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One Club Constantly Plunges Scottish Football Into Chaos. It Should Not Be Permitted.

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When did it get like this? Fans of a certain generation are entitled to look at the state of our game and the anarchy which has been wrought on it by a single club and ask that question. When did it get like this?

Because it surely couldn’t always have been this way?

They need to know this; in many ways, it has been this way for decades, at least two of them, but it got really bad in the last fifteen years. So we’re not in uncharted territory, but we’re certainly seeing a whole new level of mayhem.

It’s worth noting that I was in my 20’s when the first Ibrox club, Rangers, changed the way the game worked in Scotland. They drove up prices. They bent the media to their will. And in doing so they created the conditions for all else that was to follow. They brought the phrase “succulent lamb journalism” into the conversation, via a Jim Traynor column which still leaves you breathless when you read the dripping sycophancy in it.

The first truly atrocious piece of the current era of reeking bad journalism was in 2008, when David Murray told the media that their club was on the cusp of unveiling a £250 million stadium with a floating pitch, paid for by a casino development. I read it with astonishment, and for the first time I devoted myself to picking apart a story and writing a rebuttal.

I didn’t know it then, but that moment was to change the course of my life. It was also the very last throw of the dice for Murray’s club, although I didn’t know that either when I sat down to do my deep dive into the gush of nonsense in the press reports. I asked E-Tims if they would publish a piece on it, they said yes and I got down to business.

Two years earlier, Murray had predicted a “massive moonbeam of success waiting for us”, so naturally I called the whole thing “Moonbeams Park”. I might as well have called it Moonhowler Park because it eventually amounted to the same thing.

Everything about that proposal was ridiculous. At the time I had friends both working in and for the council, and so naturally I asked for their take on it and they assured me that the feasibility meetings had been a joke and that those involved spent most of them throwing about fantasy numbers. One good friend of mine told me “They sounded like people trying to convince themselves rather than us.” Which only confirmed what I already suspected.

Yet the media was lapping up Ibrox’s moonbeam story.

They did no due diligence. To pay for it, the club were relying on a casino being approved for Glasgow and being built on that site. They also needed to launch a bond scheme similar to the one at Arsenal’s, which had astonishing attached costs which no club in Scotland could ever have met even under the most benign circumstances.

And Rangers was not proposing this in anything like benign circumstances. The international banking system was already looking shaky. The following year, in light of the crash of 2008, after Moonbeams Park was nothing but a memory and an embarrassment to the hacks who had swallowed it all without doing a single bit of research, I wrote The End Of Rangers?, also for E-Tims, which took a lot of the work which was already being done by the likes of Phil Mac Giolla Bhain and a handful of others, but especially Paul Brennan at CQN, and expanded on it.

There were maybe a half dozen of us who were predicting the collapse of that club at that point, and from then onward we were simply waiting for it to happen. I tell people who ask me now what was it that convinced us that it was definitely going to happen that the numbers don’t lie and not even positive spin could make them lie. From the moment Lloyds took on the Murray account and cut off the flow of money that club was heading for ruin.

Ibrox fans to this day blame other forces. They blame Murray himself, but only for the EBT’s. But they ignore the basic truth that when that club went into administration it was damn all to do with the tax case. What happened was simple; Rangers ran out of money.

And the reason this is important is that their problems somehow became a problem for everyone else in the game.

Get that; they had run up massive debts, they had broken football regulations and used the SFA to conceal a tax scam, and it was the rest of Scottish football that was told that it had to come together and eat the shit on their behalf.

The first consequence hadn’t even waited for the administration crisis.

It had started months before when Craig Whyte had his notorious meeting with Neil Doncaster and Stewart Regan and told them both that the club was in peril and he was considering drastic action. At that time, Scottish football had been working on a bold new initiative called FansTV, the brainchild of Hibs chairman Rod Petrie and backed by Celtic amongst others.

And Regan and Doncaster went back to those clubs and told them something; what they told them has never been revealed officially, but the result of it was that Doncaster recommended that we grab the Sky extension which was on the table at that time for a lousy sum … and we’ve been chained to them ever since. FansTV was the first major casualty of Ibrox mayhem.

After Whyte put them into administration and started the inexorable slide towards the grave the governors and the media got together to tell us that we had to be understanding, that we all had to sacrifice for the greater good – which was basically a way of saying that every club should bend towards giving them a free pass, and make sure the NewCo was in the top flight. Remember those days? Remember “social unrest”?

And none of these people seemed to care that this would create major problems for all those clubs in their own houses, with their own fans. But thankfully the clubs themselves sussed that and refused to play ball, as exemplified by Turnbull Hutton standing on the steps of Hampden and calling the conduct of the governing bodies “corrupt.”

He spoke for us all.

It was disgusting the way Ibrox’s behaviour was made into our problem. It was shameful that the governing bodies rolled over for that and were prepared to tolerate it. Thankfully the clubs themselves didn’t.

Rangers vanished and the tribute act was born.

Not only were they allowed to dodge all the regulations which usually pertain to a club waiting to get into the league but their new chairman stood on the touchline for their first match, at a time when everyone was calling them the NewCo and birthed the Victim Lie. And he was allowed to.

The Victim Lie haunts Scottish football.

Every single one of our current problems stems from it. Every single one. Every bit of mayhem Ibrox has wrought since has been inspired by, and justified on, the grounds that Scottish football didn’t just kick Rangers when they were down but that it was the other clubs who caused them to fall in the first place.

Why do we put up with this?

The media helped push this and never challenges it although they have to know that it’s destructive and even dangerous. They blithely refer to “the Old Firm” although every one of us loathes the term and decry it and that our club follows suit, refusing to use it. The media couldn’t give a toss about our wishes.

Since the Ibrox NewCo was born they have caused chaos, and at every stage this blog and others have said that unless the governing bodies bring them to heel that further chaos will follow. Nothing is ever done to check their retrograde behaviour. And because nothing is done about it, it continues to eat away at the national sport like a cancer.

When COVID hit they didn’t even think twice about trying to exploit the crisis which had caused thousands of deaths and would cost thousands more. Their initial response to it was to demand that all the games took place before the end of the season, in front of full stadiums, when that was basically nuts and technically impossible.

They manufactured a crisis out of a mis-sent email. At a time when clubs were worried they might go out of business and all in Scottish football were concerned for their loved ones and their futures, that club was more interested in smashing the existing structure and removing people from office because they believed that Celtic had too much power.

They demanded hearings. Investigations. They called meetings. They produced dossiers.

They spent weeks casting doubt on the motivations of fellow clubs and their directors and then accused the heads of the game of all manner of malfeasance and then couldn’t even produce a shred of evidence for any of it. I remember being appalled at the time and writing a series of articles pointing out that the governing bodies would look weak and stupid if they allowed that to go unpunished … and worse. They would invite further rabid behaviour.

They dragged the reputation of the whole game into the gutter over that. They behaved in a manner that was quite simply disgusting, and they were allowed to do it. Who knows what reputational damage that did? Who knows how many sponsors looked at the game here and saw anarchy and decided not to get involved with it?

Every time they act out, the rest of us are expected to pay the bill.

Every time they do it people like me point out that it cannot go unanswered, that some form of sanction should follow it, that some form of punishment must be meted out if for no other reason than to act as a deterrent.

To stop them from going further, or doing something worse.

When the governing bodies allowed them to get away with trying to decapitate the board in a manufactured controversy it was inevitable that worse would come. What they did next rocked the game to its foundations.

They actually destroyed the sponsorship deal the league was able to get. Destroyed it utterly. They undermined it to the extent the whole deal had to be renegotiated and cinch pulled out of the final year.

How could there not be sanctions for that?

How could such a degenerate act not be punished? Every other club in the country was placed in jeopardy by their conduct, and nothing was done about it. It was obvious that they had to be punished for that, that it had become a matter of protecting the integrity of the game and the other clubs in it … and they got away with it.

It was inevitable that we would end up here, with them openly pressuring the SFA to get rid of an official they didn’t like, and it’s equally certain that other clubs will suffer for that as all the rest of the officials will recognise that if Ibrox turns the guns on them that the governing bodies will not protect them in any meaningful way, and so they will not want to give decisions which cause that to happen. Does it matter if it’s a result of bias or just something inspired by fear?

This challenges the integrity of the sport. If the line isn’t drawn here, where will it be?

And here’s the thought that should be keeping people at Hampden and elsewhere awake at night; if they can’t act even now, even when its crystal clear that Ibrox is a renegade organisation which has no respect for any other part of our national sport, what fresh hell awaits our game? What new crisis will they manufacture? What new demands will they make? What new stratagem will they unveil to keep on punishing the rest of the clubs for the events of 2012?

They’ve told themselves the lie so long they actually believe it now. What choice do they have? Their whole identity is bound up in it now, and to unravel it would unravel them. But it is scandalous that the rest of us have to keep on paying that bill … and as long as the governing bodies continue to function in this cowardly way, that bill will just get higher and higher and higher.

We don’t know what they might do in the future. They look at the complete absence of leadership in the game and they must conclude they can get away with anything. Eventually, they’ll attempt to.

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18 comments

  • John Copeland says:

    Correct me if I’m wrong here , but during the EBT period ,wasn’t the ex the Rangers player – Gordon Smith – not the head bummer at the SFA ? What kind of a chief executive turns the other way to illegal practices from a certain clumpany , then states that he ‘wasn’t aware of any wrongdoing ‘ under his watch ? He made is sound like his’ syrup ‘knew more than he did …sweeping it under ‘the rug ‘ if you catch my drift ? The entire organisation of Scottish football is rancid , putrid and incompetent ,amongst other things , right up to the heart of it !Jobs for the boys doesn’t come close to describing the discrimination at the SFA/SPFL .Sport ,business ,finance and politics combined or individually are as bent as an Arabian dagger ! You betcha .

  • Tony Watson says:

    When the masonic and the orange come together,they create a fear factor for its inhabitants,whatever or wherever there abode

  • John Devlin says:

    Ultimately we ( our board) are complicit in this. I get they are wary of going upfront against them. The howls of ” bias” and victimhood are an all too obvious concern. But consider this. What if….the rest of Scottish Football are just waiting ( hoping) for us to act? They can browbeat and bully every other club. But not us. What if, if we make a stand, it opens the floodgates for every other club to make a stand too and demand the SFA finally read the riot act to this mob? We should go for it. Because this really can’t go on. Scottish Football will look as big s fixed wrestling. If it isn’t there already…..

  • Bob (original) says:

    I blame the bloggers…

    Didn’t know that it was yourself who coined Minty’s ‘Moonbeams’. 🙂

    Can only see maybe 3 potential paths to bringing the deviant, ibrox club to heel.

    1) Cultures change with funerals.

    Only when ALL those indiividuals connected in any way with 2012’s dodgy

    goings on have died, will the game be free to move on. Those complicit

    by actions – or just mainatining a silence – at Hampden, ibrox, CFC and all the

    other 40 clubs have to move on first?

    2) An administration event at ibrox.

    If sevco suffers an administration event, then that is a ‘potential’ opportunity

    for Hampden and the other clubs to force ibrox to conditions and expected

    behaviours. But, that would still require a backbone at both Hampden and

    on the CFC Board…and I wouldn’t hold my breath.

    3) A new league.

    Maybe CFC and sevco are invited to join another league, sometime in the future?

    If it’s a new Euro league, then the Administration of that league would

    simply slap any ibrox club back into its box. ibrox influence would be greatly

    diluted, and would suffer appropriate punishment for unacceptable behaviours.

    So, mibbees in about 20 years ibrox will be dealt with…mibbees? 🙁

  • SFATHENADIROFCHIFTINESS says:

    Self evident James and the biggest part of the blame should be apportioned to, no not SEVCO and the SFA, but our own Board.
    As the biggest Club in the Country since the 1960’s, save for a 20 year Murray inspired financially doped period, Celtic should have taken the ‘Mantle’ from Turnbull Hutton and adopted the moral high ground and for the good of Scottish Football and faced down the successive lunatics that held the reins at the Debtdome.
    It was obvious from the moment that the ‘social unrest’ bogeyman was aired by Regan that these people, passed by the SFA as ‘fit and proper’ persons to run SEVCO, would use this fear as leverage to force the Governing Bodies to abstain from confronting SEVCO and discipling them as that would only add flesh and bones to the ‘Victim Lie’. So ‘big hands’ Green and’ auld squinty eyed’ Dave King ran with it causing untold mayhem. It was good business for them.
    The Celtic Board hummed and hawed and said nought. All to preserve the share price. And as the outright corruption of the Scottish Game gathered momentum they still remained quiet even as the evidence piled up. Oh, and they still managed to take their ever growing salaries and bonuses.
    The Board will maintain that they tried to address the situation but that they couldn’t garner support. They didn’t try hard enough. Just as they didn’t try hard enough over Res 12, reforming the SFA, addressing the biased Refereeing Association, VAR and it’s less than honest application to the ‘Game’, and calling out the partisan SMSM, all the obscenities that afflict the Game in Scotland.
    The Game in Scotland is finished as a genuine, level playing field Sport and consequently more and more fans will be lost to a game that they see as fixed, corrupt. The big 2 Tribes will continue but over time the smaller Clubs will struggle to survive and many will be lost to the Game. Sponsorship will dwindle and even the ‘lowball Sky deal’ will be seen as more and more of an irrelevance.
    Pessimistic, maybe but I can’t see things changing for the better anytime soon and most likely worsening at a faster rate of knots.

  • Gordon Ashley says:

    Celtic just as responsible as the sfa… one day when Celtic are run by people with actual testicles, the Celtic board will challenge the ebt titles in court and sevco will barely challenge it due to the 0% chance of winning

  • Iain Fergusson says:

    An excellent quality piece of journalism with facts not beliefs. Saying it as it is. Well done.

  • DixieD says:

    Excellent piece James! Hitting th bullseye with every point! When its laid out like this its even more embarrassing for the SFA/SPFL!! And yet the klan still think the governing bodies are totally against them and biased towards us. Incredible!

  • Michael McCartney says:

    A great article James, but it looks as if we and you are farting against thunder, the first club {1874-2012] called Rangers FC were the favourite club of the Scottish establishment even as they carried out a sectarian signing policy for nearly 100 years aimed against 20% of the Scottish population.
    This club saw themselves as the biggest in Scottish football and had the support base to back that up. Like lots of large organisation they became full of their own importance and thought they were untouchable.
    Eventually by overspending and cheating the tax man along with breaking the player registration rules of the SFA, they fell into administration and then liquidation.
    With most organisations this would have led to some soul searching and a degree of hunbleness [see what I did there], but no the 2nd incarnation of this club[2012-2024] and their followers don’t do these kind of decent things, they are more at home with anger and bitterness.
    It makes me sick that our club’s board and the rest of Scottish football along with the Scottish print and broadcasting media have let this horrible organisation infect and continue to infect Scottish football with absolutely no sanctions to be put in place as punishment.

  • John says:

    Another good article James. WRT media, the key phrase is due diligence. They have never researched any lie which has come out of their mouths. It’s the same today as the media continue to backtrack.

    What i cannot get my head around is, why are the media in their pockets. I get the OO & Masons etc, but their daily productions are going down the pan fast.

    People not buying papers are telling editors their press is crap and not reading the p*sh they are producing.

    These are non Sevco fans who are not buying their rags.

    The editors must see this.

    Are they more afraid of the Klan or their job?

  • Mr Smith says:

    Someone needs to point out that it looks like sevco have already had officials stopped from officiating their games for months on end.

    We are witnessing full on cheating and corporate fraud imho

  • Tony B says:

    Celtic is by some way the most powerful football club in Scotland.

    What is its board doing about everything you’ve just highlighted?

    If it’s nothing, then why should anyone else bother their arses?

  • Captain Swing says:

    Anarchy in the UK?!

  • John S says:

    Let’s forget, if not forgive, the original Rangers, they’re gone. This new Frankenstein is a carbuncle upon Scottish society, not just sport. Whilst they still have the political and societal props, unfortunately they don’t have the money, the intelligence or any wherewithal at all to recapture their authority except through renegade ‘scorched earth’ policies. Let’s see and treat them as they are, Imposters, ‘jobby on a stick’ merchants.

  • Clachnacuddin and the Hoops says:

    I’m one of the fans that they (SFA / SPFL and Celtic) have driven away from the game…

    The SFA and The SPFL for their pandering to Sevco and Celtic for saying not one word far less one sentence on the matter –

    We will all pay (especially Celtic) a helluva price from the inaction of the governing bodies against Sevco…

    Scottish Football is an utter farce, a disgrace and ran by dishonest and corrupt men for the benefit of one dishonest and corrupt club – Sevco –

    I’m just glad that I no longer pay towards the farce that is the game here but bloody hell I feel sorry for those fans of Celtic and every other club that do and are being cheated on an almost weekly basis…

    It’s bloody sickening as well that all those crooks and conmen are to get all the glory of a jolly to Germany 2024 –

    It’s a bloody cruel world out there at times !

  • JimBhoy says:

    When sevco are allowed to hide the main league sponsor that says it all.

    We’ll need to get the permission of sevco for the next sponsorship deal just hope the logo doesn’t have too much green on it.

    The SFA need to provide clear legislation if not already and punishment that is carried out if rules are broken, game in disrepute etc. They need a stronger legal representation if nothing else.

  • Antony Ivatt says:

    Great article and as some have said, our own board have a hell of a lot to answer for.
    They would rather joke at agm’s about penalties for rangers rather than deal with the issues at hand. All the while telling us dafties you get what you pay for!

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