 08:26

    “I say this after seeing that David Low tweeted that yesterday´s leaks were ‘dynamite’ (if genuine). So if I´m wrong can someone point to the significant please”
    —————-

    You have as good an understanding of the situation as I have. The overall significance of the documents is that they are pieces of the jigsaw. They may not clarify the overall picture significantly but bit by bit it is slowly emerging.

    If there was any wow factor it was the implied intrinsic linkeage between Sevco 5088 and the business and assets of RFC (IL). However ecobhoy and 100bjd are showing that other interpretations might be placed upon the evidence and are actively considering the alternative scenarios.

    The lesson is that if Charlotte is releasing information in an attempt to mislead, it may not have the desired effect. It may in fact just provide further clues concerning ‘the truth’.

    Signficant? Possibly. Interesting? Yes.

Comments are closed.