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Celtic’s Advantage Over Our Rivals Is Revealed In One Amazing Disclosure In Their Accounts.

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We all know that our rivals posted their accounts last week, and we all know that they were absolutely dire. In some ways they were what we expected.

In others they were far worse.

One of the things that isn’t getting as much ink as it should be is the news that they will need £7 million to get through this campaign, which tells you that on top of the big losses from last year that they expect to make another multi-million-pound loss in this one.

Aside from the promises from the board that the money will be there, there is no good news in those figures, not one bit of it.

The media may sing a different song but the truth is that they are a disaster and that club is a disaster, floating on a sea of loans and debt for equity swaps without which they would not be able to afford half of their current squad.

Everything in those accounts is frankly awful, but one hard number stands out as the most awful; the figure for merchandising. In our accounts, we posted an incredible £22 million in merchandise earnings for the year of the virus lockdown.

Their number was a mere £9.2 million. What’s more, that was the figure for merchandising and “other commercial activities.”

Those “other commercial activities” are not included in our £22 million figure.

Their number is for “sponsorship, advertising, commercial and retail.”

Which covers a lot of ground.

And yet it was still £13 million lower than our total for just one strand of that.

These figures are courtesy of Paul Brennan at CQN who knows his stuff on this, but it was borne out by reporting in the mainstream press too where there was yet another amazing figure.

According to The Record (yeah I know) the Ibrox commercial director, James Bisgrove, who they are always touting as some kind of genius, has signed almost 9000 – yes, that’s nine thousand – commercial contracts in the space of just a few years.

And they aren’t near us.

Not even in the same ballpark as our figures.

For a while now some in our circle have speculated that perhaps we’re missing a trick by not having a jersey full of sponsors, or in not going for the cryptocurrency hook ups or all the rest of the stuff he gets a lot of media praise for doing.

But as these figures reveal, the income from these schemes is not only insignificant, it is laughably small.

The idea that these people are anywhere near breaking even is ridiculous. Their much praised business department isn’t generating anything remotely comparable to what ours does. They are, in fact, scrabbling around for the sponsorship equivalent of spare change.

What it makes plain is that even a season of Champions League income is not going to significantly change their situation. An injection of funds of around £30 million would make a difference, but one lasting a single season or perhaps two.

But they would squander it on new signings and even higher wages. It would not go towards growing the club.

Our biggest advantage over them is to be found in the size of our stadium, and what happened here is that the lockdown negated that advantage. It made no difference whatsoever. We outperformed them by every available metric and we can, and will, continue to do so.

If financial fair play rules were in place this club would be behind us to an extent that they would never be able to make up.

Even without them, they face the tough choices now that have been long delayed. The press may want to paint the garden over there as being all rosy and to pretend that they have closed the commercial gap … but it isn’t true.

Every break-even projection – and the one offered by the hilariously poor “finance expert” Kieran McGuire, and which was written up as gospel by the ever gullible Matthew Lindsay in the Evening Times, in a piece headlined “Why Rangers are on track to achieve self-sustainability – despite posting losses of £23.5m” is especially bad – depends on European football income that isn’t a sure thing and player sales which they might not ever realise.

It’s funny money, pulled out of the ether and not in any way connected to the real world.

But the facts do not lie. The numbers can be spun but they cannot be denied.

They are solid. They are real.

And for Ibrox, they are dreadful.

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  • Brian says:

    Why isn’t financial fair play not come into the equation I don’t understand why Uefa aren’t getting involved

  • Jimmy says:

    James I think cfc merchandise income is reported gross with related expenses included in the profit and loss account so the actual profit will be considerably lower than the headline figure. Sevco on the other hand don’t have shops and their income is effectively commission with no expenditure attached to it. The disparity between the two will be much lesser than you suggest. Hope this helps.

    • Damian says:

      Interesting explanation. All else to one side, Rangers fans are not any less likely to spend ludicrous sums of money on merchandise than our own support – certainly not in a season where their team played well in the league and in Europe, and ours was hopeless.

    • JimmyWhite says:

      I think you will find “gross” and “net” both, will be recorded in the accounts, surely you’re no implying that net has been used for the sevco results while gross has been used for Celtics, for some reason, surely no, why would you think this?

  • Peter Cassidy says:

    They have burnt thru over £120 mil in loses since new the company was formed in 2012 and then clear of debt its madness how this company is being run it will all end in tears Mike Ashley still to be paid as king spanked them for nearly £850000 in interest on his £5 mil loan good rangers man.

  • ?Green Machine? says:

    Govan Sevco FC 2012 Same Club since Formed and Founded by the Yorkshire Man with the Big Hands Charles Greene.Real Factual History Books Will Show They Achieved the Unimaginable 1 In A Row.AND they can boast They have the Petrol Tank Cup.Living in Celtics Shadow for Eternity.Chasing Celtics Achievements is Certainly Going to Kill this New Club Too

  • Bob (original) says:

    The risk at Ibrox is unchanged since 2012: the club will bite the dust when;

    – nobody is left to buy worthless shares in the never ending Share Issues
    &
    – nobody is left to provide personal loans.

    With accumulated losses now exceeding an incredible £100M, the Ibrox club must be close to running out of legitimate sources of funding…?

    • Roonsa says:

      Let’s hope so, Bob-a-job-Bob.

    • Mark B says:

      The losses will stop if they get CL money and sell a couple of 10m players. Park and bennet can’tfund forever but so far have spent 23m it’s staggering truly. ForgetKing they are the true backers. You have to admire the gamble the backing and the result they have achieved something I didn’t think possible… stopping ten and reversing our dominance for last two years

  • Roonsa says:

    I think it is not only desirable that Celtic win the League this season, it is an imperative. The future of that shower of bastards depends on it not happening.

  • Mark B says:

    Having a financial advantage means nothing if you don’t use it or manage it well. We have wasted 100m of transfer fees while over at Ibrox they have racked up 100m of losses. But their squad is better than ours and they are favourites for two in a row. They gambled on stopping ten and winning CL money his year. So far it’s paying off. Incredibly Park and Bennet have personally backed them to tune of 23m, that is amazing. Lawell extracted 20m plus. Their board invests, backs the manager and prioritises the team. Our board disinvests in the squad doesn’t back the manager …eg Rodgers…and take money from the club. That’s the difference that’s why we didn’t win ten and haven’t beaten them in two years. Our board are a disgrace.

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