I took my time considering what to call Sevco social media’s latest embarrassment.
I had a lot of possible names for it, but Gormless-gate works for me.
It sums them up perfectly.
It was so easy to execute too; the guy responsible knew he only had to scatter enough breadcrumbs and the febrile minds on their forums would take care of the rest.
In case you’ve missed this, a Celtic fan made up a fake invoice showing that Dundee had been paid £50,000 in the days after the SPFL vote.
He knew that it he got it out there that the geniuses over in La La Land would do their own “digging” and find the “evidence” they wanted.
The money was apparently coming from a company owned by Dominic Keane.
In every way, this was the perfect trick to pull on this lot. Keane has no official connection to Celtic these days but was once on the board.
But he’s also got history putting his money into other Scottish clubs, so it was plausible that he would shield a bribe behind a sponsorship opportunity, and that the trail would be traceable to Celtic Park, but only if you start out from the assumption that the Grand Conspiracy of the Unseen Fenian Hand is behind the voting.
|
|
Since almost all of them do believe the SPFL vote was designed solely to “hand Celtic the title” there was no way in Hell they weren’t going to swallow this.
It was like shooting fish in a barrel. So many of them are so eager to believe the worst, the very worst, that they leaped at this like a cat spotting a mouse peeking out of a hole in the skirting. And like said cat in every Tom and Jerry cartoon there is, they banged their heads on the wall instead.
This lot are so dense they make osmium seem like Swiss cheese.
One of those caught up in the net was our old friend The State Aid Loony who gobbled it up like the old lady who swallowed a fly. The moment he did his rabid followers started disseminating the story all over the forums.
Noted “in the know” voices “confirmed” the legitimacy of this barefaced and brazen fabrication, proving to all the word that they have none.
It was a masterpiece of disinformation, and not because it was especially creative – although it certainly was – or particularly well executed, but because they so badly wanted to believe it they couldn’t help themselves.
Lunacy and paranoia proliferate on their forums.
Think back to the incident involving Morelos’ car, back when that seemed important. Threads buzzed with dark rumours about how he had been targeted for assassination. And for what? Because he was threatening to score, at some point, in some match, against Celtic.
It is madness.
Yet their fans clearly believed this.
They clearly did think their player was in fear of his life because he had scored a few goals in the SPL and might score a handful more.
No other explanation was even considered by some of them, and there were many possibilities.
The same applied to the Jim Traynor “assault” about which nothing more has ever been heard … they believe that the rest of the world is venal and corrupt and capable of anything.
It doesn’t help that we have a media which panders to this nuttiness and often echoes it.
None of the hacks latched onto this, not in print anyway, but it’s clear that some of them were initially convinced; David Tanner, who was tweeting just the other day, wondering what inducements had been made to Dundee, clearly took the bait.
I would be amazed if others hadn’t gotten all excited and feverishly tried to verify it.
All of them expect Sevco to have some devastating information; we’ll know by the end of the day if the top flight clubs are as convinced. I’ll be doing a separate piece on that when we know more, but you have to remember that we’re not the target audience here and the clubs aren’t either.
The target audience for whatever dodgy dossier the Ibrox board has come up with are their own supporters … the very Peepul who believed this forgery was real.
Is it any wonder they think they can convince their fans to buy into their claims?
These Peepul will accept anything if it appears to confirm their twisted view of the world.
If there really is a sucker born every minute, you have to marvel at how an inordinate number of them seem to wind up in Larkhall.
As Scottish football goes through the current crisis it is important to keep up with developments and the key issues. We are determined to do so, and to keep you informed as well. Please subscribe to the blog.