Today, more news from Chernobyl FC.
Two of their directors, Paul Murray and Barry Scott, had jumped ship today and their resignation has been announced. In the background, the Takeover Panel tanks have been revving their engines and they’ve told King that his paper shuffling exercise of a month ago isn’t going to fly.
They want to see cash, in an account, before they’ll accept that this charlatan is doing as he’s told.
These people have phenomenal patience, but that patience is not infinite. The hammer will fall. The wheels of justice turn slowly, but they turn.
So is this related to that? Perhaps. It could also be because these two can see a Steven Gerrard car-crash coming and don’t want to be near the place when the meltdown happens. The outpouring of adulation for something that’s not a done deal is embarrassing.
But not half as embarrassing at it will be if this thing goes tits up.
Amidst all the hearts and flowers on the official Sevco site, wishing Murray and Scott well, there’s little doubt that the carnage over there is just going to go on and on and on. In addition, the optics are dreadful. Even as the English midfielder gets ready to weigh up their offer the club has fired a manager and lost two members of the board.
What does this guy need to see to convince him that this is a circus? Stewart Robertson turning up for talks in a clown costume? John Brown on the negotiating team, shouting at a random passer-by for wearing a green scarf? Does it really have to get to the point where the people promising him a war chest stiff him for the bar bill?
Is that what it’s going to take to make the reality of this clear? Sevco is a freak show run by the freaks and for the freaks. Who can read their forums or study that club in any detail and have the slightest doubt about that?
One of the best mainstream media articles I’ve seen on this farce was published this morning, in The Guardian, by Ewan Murray, who is often excellent. But this paragraph got right to the heart of it all in a big, big way, and kudos to him for it;
“In no particular order (they) have an absentee chairman in constant dispute with the takeover panel; two senior players suspended after a dressing room rammy; accounts which illustrate a business kept afloat by director loans and a recently jettisoned interim manager who had been in position since October. The man now overseeing first-team affairs at Ibrox, Jimmy Nicholl, last managed Cowdenbeath towards relegation from Scotland’s second tier. (They) were bundled out of Europe last summer by a team from Luxembourg, after which their manager ranted at supporters while standing in a bush. No wonder this is the stuff of comedy for opposition fans.”
And this before today’s Morning Of The Dull Spoons.
When directors run out on a club in this state it’s clearly not a sign of a well-oiled machine, but it might just be that someone over there is at least starting the task of restoring order. That’s why I won’t call this evidence of a full-on cataclysm just yet, but it certainly has the look of one.
Murray will not be a loss to Scottish football, he was a sock puppet with a South African hand up his arse, and Barry Scott got a directorship in exchange for a loan, so it’s possible they’ve resigned to let better people take their place … it would not be difficult.
But realistically, this is Sevco and there’s more than just the appearance here of rats leaping off a sinking ship. If it’s as bad as it looks this isn’t over yet and whilst the likes of King and Blair are still in place, there are still grubby hands at the controls.
Even the media seems to think this is a sign of more bad news on the way; Keith Jackson has written, with no trace of irony, about the calamitous nature of the Ibrox operation. He should have been reading the stuff by Phil over the last few months; it’s all been laid out there.
The media aren’t even the part of this you genuinely marvel at.
Hands down, that has to be the Sevco fans.
You know, people often accuse me of focusing overmuch on what goes on at Ibrox and not so much on what’s happening inside our own club. Believe me, if our club was involved in a multi-car pileup such as this it would be the only topic of conversation on this site. I am proud of the fact that when Celtic was in trouble in the 90’s that our fans had nothing else on their minds. Everything was secondary to getting the people who got us into that position out.
We are a superbly well run club.
That’s why I don’t have to be peering into corners for cobwebs.
What do you find when you look at Sevco blogs and forums today?
People indulging in the most ludicrous fantasies. At Ibrox Noise they are publishing a “blueprint” without a manager to execute it; amongst its “predictions” are that Fernando Torres will be playing at Ibrox and that they will be five points clear of Celtic by next January.
And all the while their club rots from the inside.
You want to talk about delusional? I give you the stupidest football fans on Earth.
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