A Blog for Scottish Football Monitor by Stuart Cosgrove
At the height of summer of discontent I was asked to contribute to a BBC radio show with Jim Traynor and Jim Spence. ‘Armageddon’ had just been pronounced and if the media were to be believed Scotland was about to freeze over in a new ice-age: only a cold darkness lay ahead.
To get the radio-show off to a healthy and pretentious start I began by saying that Scottish football was experiencing an “epistemological break”. It was an in-joke with Jim Spence, who I have known since we were both teenage ‘suedeheads.’ I was a mouthy young St Johnstone fan and Jim was an Arabian sand-dancer. But even in those distant days, we shared a mutual distrust of the ‘old firm’ and in our separate ways wanted a better future for our clubs. We both grew up to become products of the fanzine era, Jim as a writer for Dundee United’s ‘The Final Hurdle’ and me as a staff writer for the NME. Without ever having to say it, we had both engaged in a guerrilla-war against what Aberdeen’s Willie Miller once characterised as “West Coast Bias”.
The term ‘epistemological break’ was shamelessly borrowed from French Marxist philosophy. It means a fundamental change in the way we construct and receive knowledge and although I used it on air as a wind-up to test Spencey’s significantly less-reliable Dundee schooling, deep down I meant it.
Social Media has proved to be one of the greatest disruptions in the history of the football supporter – greater than the brake clubs of the 19th century, the football specials on the 1970s; or the fanzine movement of the post-punk era. The pace of change in the way we send, receive and interrogate information has been so dynamic that it has wrong-footed administrators, asset strippers and sports journalists, alike. No matter who you support we are living through media history.
2012 had just witnessed an unprecedented summer of sport. The Olympics provided a snapshot of how sudden and pervasive the shift to social media has become. Over 40% of UK adults claim to have posted comments on websites, blogs or social networking about the Olympics and in younger age-groups that figure tips conclusively to a majority – 61% of 16-24’s posted Olympic comments. Think about that figure for a moment. Well over half of the young people in the UK are now participants in social media and pass comment on sport. The genie is out of the bottle and it will never be forced back. That is the main reason that Armageddon never happened: we no longer live in an age where the media can guarantee our compliance.
On the first day of the 2012-13-season, Rangers were in the deep throes of administration and facing certain liquidation. With no accounts to meet the criteria for SPL membership, one among a body of rules which the old Rangers had themselves been an architect of, the new Rangers could not be granted entry without a wholesale abandonment of the rules. It was not to be.
St Johnstone launched their new season at Tynecastle so I travelled with misplaced hope. We were soundly beaten 2-0 and both Hearts goals were entirely merited. On the day, I did a quick if unscientific survey of two supporters’ buses – the Barossa Saints Club, a more traditional lads-bus and the ‘208 Ladies’ a predominantly female and family-friendly bus. On both buses, over 75% of fans had mobile phones with 3G internet access and the majority of them posted updates or pictures before, during or after the match. They mostly posted via micro-blogging sites such as Facebook or Twitter, many commenting on the game, their day-out and the surroundings. Most were speaking to friends or rival fans. Some were publishing pictures and updating forums or blogs. And when he second a decisive goal went in some were undoubtedly taking stick from Gort, Webby DFC and DeeForLife, the pseudonyms of prominent Dundee fans, who as the newly promoted ‘Club 12’ were suddenly and very temporarily above St Johnstone in the SPL.
By my rough calculations, well over half the St Johnstone support was web-connected. I have no reason to think the Hearts supporters were any different. This small experiment reflects an unprecedented shift in the balance of communication in Scottish football and in the truest sense it is an ‘epistemological break’ with past forms of spectatorship. Social media has been widely misrepresented by old-style radio ‘phone-ins’ and by journalism’s ancien regime. The presumption is that people who are connected to the web are at home, in dingy rooms where they foam at the mouth frustrated by loneliness and mental illness. The term ‘internet bampots’ (coined by Hugh Keevins) and ‘keyboard warriors’ (Gordon Strachan) speaks to a world that is fearful of the web, irked by alternative opinions, and the threat that the new media poses to the traditional exchange of knowledge.
It further assumes that opinion from social networks is naïve, ill-informed, or unreasonable. Whilst some of this may be true, mostly it is not. No one would dispute that there are small enclaves of truly despicable people using social networks and comment sites, but they are overwhelmingly outnumbered by the multitude of fans who simply want to talk about their team and share their dreams and memories.
Social media is porous. By that I mean it has cracks, lacunae and fissures. This inevitably means that information leaks out. It can be shared, released and in some cases becomes so energetic it becomes a virus. It is no longer possible to ‘keep secrets’, to withhold information and to allow indiscretions to pass unnoticed. Newspapers have been caught in a whirlwind of change where views can be instantly challenged, authority quickly questioned and pronouncements easily disproved. Many papers – almost all in decline – have been forced to close down their comments forums. Undoubtedly some of that is due to breaches of the rules, the cost of moderation, and the rise in awareness of hate crimes. But another significant factor is that ordinary fans were consistently challenging the opinions and ‘facts’ that newspapers published.
Talking down to fans no longer works and we now have evidence – Armageddon did not happen. The beast that was supposed to devour us all was a toothless fantasy. In the more abrasive language of the terraces – Armageddon shat-it and didn’t turn up.
In one respect the myth of Armageddon was an entirely predictable one. Tabloid newspapers make money from scaring people – health scares, prisoners on the run, fear of terrorism, anxiety about young people, and most recently ‘fear’ of Scottish independence is their stock in trade. Almost every major subject is raised as a spectre to be fearful of. Most newspapers were desperate to ‘save Rangers’ since they themselves feared the consequences of losing even more readership. It was easier to argue that a hideous financial catastrophe would befall Scottish football unless Rangers were fast-tracked back into the SPL. Newspapers found common cause with frightened administrators who could not imagine a world without Rangers, either.
So we were invited to endorse one of the greatest circumlocutions of all time – unless you save a club that has crashed leaving millions of pounds of debt, the game is financially doomed. You would struggle to encounter this bizarre logic in any other walk of life. Unless Rick Astley brings out a new album music will die. That is what they once argued and many still do. That is how desperately illogical the leadership in Scottish football had become.
Armageddon was a tissue of inaccuracies from the outset. It tried to script a disaster-movie of chaotic failure and financial disaster and at the very moment when senior administrators should have been fighting for the livelihood of the league, they were briefing against their own business.
Armageddon was a big inarticulate beast but it faced a mightier opponent – facts. One by one the clubs published their annual accounts. Although this was against the backdrop of a double-dip recession and fiercely difficult economic circumstances it was not all doom and gloom. The arrival of Club 12 (Dundee) meant higher crowds and the potential for increased income at Aberdeen, Dundee United and St Johnstone. To this day, this simple fact remains unfathomable to many people in the Glasgow-dominated media. The arrival of Ross County meant an exciting new top-tier local derby for Inverness Caley Thistle and a breath of fresh air for the SPL. St Johnstone insisted on the first ever SPL meeting outside Glasgow to reflect the new northern and eastern geo-politics of the Scottish game.
European football meant new income streams for Motherwell. Of course times were tight, football is never free from the ravages of the economy and some clubs predictably showed trading losses. But the underlying reasons were always idiosyncratic and inconsistent never consistent across the board. Inverness had an unprecedented spate of injuries and over-shot their budgets for healthcare and so published a loss £378,000.
Meanwhile Dundee United published healthy accounts having sold David Goodwillie to Blackburn. Celtic reached the Champion’s League group stages with all the new wealth it will bequeath. St Johnstone – led by the ultra-cautious Brown family – had already cut the cost of their squad, bidding farewell to the most expensive players Francisco Sandaza and Lee Croft. The club also benefited from compensation for their departed manager, Derek McInnes and player-coach, Jody Morris. Paradoxically, Bristol City had proven to be more important to the club’s income than Rangers. Again this was not part of the script and proved unfathomable (or more accurately irrelevant) to most in the Glasgow media.
Hearts failed to pay players on time due to serious restraints on squad costs and internal debt. They were duly punished for their repeated misdemeanours. Motherwell and St Mirren despite the economic challenges were navigating different concepts of fan ownership. By November most clubs – with the exception of Celtic – were showing increased SPL attendance on the previous season. Far from the scorched earth failure that we were told was inevitable what has emerged is a more complex eco-system of financial management, in which local dynamics and a more mature cost-efficient reality was being put in place.
It may well be that Armageddon was the last desperate caricature of a form of media that was already in terminal decline. Flash back to 1967 when Scottish football had a so-called ‘golden age’. There was European success, we tamed England at Wembley and names like Law and Baxter brightened dark nights. Back then access to knowledge was a very narrow funnel. Only a small cadre of privileged journalists had access to the managers and players, and so fans waited dutifully for the Daily Record to arrive at their door to tell them what was happening. That system of ‘elite access to knowledge’ was in its last decadent throes nearly thirty years later, when David Murray would dispense wisdom to his favoured journalists. We now know they drank fine wine and ate succulent lamb in Jersey and the most loyal attended Murray’s 50th birthday party at Gleneagles. One journalist was so proud of his invite he danced round the editorial office mocking those who had not been invited. This was the early height of the Rangers EBT era but it is now clear that difficult questions went unasked by either journalists or by football administrators.
Although it may not suit the narrative of this particular blog my first realisation that David Murray’s empire was living on leveraged debt was from a small cadre of Rangers fans. It was around the early years of the Rangers Supporter’s Trust (RST) and they were determined to shake more democracy from the Ibrox boardroom. Whilst real fans of the club argued from the outside, the press took Murray at his loquacious word. He was in many respects their benefactor, their visionary – their moonbeam.
By the 1990s onwards, football journalism had ritualised and festered around the inner sanctums at Ibrox. This was an era where relevance meant being invited to a ‘presser’ at Murray Park, having Ally’s mobile or playing golf with ‘Juke Box,’ ‘Durranty’ or ‘Smudger’. Many journalists, showing a compliant lack of self-awareness, would use these nicknames as if conveyed closeness, familiarity or friendship. It is desperately sad that careers have been built on such paltry notions of access and such demeaning obsequiousness.
Around this period I had become a freelance radio-presenter and was presenting Off the Ball with my friend Tam Cowan, a Motherwell fan. We both wanted to fashion a show which saw football not trough its familiar narratives, but through the lens of the ‘diddy’ teams, a term so demeaning that we tried to reclaim it. Refusing to peddle the inevitability of ‘old firm’ power we sensed that journalistic compliance at Ibrox was now so ingrained that it was ripe for satirising. This was the main reason that Off the Ball branded itself as ‘petty and ill-informed.’ It was a self-mocking antidote to those journalists that could ‘exclusively reveal’ breaking stories from ‘impeccable sources,’ which usually meant they had heard it on the golf-course, from Walter, a man who needed no surname.
Many fans are astonished when I tell them how the journalism of this era actually functioned. On Champions League nights, journalists from opposing papers gathered together to agree what to write. Circulation was in decline, money was tight, agency copy was on the increase and foreign trips were under-scrutiny. No one dared miss the ‘big story’. So sports journalists who commonly boasted about their toughness and who ‘feared no one’ were often so fearful of returning home having missed an angle, that they agreed by consensus to run with variations of the same story. Celtic fans may wish to recoil at the image – but journalists would go into a ‘huddle’ at the end of a press-conference to agree the favoured line.
So the summer of 2012 witnessed an ‘epistemological break’ in how knowledge and information was exchanged. But let me go further and taunt Jim Spence one more time. It was the summer we also witnessed an ‘amygdala-crisis’ exposing the way the media works in Scotland. Amygdala is the nuclei in the brain that manages our tolerance for risk and is the key that often unlocks creative thinking. Many people in relatively high places in the media – a creative industry – demonstrated that they could not conceive of change, nor could they imagine what football would look like if Rangers were not playing in the SPL. They not only resisted change but lacked the imagination to think beyond it. A common language began to emerge that tried to ward off risk and an almost a childlike fear of the dark. ‘Scottish football needs a strong Rangers,’ ‘But there will no competition’; ‘other clubs will suffer’; ‘Draw a line in the sand’; ‘It was one man – Craig Whyte’, ‘They’ve been punished enough’ and of course, the daddy of them all – ‘Armageddon.’
The biggest single barrier to change was the lingering and outmoded notion that Rangers subsidised Scottish football. As a supporter of a club that had spent seven economically stable years in a league that Rangers have never played in made me deeply suspicious and I was in the words of the we-forums ‘seething’ that St Johnstone were portrayed as somehow ‘dependent’ on a club that was already fatefully insolvent. Because so little is known about the experience of the fans of smaller clubs, they are often misrepresented. For seven years my friends and I, travelled home and away in the First Division, often narrowly missing out on promotion as rival clubs like Gretna, Dundee and Livingston all used money they did not have to ‘buy’ success. It remains an incontrovertible fact that St Johnstone FC has been among the most consistent victims of fiscal misdemeanour in Scottish football. That is the irreducible issue. Several clubs have very real reasons to loathe financial mismanagement, rogue-trading and those that gain unfair advantage on the back of unserviceable debt.
Social media has allowed these smaller incremental versions of history to be told when the established media had no interest in telling them. Blogs can dig deeper than the back pages ever can and fans are now more likely to meet on Facebook than on a supporter’s bus. Many players now bypass the press completely and tweet directly with fans. Rio Ferdinand’s recent attack on racism in English football has been conducted entirely via social media, over the heads of the press. In the Rangers Tax Case context, restricted documents are regularly shared online, where they can be analysed and torn apart. Those with specialist skills such as insolvency, tax expertise or accountancy can lend their skills to a web forum and can therefore dispute official versions of events.
Not all social media is good. Open-access has meant a disproportionate rise in victim culture. The ‘easily-offended’ prowl every corner of the web desperate to find a morsel that will upset them but that is a small price to pay for greater transparency and even the most ardent bore is no excuse for limiting the free exchange of information.
We have witnessed a summer of seismic change. A discredited era that largely relied on ‘elite access to knowledge’ has all but passed away and information, however complex or seemingly unpalatable, can no longer be withheld from fans. The days of being ‘dooped’ are over.
It has been a privilege to participate in the summer of discontent and I yearn for even greater change to come. Bring it on.
Stuart Cosgrove
Stuart Cosgrove is a St Johnstone fan. He was previously Media Editor of the NME and is now Director of Creative Diversity at Channel 4, where he recently managed coverage of the Paralympics, London 2012. At the weekend he presents the BBC Scotland football show ‘Off the Ball’ with Tam Cowan. He writes here in a personal capacity.
Armageddon the feeling that Stuart’s blog won’t be well received by some. I don’t know about a mass of Amygdala but I’m fairly sure there will be mass apoplexy in certain quarters. Apocolyptic rage even.
Keep shaking those pillars folks.
Ah well. If Stuart Cosgrove can get away with spelling errors, why can’t I?
Fine Article SG – Insightful and appreciated – and a bloomin` good read 😉
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PR fed MSM still work in progress alas
Was noted that Media PR calculate success is on the Public not knowing anything at all. A fair low % success to them is the MSM not following up on, or alerting the Public to coyness on information. Well,
– from 12 Sept;
• LN SPL Inquiry is scheduled to start a week tomorrow.
“SPL lawyers have to lodge a list of witnesses for the hearing by October 19 and has any other relevant party who wishes to be represented at the hearing lodge their intimation to do so by November 1 [4pm]”
• Anyone know if SPL lawyers lodged a list of witnesses 2 weeks ago? [Oct 19] – And who they are?
• Or the names of any relevant party to be represented submitted to the SPL by last Thursday?
Well we knew D+P and CG stated they wouldn`t co-operate 12 Sept – but not a sausage since – nada
Funny that – disappeared from the agenda – howsabout asking BDO if they`d like to appear or participate now that D+D have vamoosed? – Or will that delay the delayed delay? As FTT in `planned` limbo;
Could the MSM find if LN tribunal in receipt of the `unredacted` FTT – or requested a confidential copy?
Yes/No would do – we could gauge if the FTT `delay` was generating a material consequece or not
Just a thought
The SFA are again showing themselves up for the bunch of incompetent maladministrators that they are. I am no fan of Craig Levein, however, the shambolic handling of his dismissal is nothing short of disgraceful and disrespectful to the man who they put in charge in the first place.
According to their own website the SFA are responsible for the operation of the Scotland National Football team, the annual Scottish Cup and ‘several other duties important to the functioning of the game in Scotland’.
Hmmm! I trust that these ‘other duties’ are extremely onerous, because, to be frank, unless these duties include protecting old Rangers FC at all costs, they have done nothing else as far as I can see. The President and his Chief Executive have presided over the biggest scandal ever to grace the Scottish football arena ever or, as my daughter would say, ‘ever, ever’ and they have contributed the square root of FA to the solution.
As I have said before, In any other line of work these individuals who have presided over this fiasco would be encouraged, if not persuaded, to do the honourable thing and stand down for the benefit of the whole body. That the head of this organisation is ‘heavily conflicted’ in the death of old Rangers, and who by his own admission, is ‘unable to do his job properly’ just defies belief.
Scottish football is in a much worse state than it was when they were appointed, they have flouted their own rules and destroyed any residual respect that anyone had for this institution.
For everyone’s sake, including their own, they should both go….now.
And another thing; Has Charles Green been reported to Mr Lunny for bringing the game into disrepute by his claiming that one of the governing bodies had ‘stolen’ Rangers money ?
A bit of bear on bear action here!!!
Read from bottom upwards
RangersUFC @RangersUFC
@ChrisGraham76 Chris, ok – forget all about the cuddles. Who is the largest shareholder in Allenby then? http://bloggingblue.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/01/Ostrich-man-head-in-sand.gif …
23m RangersUFC @RangersUFC
@ChrisGraham76 I’m not sure,perhaps you’re more unpopular than you realise? They don’t engage with me, nor do I give a toss who follows who.
View conversation
1h RangersUFC @RangersUFC
@Gri6dead @ChrisGraham76 Who is currently the largest shareholder in Allenby Capital as of this moment in time. FFS!
View conversation
1h RangersUFC @RangersUFC
@ChrisGraham76 Chris, don’t play with fire I know what you did last summer. Just because I don’t lick ass doesn’t mean I’m one them.
View conversation
2h RangersUFC @RangersUFC
@ChrisGraham76 Chris, forget it, I’ll try a real fan who’s not been bought off. You’re actually worse on here than the telly (mumbles)!!
View conversation
3h RangersUFC @RangersUFC
@ChrisGraham76 Why is Imrans company now in with Merchant House. It’s a small world, but not that small. You’re not really bothered it seems
View conversation
3h RangersUFC @RangersUFC
@ChrisGraham76 How can I get my concerns addressed? Don’t you have any concerns regarding the links at all? Look what happened last time.
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3h RangersUFC @RangersUFC
@ChrisGraham76 Links between Whyte/Green/Imran and Allenby, now nomad to Merchant House scares me.Worthington group (whyte) legal team=FFW!!
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3h RangersUFC @RangersUFC
@ChrisGraham76 Imran/Allenby advise on AC Ancona. Club dead, investment disaster. Allenby now Nomad to Merchant House,CW really gone,honest?
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3h RangersUFC @RangersUFC
@ChrisGraham76 I’m thinking it’s you who’s not even bothered by the links, if not – why?
View conversation
3h RangersUFC @RangersUFC
@ChrisGraham76 I have friends, as you do, on both sides. Imrans last advisory role re investement at AC Ancona, total disaster, club dead.
View conversation
3h RangersUFC @RangersUFC
@ChrisGraham76 Ultimate Fighting Championship, my other passion. Allenby Capital is the key link re Imran with FFW/Whyte/Green the other
View conversation
3h RangersUFC @RangersUFC
@ChrisGraham76 who is the nominated advisor to Merchant House. it stinks, but it gets worse, much worse when you see Green and Whyte both…
View conversation
4h RangersUFC @RangersUFC
@ChrisGraham76 Seriously though, you’ve got an influence, use it. Look up Imrans company and the takeover of AC Ancona then look up who is..
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4h RangersUFC @RangersUFC
@ChrisGraham76 Shame as I don’t do walking away, unlike yourself. Just look up AC Ancona and give me your thoughts. You’ll be very concerned
View conversation
4h RangersUFC @RangersUFC
@RangersUFC @ChrisGraham76 Chris, you do know how they are linked, it’s very direct link and alarms me. What’s your thoughts?
View conversation
6h RangersUFC @RangersUFC
@ChrisGraham76 What’s your view on Imran Ahmad/Rangers/AC Ancona (dead)/Merchant House and Craig Whyte. Small world, but not that small eh?
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Fantastic piece from Tam’s sidekick.
It was almost a great weekend Tam read out an email from me on the Sunday Supplement and Where Eagle Dare was on TV…… but then Efe Ambrose forgot how to jump.
Long Time Lurker says:
Monday, November 5, 2012 at 18:00
Although Armageddon didn’t occur, it looks as though we may yet have to endure a nuclear winter. I can’t wait
A few OT ramblings…..
I’ve never really understood why Ch4’s AT got involved in this story, if memory serves the reason he gave was that he was filming for Ch4 news in Glasgow on the day after admin was announced and thought he’d take a look. I’ve a sneaky feeling he was tipped off about the financial ICBM heading towards Charlotte’s (Square) Web of Deceit and Govan. His caveat of ‘corporate governence’ provides him with a perfect segue into a money laundering story if it exists.
Usually at this time of the season we would have the Green and Blue stretching their lead and later in the year with suspensions and injuries affecting the chasing pack, the 2 horse race would take shape. My usual reaction to a result like yesterday’s at Tannadice would be to fear a one (blue) horse race. As a Celtic fanatic this used to always cut me to the core. I now realise that one of the catalysts for this reaction was the financial cheating of the dead club.
Although my club Celtic will probably win the League, if any team can be better than the rest, this is the year they’ll have best chance of being champions. I’m enjoying the SPL this year, it has a feel-good factor sans the bile of the OF square offs.
TheCollardGreen (@chrisshields10) says:
Monday, November 5, 2012 at 18:15
twopanda says:
Monday, November 5, 2012 at 18:59
‘..• Anyone know if SPL lawyers lodged a list of witnesses 2 weeks ago? [Oct 19] – And who they are?..’
—-Can’t help you with that, I’m afraid.
But on Harper MacLeod this is what they had to say about themselves today, in a Legal Supplement in the Scotsman:
“” With Rangers and the SPL we have been pretty much full on for the past year.
Rangers….went into administration in February.
That has meant we have been doing pretty much continuous work for the SPL on all the implications including a big re-write of the SPL’s rules on insolvency events over the summer.There was a lot of drafting and legal opinion work in relation to that.
We also carried out the investigation for the SPL into the Rangers EBTs andwe are preparing for the first hearing of the inquiry Commission in mid-November……
We acted for some of the European clubs which had disputes with Rangers, and acted for some of the European agents for Celtic players…””..
———-
john clarke says:
Monday, November 5, 2012 at 19:36
Did a sweep but missed that JC – well spotted – appreciated!
Terrific summing up of the change of culture Stuart. You have nothing to be ashamed of and neither has Jim Spence. Speirs and English have come around but took far too long. The rest will be remembered as fondly as jimmy saville.
In saying that I hope your team get relegated – these managers from the north of Ireland coming over here taking jobs off of billy dodds!
A few handbags thrown at the end of Sportsound tonight. JT said the press pack would get to the bottom of the Levein story. A dissenting presenter quipped something along the lines of: ‘Just the way they did with Graig Whyte?’. A vocally peeved JT indicated the discussion would continue off-air. Light the blue touchpaper and stand back … 🙂
“…Levein…had tried to convince Regan and president Campbell Ogilvie that he should remain in post during a meeting early last week…”
http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/20205303
=====================================
So, did any hack at the SFA press conference pose the question why the ‘heavily conflicted’ Ogilvie was still at the SFA – never mind being involved in any significant decision-making ?
No, didn’t think so… 🙄
Another welcome traveller to the fertile ground of Bampot County.
“Walter, a man who needed no surname” .Is it just me or can
others actually hear the noise of dripping disgust when you read that.
Superbly constructed post, Stuart. A great addition to the world where
true and honest examination of the upheaval caused by R.F.C.`s
immoral behaviour is gaurenteed
A very, very ,very good piece by Stuart Cosgrove on the impact on MSM of the new social media mechanisms.
And a devastating and entertaining critique of what passed for football journalism, with beautiful little swipes at some of our favourite characters!
Delicious.
More importantly, from my perspective, it is further proof, if any such were needed, that the main, solid body of Scottish football fans are not by any manner of means closet RFC(IL) supporters: no club was free from anger and sense of affront at being cheated by the actions of that dead club.
In saying that ” Newspapers found common cause with frightened administrators who could not imagine a world without Rangers” Stuart, probably wisely, stayed clear of suggesting that there may have been motivations other than financial and commercial concerns in the minds and hearts of at least some of the media fraternity and of some on the SFA board.
(Some of us believe there may well have been).
But essentially, what Stuart has said neatly brings together the two main strands of concern on this site-that an important club cheated its way to ‘success’, damaging the rest of Scottish and European football in the process; and were protected from any journalistic investigation by men ( and possibly, women) incapable of resisting either the blandishments or the power, of a Press manipulator and his minions.
The peoples of other countries began the much more serious business of claiming their freedoms by the use of social media.
The Scottish Football supporters have advanced far in re-claiming their Sport by the same means.
Long may that continue.
Well said Mr Cosgrove. A very refreshing read!
Danish Pastry says:
Monday, November 5, 2012 at 19:48
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Heard tha as well – and if Traynor carried out his bullyboy threats to Kenny McIntyre (for it was he who made the Craig Whyte remark) then I trust the Sportsound producers will take suitable action against the fat oaf.
“That has meant we have been doing pretty much continuous work for the SPL on all the implications including a big re-write of the SPL’s rules on insolvency events over the summer.There was a lot of drafting and legal opinion work in relation to that.”
Quite blatant admission that the SPL rules were completely rewritten to save Rangers, as opposed to just applying the existing rules.
Not that us bampots didn’t already know, but just interesting to see it stated as plain as day by a participant.
Absolutely fantastic piece and brutally honest Stuart. Thank you
Lets see Jabba, Chico, Keevins et all follow that.
john clarke says:
Monday, November 5, 2012 at 20:01
The peoples of other countries began the much more serious business of claiming their freedoms by the use of social media.
The Scottish Football supporters have advanced far in re-claiming their Sport by the same means.
Long may that continue.
———
hear hear!
parmahamster says:
Monday, November 5, 2012 at 20:02
2 0 Rate This
Danish Pastry says:
Monday, November 5, 2012 at 19:48
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Heard tha as well – and if Traynor carried out his bullyboy threats to Kenny McIntyre (for it was he who made the Craig Whyte remark) then I trust the Sportsound producers will take suitable action against the fat oaf.
————
Thanks parma, I wasn’t sure who’d said it. It all got very animated. Oh to have been a fly on the wall when the broadcast ended!
At last someone who has some dealings with the MSM tells it like it is
I wonder if it will ever catch on
A great article Mr Cosgrove, and I hope it gets the audience it deserves
Great article Mr Cosgrove, saying with your inimitable sense of humour what the vast majority of Scottish football fans believe.
I would hope that even a majority of Rangers’ fans would agree with what you have written.
Your courage in ‘coming out’ in such a public fashion will hopefully inspire other journalists to follow suit. Where you lead, others will hopefully follow.
I look forward to the day when journalists write honestly and using facts – rather than sevcophanticly regurgitating PR releases – about Scottish football in general and Rangers/Sevco in particular.
What a tragedy that an article such as this could never be printed in the Record or The Sun.
Articles such as this perfectly illustrate why so many have given up on newspapers and prefer to get their information from the internet.
Should be hilarious reading the response from Sevco apologists like the wee white brick man (Leggo) over the next few days 🙂
More power to your keyboard.
Keep up the good work.
The old media is dead, Long Live the New Media.
blindsummit63 says:
Monday, November 5, 2012 at 20:03
‘Quite blatant admission that the SPL rules…’
—–
I’m not sure we can say that.
I think any extensive re-write will not yet have been finished , and will in any case have to be formally approved and adopted by an AGM of the SPL members, after the SFA have checked that the re-write is compatible with Uefa and Fifa rules.
You might be right, of course, and all of that may already have happened.
I think, though,that the SPL followed the (then) existing rules in so far as they did not admit the guilty club/new club into the SPL.
(The real sell-out was when all three organisations -SFA SPL and SFL- did not follow through and refuse them admission into the SFL for less than the purest of reasons).
blindsummit63 says:
Monday, November 5, 2012 at 20:03
“That has meant we have been doing pretty much continuous work for the SPL on all the implications including a big re-write of the SPL’s rules on insolvency events over the summer.There was a lot of drafting and legal opinion work in relation to that.”
Quite blatant admission that the SPL rules were completely rewritten to save Rangers, as opposed to just applying the existing rules.
========================================
I think any changes to the SPL rules would have to be ratified by the members. So far as I am aware, the SPL rules remained unchanged over the summer- I stand to be corrected, of course, but the rules are in the public domain, so any changes should be apparent.
Anyway it was not the SPL who saved Rangers. Rangers were “saved” by the SFA and Lord Hodge- without SFA membership they wouldn’t be playing in any senior league, and without Lord Hodge holding the door open, TRFC could never have obtained the transfer of RFC’s SFA membership. In my opinion.
I know all you people on here like a good read. Stumbled over this perfect perfect word to describe Chuckles via the ST book reviews
“A snollygoster” a shrewd unprincipled person.
or hows about this for our favorite useless journo – “gandy-guts” – a lard arse
The Horologicon: A Day’s Jaunt Through the Lost Words of the English Language
Auth Mark Forsyth
im sure there are a few more belters in there. Let you know when Ive read it all.
ianagain says:
Monday, November 5, 2012 at 20:29
“a crowd of #rses” will suffice and anything else is a bonus!!
I did my little bit to help prevent Armageddon at the weekend by making a six hour return train journey to Dingwall. I took my son to his first Aberdeen game. We both thoroughly enjoyed the day even though the score didn’t go our way.
I doubt whether my enthusiasm would have been the same if the summer’s turn of events hadn’t gone the way it did. If new rangers had been allowed into the SPL, then I would have turned my back on Scottish football. They weren’t and I haven’t.
I have always found Dingwall to be a very friendly town full of cheery people. Saturday did nothing to change this view. A very healthy crowd of 6000+ people attended the game. Ross-County are, as you say Stuart, a breath of fresh air. Their achievements mirror those of their neighbours, Inverness, and both have helped move the centre of Scottish football slightly further North. I find what these two clubs have achieved in a very short time quite amazing. 1994/95 was, for both of them, their first season at the bottom of the Scottish Football Leagues.
The only downside of the day came when a solitary drunken rangers supporter faced up to a group of still enthusiastic Aberdeen supporters to complain about the lyrics of a song that was being sung on the return journey. Fortunately, none of the Aberdeen fans took him on in anything other than a mocking derisory manner. My son commented later that he had been a little worried about the situation. I was grateful that this brave, or more likely stupid, guy was a lone ranger.
Hopefully my positive feelings and renewed enthusiasm for Scottish football are mirrored throughout the country. The figures suggest it is. I hope the people who run Scottish football have realised that the majority will no longer be bullied and manipulated by the minority.
paulsatim says:
Monday, November 5, 2012 at 19:10
8 0 Rate This
A bit of bear on bear action here!!!
—————————————————
Is this an intelligent bear. Finally?
With such a world record breaking numbers of supporters, they were bound to find one.
Its only taken a few years.
Fair points. Anyone else want to pick up and expand on this guys digging?
iamacant says:
Monday, November 5, 2012 at 20:07
9 0 Rate This
Absolutely fantastic piece and brutally honest Stuart. Thank you
Lets see Jabba, Chico, Keevins et all follow that.
———————————————————————————————————————-
The day the above three could follow that would almost certainly be Armageddon.! They would have to master the art of joined up writing first.
readcelt says:
Monday, November 5, 2012 at 20:46
0 0 Rate This
=======================
He was likely just commenting on what he read on Paul’s blog
https://scotslawthoughts.wordpress.com/2012/10/20/charles-green-and-craig-whyte-connections-or-coincidences/
After the past year and following from the RTC blog – It’s more than encouraging to see a post from Stuart Cosgrove, excellent article and coming from a true Scottish football supporter – not to mention his role at Ch4 and the BBC – Kudos for the wordsof Stuart and even more kudos for the TSFM community for the reach of this community.
I’m quite chuffed anyway:)
Levein sacked? I seen that, Lord Cardigan Of Dignified Brown Brogues, being one of the media’s fore-runners – haha – i think it will be Gordon Strachan (if he’s daft enough to want it) or the ginger Borrheid bawbag himself, Alex McLeish. Ohh–nail-biting stuff–can barely type with the waves of euphoric excitement–aye, anyway I would personally love to see Robert Mugabe (or a certifiable mentalist of equal mania) given the gig instead – what about Pol Pot? What’s he up to these days??
One things for sure – it won’t be Lord Cardigan – unless Campbell has a bigger brass-neck than even his boss! Nope, give the job to a nutter (myself excluded..) instead and watch the team climb that qualifying table with no little gusto! That shower, collectively, are an embarassment and a complete and utter joke – no disrespect to the actual players, and even some coaches – but the entire system has been rotten for years – if the administration is bad, it doesnt bode well for the system – but with any luck, Campbell Ogilvie et-al will be the last of this rotten system – just because many football insitutions are basically corrupted-to-the-core gentlemans clubs (like FIFA for example) it doesn’t mean we in Scotland have to accept ‘it’s just the way it is’ and with folk like Mr Cosgrove lending their support, it can only be a good thing.
Btw – anybody think Charlie’s been awfuly quite of recent?? Wonder why…anyone would think he’s had a bit of a recent shock? – Now, what has occured in Charlies life of recent that has kept his gob from print?? Now that I think about it – there are quite a few folk that seem to be hiding under the bed – none more so than messrs Regan and Doncaster – what happened to the ‘cool’ and ‘happening’ world of their twitterness and the occasional, and often quite bewildering, statements and whatever?? Nothing. Not a bloody thing…
It must be one helluva bed their all hiding under – hats off to Campbell for keeping them all there!
Just told the boss about this piece, the conversation went something like this:
Me: “That was great read from TSFM”
Wife: “Was it another piece from that Rogan Brogan guy you like?”
Me: “No, a media guy called Stuart Cosgrove who works for C4 and The Beeb in Scotland”
Wife: “I thought you didn’t like their opinion? You said they are either Rangers supporters who want to follow the party line or Celtic supporters who have to follow the party line.
Me: “Not all of them, he is actually a fan of The Saints and dislikes Celtic as much as Rangers”
Wife: Wow, you like someone that dares to criticise your beloved hoops?”
Me: If it is constructive criticism then yes, I welcome it”
I lost her at that point, well she is German after all and her love for most things Scottish does not stretch to football; or me for that matter!
My point is this; I find it really refreshing to read another insightful view out with the traditional Glasgow 2. This is the strength of the blog, a group of football fans from many clubs, united in their aim to dissect and analyse the myths, lies and ignorance peddled by Scotland’s MSM.
Even more refreshing, I now find myself welcoming the critiquing of my own team’s footballing politics, never thought I would say that.
Bring it on Mr Cosgrove!
A readers’ comment from the Scotsman;
“…cardigan who has an injunction on the press mentioning EBTS and his name in the same sentence…”
http://www.scotsman.com/sport/stephen-halliday-regan-s-sfa-reform-now-in-tatters-1-2614257
==========================================================================
Can anyone confirm if this is indeed true for ‘the man with one name’ ?
Thank you Mr C for an entertaining and illuminating post, all of which begs another question. When will the MSM realise that the Moonbeams have faded and that their ‘demographic’ isn’t waiting for, or taken in by, what are in effect PR pieces direct from Ibrox? Or, for that matter, anywhere else?
Who among the current MSM will be first to stick their head above the parapet and declare ‘Haud oan Chuckles …… Turnover £40m? Apple? Debt free? 20 pension funds? Sky telly? The Dallas f’n Cowboys?? Who ye tryin tae kid?’
Another oft heard refrain is ‘Ah but ….. we’re sports reporters, we don’t know about all this financial stuff’. Translation : And you, dear reader, don’t need to know’.
It is my fervent hope that our game will survive this seismic shift which, frankly, has been overdue. If we keep our focus and strive for transparency and fair application of fair rules, I think we’ll come out the other side the better for the experience.
Stevie bc
would Walter really need an injunction ? Our press are self gagging
Brilliant stuff, Mr Cosgrove. Bit pretentious like, but it didn’t totally spoil the article.
As others have commented, I am particularly enjoying your handling of Mr Traynor on the phone-in show.
Thank you.
nowoldandgrumpy says:
Monday, November 5, 2012 at 21:00
1 0 Rate This
readcelt says:
Monday, November 5, 2012 at 20:46
0 0 Rate This
=======================
He was likely just commenting on what he read on Paul’s blog
https://scotslawthoughts.wordpress.com/2012/10/20/charles-green-and-craig-whyte-connections-or-coincidences/
—————————
And i actually read that shortly after it was posted.
In one ear and …. i’ll get my coat
A lateral thought that may be the motivation of everybody in the RFC saga
,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,
Before the sale to Sevco in June 2012, Ticketus faced a loss of £27m when RFC were liquidated. However if the RFC ST deal rolled over into Sevco 5088 it would bring Ticketus around £40m over 4yrs.
£40m is such a huge number it could easily fund payoffs to all the Spivs and still leave Ticketus with a fair chunk of their £27m
Which got me thinking
If you were Craig Whyte or Charles Green on 24 March 2012 when Lord Hodge made his ruling what would go through your mind?
Surely it was
“Heres a cast iron opportunity to legally make £40m over 4 yrs if the Ticketus deal can be kept alive until season 2015-2016”
So for the next 6 weeks D&P, Green and Whyte were motivated to work together.
i.e.
How to find a legal way to acquire the Ticketus ST Contract and then roll it over from RFC to Sevco5088
This action would make it legal to syphon £40m out of Sevco Scotland over 4 yrs. The business could then be liquidated or sold to genuine fans with deep pockets.
But would Ticketus be prepared to sell the ST contract?
Well
If it could be shown that SDM and Dave King had financed most of the Ticketus deal then Octopus would be up to their ears in a ruinous scandal. They would dearly love to liquidate Ticketus and close down the entire operation. So much so they might be be prepared to sell the Ticketus debt as part of the Sale Agreement between D&P and Sevco5088.
But where would Green get the money to buy out the Ticketus ST contract?
And
What would Ticketus get in return?
Their own money back of course………
Assuming the Backers of Ticketus were the same people who put up the money for Green to buy the Ticketus ST Contract
This would mean that after the Sale Agreement was concluded
Green owed the Ticketus Backers £27m but declared in the RFC accounts that he owed them £40m
i.e.
Green siphoned off the difference between £40m and £27m over a period of 4yrs
Quite Spivvy really
No wonder these guys are all millionaires
Slightly off topic, but I do feel a little sorry for Levein. He would have been better appointed to a back room job, as he appeared to have some very good ideas about how things would need to change behind the scenes. Unfortunately, he also had to put a winning team on the park at the same time, and that appeared to be beyond him, despite us having our best group of players for a long time.
Whatever the view of his stewardship, he did not deserve to be left hanging on for 3 weeks, and to made to plead his case to Regan and Ogilvie of all people really sticks in the craw. Why are those two still there?
StevieBC says:
Monday, November 5, 2012 at 21:25
A readers’ comment from the Scotsman;
“…cardigan who has an injunction on the press mentioning EBTS and his name in the same sentence…”
http://www.scotsman.com/sport/stephen-halliday-regan-s-sfa-reform-now-in-tatters-1-2614257
==========================================================================
Can anyone confirm if this is indeed true for ‘the man with one name’ ?
=====================================================================
So he “the cardigan”, aka “the man with no name” will not be in the running for the newly vacated Scotland manager/head coach/chief coach then…?
The bears on RM anf FF will indeed be relieved…
“…anf…”…ye gods…!
and…?
An excellent article by Stuart, and as entertaining as ever. As others have said, it’s refreshing to see someone from the MSM comment intelligently on this issue and interact with ordinary supporters in a polite and intelligent manner.
I note, with some sympathy, that Stuart thinks his club suffered at the hands of other clubs who spent beyond their means. Nothing worse, from a fan’s perspective. My own club suffered a similar fate, and as a sult myself and others were denied the chance to celebrate prizes, while my club lost the investment which prize-money and further European involvement would have allowed.
Let’s hope that, as a result of our common desire for competitions which are won on merit, supporters around Scotland can overcome age-old grievances, real or imagined, over ‘west coast’ bias and focus on helping our respective clubs fund and develop the best local talent to play pleasing and technically-mature football. St Johnstone and Dundee have both brought something to the SPL this year. I, for one, have no problem with a challenge emerging from any club in the land. I could even live with one of them winning the league, but not every year!
This season I was happy to buy my son his first season ticket, secure in the knowledge that we would not have to tolerate the kind of bile which, unfortunately, drove countless parents such as myself from our stadia in the past. He’s desperate for Wednesday so he can see Messi and co. I just hope he remembers which team he is meant to support!
Armageddon? Bring it on.
That was a great read! And a good summary of where Scottish football media currently stands.
As I’ve grown up, the Rangers sycophancy (I suppose if I supported a smaller team I may have called it an Old Firm sycophancy, but certainly Rangers) became more and more obvious to me and we’re now at a point where it is being publicly highlighted and challenged.
This is thanks, in no small part, to instant media and instant communication.
While my Dad, as he grew up, might have shouted at the radio or threw his paper in the bin at what he perceived to be bias, he didn’t really have the tools or the medium to challenge it and he would just have to accept that: “That’s what we’re up against”.
In the ’90s there was a swing. The calls of bias we’re being heard louder and more often, but the “Paranoia” tag was a useful tool with which to dismiss legitimate questions and to put us back in our place.
Fast-forward to today and as Stuart points out, instant media is now a recognised danger to the old trusted journos who now try in vain to swat away it’s relevance with terms like “Internet Bampots” but it’s a runaway train that cannot be stopped.
Journalists have to move with the times and adapt, and I have respect for all journalists who try to embrace new media. Many (if not most) are now on Twitter and I think that’s great. Now, I may completely disagree with what they have to say, but the fact is that they’re putting themselves out there to be held accountable for what they write.
I believe that’s what terrifies Jim Traynor and Hugh Keevins (for example). Two people who have built their careers on repeating PR releases and keeping David Murray sweet.
They get it alright.
They knew fine well that without Rangers in the SPL, “a slow lingering death” would indeed ensue, “armageddon” even, but not of the Scottish Football variety. No, it is their very jobs that were/are on the line.
They know it and we know it, and it’s thoroughly refreshing to hear that Stuart Cosgrove, Jim Spence, Tam Cowan and others get it as well.
I found the story about the nameless journo dancing with delight at his invitation to Murray’s birthday – illuminating. I think we can all probably guess who it is. I just hope that I bump into Stuart in the pub someday and he can tell me some more stories about the behavior of the chosen hacks!
I suppose he must take great comfort from the fact his career was not built on being a performing lapdog…..
“beg, roll over, play dumb. Ok, here’s a treat, a transfer exclusive”
Infact, he could be excused for mocking them. They’re becoming caricatures of their former selves.
Everyone is pointing and laughing at them.
It’s great to see neutral commentators of the game calling old media journos for what they are.
I feel vindicated.
goosygoosy says:
£40m and £27m over a period of 4yrs
Quite Spivvy really
No wonder these guys are all millionaires
=======================================================================
Goosey….millionaires….?
I think the saying is “…asset rich and cash poor….”…..until some “billionaire with wealth off the radar wealth comes long and gives them a pound for it…”
Duped again…!
Night Terror says: Monday, November 5, 2012 at 21:45 1 0 Rate This
Brilliant stuff, Mr Cosgrove. Bit pretentious like, but it didn’t totally spoil the article.
As others have commented, I am particularly enjoying your handling of Mr Traynor on the phone-in show.
Thank you
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Spot on. Credit where it’s due to Mr Cosgrove. Interesting to see confirmation of what we all knew about the sycophancy – I feel he will have put a good few noses out of joint. The phone in might get a bit more entertaining!
I just can’t get the image of one of our churnalitic heroes dancing around the office slavering.
(Of course when I said heroes I really meant idiots)
Vandalgrease says:
Monday, November 5, 2012 at 22:15
__________________________________________________
I think that hits the nail on the head. There are those like English and Spiers who despite being all over the place on the RTC issue, are at least fronting up and engaging with others.
The Ancien Régime of HK, JT and CY and their likes will not engage with the public. Ostensibly they do, but their exposure is limited to the time it takes to use the ejector button for uppity callers on radio phone-ins. They are the last vestiges of the Moonbeam variety of patronage, a sickness which runs through our society in the UK like the word “Saltcoats” on a stock of rock.
One of the notable successes I believe Stuart Cosgrove has achieved since he got the gig on SS is to curtail Traynor’s patronising and arrogant attitude towards callers. Traynor is more exposed now than he has ever been, and the bus pass will be calling louder to him as a consequence.
Perhaps along with a copy of the FTT result, we could also donate JT, HK and CY to the Scottish Football Museum ?
madbhoy24941 says:
I now find myself welcoming the critiquing of my own team’s footballing politics, never thought I would say that.
————————————————————
One huge positive that’s come out of all of this is the sharpening of perspective in terms of what defines a good supporter of a team. In the olden days, it was follow your team no matter what. But now we see how easily hard-headed businessmen can play on those emotions and fillet a club of its resources, while mouthing the right words at the right time. The traditionally poor administration of the local worthy who served as club chairman for the prestige and the perks has been replaced by organised sharks who arrive from their tax exiles and morph into instant supporters, at club after club. And so now the real supporter is the one who is on his or her guard, and weighs what the custodians of their club both say and do. Honest criticism of what is happening to their OWN team is the best weapon to guard against those who would destroy them from within, then move on.
Magnificent piece. Absolutely superb in every way.
Take a bow Stuart Cosgrove. You have been staunch throughout this affair.
More power to your pen fella. Keep on keeping on.
Congrats to Stuart, but congrats to so many who have responded more philosophically, rather than forensically, to his words this evening. Some fascinating responses and a feeling of hope shared by so many.
Thank you, Craig Levein. You did your best, I’m sure of that.
Campbell Ogilvie, that will never be said of you. Now leave.
tommythehat says:
Monday, November 5, 2012 at 21:03
“Levein sacked? I seen that, Lord Cardigan Of Dignified Brown Brogues, being one of the media’s fore-runners – haha – i think it will be Gordon Strachan (if he’s daft enough to want it) or the ginger Borrheid bawbag himself, Alex McLeish. Ohh–nail-biting stuff–can barely type with the waves of euphoric excitement–aye, anyway I would personally love to see Robert Mugabe (or a certifiable mentalist of equal mania) given the gig instead – what about Pol Pot? What’s he up to these days?? ”
[edited]
************
If they could prise Baby Doc out of a Haitian jail then they could appoint him and complete the circle to our hero Whyte and his villa in Grasse 🙂
This great post by Cosgrove reminded me of an “article” printed in the Record by Neil Cameron.!!…..
MAURICE EDU watched in astonishment as a working-class black man with a Muslim sounding name became president of his country.
But while the rise of Barak Obama stunned this exiled American, It’s nothing compared to the miracle he sees every day he works beside David Weir.
TSFM says:
Monday, November 5, 2012 at 22:26
Rate This
Vandalgrease says:
Monday, November 5, 2012 at 22:15
__________________________________________________
I think that hits the nail on the head. There are those like English and Spiers who despite being all over the place on the RTC issue, are at least fronting up and engaging with others.
The Ancien Régime of HK, JT and CY and their likes will not engage with the public. Ostensibly they do, but their exposure is limited to the time it takes to use the ejector button for uppity callers on radio phone-ins. They are the last vestages of the Moonbeam variety of patronage, a sickness which runs through our society in the UK like the word “Saltcoats” on a stock of rock.
One of the notable successes I believe Stuart Cosgrove has achieved since he got the gig on SSB is to curtail Traynor’s patronising and arrogant attitude towards callers. Traynor is more exposed now than he has ever been, and the bus pass will be calling louder to him as a consequence.
========================================================================
SC has not been on SSB, rather BBC Sportsound.
OT, Melody Maker was much better than “Punky” NME and “Heavy Metal” Sounds!
I’m intrigued as to what type of dance was common at Mintys parties
the Collapso – Minty
the Quickstep – Mr Charles
the Blues – Ally McCoist
the Bossa Nova – Craig Whyte
the Chicarera – Chic Young
Cheer leading- Mark Dingwall
the Doublebugg- Craig White
the Hustle- Duff and Phelps
the Jabbawokeez – James Traynor
the Slosh- Leggat
the Shuffle-Neil Doncaster
Square dancing – the SFA
the Time warp – Lord NS
the Waltz – Sir Cardigan
the Twist-all of the above
readcelt says:
Monday, November 5, 2012 at 21:47
nowoldandgrumpy says:
Monday, November 5, 2012 at 21:00
readcelt says:
Monday, November 5, 2012 at 20:46
=======================
He was likely just commenting on what he read on Paul’s blog
https://scotslawthoughts.wordpress.com/2012/10/20/charles-green-and-craig-whyte-connections-or-coincidences/
—————————
And i actually read that shortly after it was posted.
In one ear and …. i’ll get my coat
———————————–
I think Graham may be suggesting he could be one of our regular “obsessed” posters.
Superb stuff from Stuart. Anyone who can link Sir Jim Spence (pbuh), Rick Astley and French Marxist philosophy and make me roar with laughter at this late hour deserves the freedom of SFM, or some other such award.
TSFM says:
Monday, November 5, 2012 at 22:26
They are the last vestages of the Moonbeam variety of patronage, a sickness which runs through our society in the UK like the word “Saltcoats” on a stock of rock.
,,,,,,,,,,,,,
TSFM
When you mentioned “Saltcoats” it reminded me of the Ticketus deal and how it was done
At least that how I remember it in an old RTC post after many swallies
It went something like this
Once upon a time (around March 2011) there was an Old Folks Home.
I can`t remember exactly where it was. On the coast somewhere with a great beach. Somewhere that was hot and sticky every 20yrs or so. I remember a promenade with no ice cream vans and smelly drains. A place where the sea breeze mingled with exotic aromas piped all the way from a big city. It might have been Saltcoats but it could have been Port Seton. It`s hard to remember when you`re on the pop. The house was very well built. Solid brick, 3ft thick people said. UncleJoe said it was called the Whyte House It sounded something like that. As I said before. It`s hard to remember when you’re hard at it every day
Anyway
The Whyte House only took in rich millionaires. You know who I mean. People that paid nobody. We`ve all met them. The ones that put 5 fags into 5 empty packets. The kind who drink your pint when you go to the loo.
But I digress
One day a nice man came to the Whyte House. After admiring the thick walls he asked to speak to the residents. Sadly the residents were mostly female. Not sadly for them but sadly for their departed. They were having a hard time in the bad fire.
It’s not much fun getting poked every 5 mins by Raith Rovers fans .They were first in the queue for the lift. All down to Turnbull Hutton or so they said when they poked your bottom.
The nice man had a proposition for the widows. It was a way of saving tax on their pensions. The audience were all ears.
This was what the nice man said
“I know a man who has a football club. He wants you to lend him money on Monday and he will give you it back on Tuesday.”
And
He will give you 10% interest for lending this money for just one day. All you need to do is to sign these forms
“How much money do you want?” said one old lady.
Then
Thinking back to when she lost Wullie`s breeks at the steamie
she said
“If this goes pear shaped”
“How can I be sure I will get my money back?”
“No problem” said the nice man
“I will put your money into an escrow account on Monday”
“That way I can`t take it out on Tuesday until your money is back in your bank account”
“Well” said the old lady
“Here`s 100 grand for starters”
“And”
“If my Bidie-in likes this idea”
“You could be looking at £500k”
And so it went on
Every day for weeks the nice man went to the Whyte House in Saltcoats.
I`m sure it was Saltcoats I remember Daddy won at the Bookies. Mammy got a Fish Tea and we all got chips.There was great Chippies in Saltcoats
The main problem was the forks were wired to the table. Daddy said they were hard to loosen with a spoon. A lot harder than St Enochs. But Daddy had a screwdriver. so we always had stacks of cutlery in the house. Wullie made a dart board in the room. But it was too near the window. When Wullie was in charge we threw forks everywhere. Wullie hit a pigeon one night. Mammy and Daddy were out on the pop. I wanted to roast it as a surprise. Wullie said No we would get a row. So we gave it to Dinky for his tea. There was feathers everywhere. We all had to clean the place. But Daddy found out. There was feathers in the bunker. We just blamed Dinky. He was a stupid cat. It was his fault anyway. If he hadn`t jumped, Wullie would have hit him and missed the pigeon
Anyway I digress
Eventually the nice man raised £24.5m. He got all the widows together. He ordered a round of Pimms. Apart from the lady who put in £500k by mistake. She got a Black and Tan and a roll on sausage. She got a taste for Black and Tan when she worked at the Barras. The roll on sausage was for her man. Sadly he couldn`t eat it He was too busy fending off Fifers in the bad fire.
His wife used to think about him. Not a lot, just when she bought black pudding. You see the black pudding was next to the square sausage. That`s what reminded her. As well as the Butcher. He came from Burntisland
Anyway I digress
…yet again ……too much pop tonight
The nice man raised £24.5m from the rich widows
He went to see two even nicer men. Their names were Craig Whyte owner of Wavetower & Liberty Capital and his advisor David Grier ,Partner in MCR(soon to be taken over by Duff &Phelps)
“Well” said the nice man
“I`ve got a form listing the names of wealthy widows who have £24.5m to invest”
“That’s nice” said Craig
He always said “nice” when he talked about money. No wonder. It was all he thought about. Other people`s money. They had lots of it. Too much actually. “That`s a niche market” thought Craigie.” I`ll have some of that” And he did. All the time. “What a life “ he thought.”I might run out of £1 coins” “But I`ll never run out of other peoples money”
Anyway I digress again…..( hic!…..or is it hick? …who knows?)
Craig Whyte said to the nice man
“How would you like to lose all your £24.5m and make £40m instead?”
He was thinking back to the last time Mammy went to the Shows at Kelvin Hall
You know,
The place where everything costs more than Mammy has in her purse
The place when Daddy always turned up late with not enough chips to go round He would let you on anything you wanted Then tell Mammy to pay for it. I liked Hobby Horses the best. Daddy said they were cheaper than real Nags
Anyway
I digress again
The nice man said
“That sounds a bit risky”
“ I`ll need to ask the people who own this £24.5m”
“But just so you understand the situation Mr Whyte”
“It won`t be a bunch of wealthy widows who make this decision”
“The man who decides isn`t named on the form”
“But it`s still his money we`re talking about”
“He`s a guy with lots of dough “
“But a bit like yourself Craigie”
“He never uses his own money for big deals”
“ He borrows it from his bank”
“No problem said Craigie Boy”
“I give you my word”
Meanwhile
Down in the bad fire
Granda Whyte listens to Craigie Boy telling the nice man there`s no problem
“Ouch” he says as a guy fae Pittenweim pokes him in the bottom
“Craigie should know better than to trust a Banker”
I think he said “Banker”
But It`s hard to remember
……………..when you`re on the pop
Great blog.
Stuart might be right that “Armageddon” is “the daddy of them all” when it comes to disingenuous MSM rhetoric, but the one that really makes me want to punch kittens is “Scottish football needs a strong Rangers”.
No it doesn’t. It needed an honest Rangers.
StevieBC says:
Monday, November 5, 2012 at 21:25
______________________________
Stevie,
I don’t think this is true. It is certainly not true about Campbell Ogilvie. CO got harassed into admitting that he had an EBT for a lot more than a Chick Young night out when Alex Thompson was chasing him.
I would have heard if there was a Smith injunction on this matter.
goosygoosy says:
Superb goosy! Very James Kelman, if I may say so.
timtim says:
Monday, November 5, 2012 at 23:05
I’m intrigued as to what type of dance was common at Mintys parties
the Collapso – Minty
the Quickstep – Mr Charles
the Blues – Ally McCoist
the Bossa Nova – Craig Whyte
the Chicarera – Chic Young
Cheer leading- Mark Dingwall
the Doublebugg- Craig White
the Hustle- Duff and Phelps
the Jabbawokeez – James Traynor
the Slosh- Leggat
the Shuffle-Neil Doncaster
Square dancing – the SFA
the Time warp – Lord NS
the Waltz – Sir Cardigan
the Twist-all of the above
==========================================================================
Paso Doble – RTC (smiley face)
I’m beginning to think that there is no one in Scottish football who can remove Campbell Ogilvie from his post.
He appears to be not just important – but strategically indispensable to the blues.
That will make him a protected species.
“Armageddon was a tissue of inaccuracies from the outset. It tried to script a disaster-movie of chaotic failure and financial disaster and at the very moment when senior administrators should have been fighting for the livelihood of the league, they were briefing against their own business.”
Excellent stuff as usual from Cosgrove.
I’ve asked one question for some time – why are Regan and Doncaster still in their respective positions? They stated that “armageddon” was on the cards, that there would be a number of clubs going into administration and that Scottish football was essentially finished. Yet they are still in their jobs as figureheads for our game! In what other business would directors tell customers and investors that their product was s**t then carry on as if nothing had happened?? Even Gerald Ratner had the sense to resign after denegrating his own product…
Yes, definitely.
There is simply no legitimate explanation for him remaining in position from the second it was revealed he was implicated in Rangers tax ‘dispute’.
Folks, I know it’s a bit @rsey, but he’s either Dr Cosgrove, Professor Cosgrove or plain Stuart. What he isnae is a simple mister – neither a simple mister or simple…if you catch my drift.
michaeljamesroy – I agree – its a personal hate of mine to see the fawning over Mr Green and such on the RM websites – no one says Mr Regan, Mr Lawwell, Mr Romanov etc – so would prefer now that Stu has posted on our blog site with a great peice to boot that we show him the respect of familiarity – he is one of us!
Thanks Stu!
M8Dreamer
When the current cancer within Scottish Football is eventually cured and all guilty parties in this massive fraud, corruption and collusion have been dealt with appropriately by the Authorities, Scottish Football Supporters will be able to begin the recovery from “Armageddon” and enjoy the game that we all love.
This may take a considerable time but the results will be inevitable.
As a football supporter and internet bambpot it is imperative that everybody continues their tireless efforts to uncover the truth and return “Sporting Integrity” to our national sport
michaeljamesroy says:
Tuesday, November 6, 2012 at 00:04
1 1 Rate This
Folks, I know it’s a bit @rsey, but he’s either Dr Cosgrove,
Professor Cosgrove or plain Stuart. What he isnae is a simple
mister – neither a simple mister or simple…if you catch my drift.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
According to Chris Graham, Stuart is “Rangers hater supreme at the BBC”.
Chris Graham @ChrisGraham76 1h
Outstanding. Stuart Cosgrove, Rangers hater supreme at the
BBC, blogging for the bastard child of Rangers Tax Case. A
match made in heaven.
Presumably, in Christopher’s warped view of the world, Alex Thomson holds that accolade at Channel 4.
I wonder if Stuart and Alex also hate The Rangers?
michaeljamesroy at 00.04:
You’re right; it IS a bit arsey. The blessed Stuart will be Mr C on here from here on in.
Cheers!
Many thanks to Stuart Cosgrove not only for a wonderfully illuminating and insightful piece but for a much needed (and well earned!) vindication of both RTC and TSFM’s tenacity.
It is abundantly clear that Stuart is correct in highlighting the West/East disparity when it comes to current Scottish football reportage. It’s no coincidence that it is Stuart, Jim Spence and Richard Gordon who (within the Scottish sports MSM) are leading the claims of incredulity at some of the proclamations of Keevins, Traynor, etc.
However we should be grateful that, evidently, Traynor and his ilk are a dying breed ….. thankfully.
Some on here have employed the label ‘presstitute’ against such as Traynor. How deliciously apposite therefore to see SC confirming instances such as;
“By the 1990s onwards, football journalism had ritualised and festered around the inner sanctums at Ibrox. ”
and,
“It is desperately sad that careers have been built on such paltry notions of access and such demeaning obsequiousness.”
also,
“One journalist was so proud of his invite he danced round the editorial office mocking those who had not been invited. ”
Presstitutes ……. sums up Traynor, Keevins, Young, Guidi and King wonderfully don’t you think?
Interesting piece from SC. I don’t buy papers but if one is lying around I might look at it and, rather than concern myself with the content of an article, try to figure out why the article is there and for whose benefit. The events of the last few months have helped open my eyes to the media in this country. It’s been a bit like the point in The Matrix when Neo looks down the corridor and the older, false reality falls away, leaving an inferior truth. There I am, The One, effortlessly batting away constant waves of media bullshit. 🙂 We are all Neo.
Tommythehat suggested some infamous candidates for the Scotland job and I suspect he wasn’t taking the subject too seriously. There is one stand-out for me. An obvious Rangers connection but this Englishman has the respect of many, having moved up here and been involved in business in Scotland. He has international pedigree and has already united much of the country in a common cause. For me, Charles Green is the man. His part-time appointment would be a world record. Probably. He would simply fill the team with Rangers fans and tell them they could qualify. “Impossible is nothing”, as his friends at Adidas would say (where is that new kit?). Halcyon days would return as being lifted over the turnstile is positively encouraged and Green negotiates deals with Wrigleys and Lees to provide the catering. Hospitality extends closer to the action as VIPs take their £500 seats in the pale blue Reliant Robins behind the goals (aircon £100 supplement). Charles understands the punters. No caviar here – cod roe sandwiches only.
Do we have an extradition treaty with Brazil?
Lord Wobbly says:
According to Chris Graham, Stuart is “Rangers hater supreme at the BBC”.
Chris Graham @ChrisGraham76 1h
Outstanding. Stuart Cosgrove, Rangers hater supreme at the
BBC, blogging for the bastard child of Rangers Tax Case. A
match made in heaven.
Presumably, in Christopher’s warped view of the world, Alex Thomson holds that accolade at Channel 4.
I wonder if Stuart and Alex also hate The Rangers?
*********************
Having tried in vein once a little while ago to engage the said chappie Chris Graham (note CG’s double!) in an attempt to find out how he knew certain “known facts” that he kept regurgitating, the first response was “I know it happened, so I don’t need to prove anything” to then being told “to go away” to then being blocked from the site.
He has no interest like Dingbat in saving TRFC – nor RFC his former club he supported – both were eager to dine at the table of DM and CW if it meant one of them getting a spot at the party – ie a place on the board as a supporters representative. The infighting between Chris and Dingbat has divided the support and has helped DM and CW do what they do best – and CG will continue while these 2 continue to bicker and doff their caps to Mr Green while fawning over his every promise, whilst promising him their support as long as he sees them right too,…..
If the Bears could realise that these 2 are not looking out for them but are looking out for themsleves, they may finally be able to take their club back.
Unfortunately the bile and hatred towards anyone who says other something than what DIngbat and Graham want their members to hear is tarred with the “haters’, “obsessed” and various other insults to do with religious and Jimmy Saville like insults………..
When this is all over – when TRFC has sunk and hopefully takes the 140 of dignified bogitry down with it this time – these 2 chaps will have assisted in driving their members hopes and dreams for their team into oblivion, by their persual of their own personal agendas in getting themselves a pair of brown brogues and a club tie.
Lord Wobbly says:
Tuesday, November 6, 2012 at 00:28
Chris Graham? As in Chris ‘BBC don’t you dare criticise Craig Whyte’ Graham?
April 17th Daily Record, James Traynor tells Neil Lennon that he should shut his mouth.
November 6th Daily Record, James Traynor says managers should be allowed to speak out.
Jabba’s article is hilarious. A sanctimonious, sh1t sandwich of platitudes using the Kilmarnock manager, Kenny Shiels, as two slices of Hovis, then filling the middle with layer upon layer of keech.
Its all there, veritable bolders of observation and wisdom:
– Kenny Shiels was mad at the referee at the weekend.
– Bigotry is not nice.
– There needs to be more truth in Scottish football.
– Politicians are greedy opportunists.
– Racists are vile.
– Kenny Shiels should be able to speak out.
Jabba himself even admits that he is talking complete sh1te when he admits that he wandered away there a wee bit, but then, Kenny Shiels does that too, he writes. What?
Stuart Cosgrove he is not.
What a fantastic and unexpected surprise coming on to read such a hard-hitting blog from someone as respected on here as Stuart Cosgrove. Each and every day the picture formulating in my head of a Scotland ridding itself of it’s shackles is getting clearer, the belief gathering momentum.
The signs are all there, independence looming on the horizon which could see the general mentality of Scotland and it’s people take a turn for the positive, long-standing corruption, bias and propaganda now being laughed at and shown up for what they are.
Stuart I sincerely hope you are the first of many to embrace the new way of information sharing, as you put it. It’s exciting times we’re in, congratulations on standing up and trying to take a stand. This will never be forgotten.