http://scotlandonsunday.scotsman.com/football/Sale-of-Rangers-FC-39will.6650410.jp

 

Quote

Sale of Rangers FC 'will go ahead by mid-January'

 

Published Date: 05 December 2010

By Tom English

 

A DEAL to sell Rangers Football Club to Scots venture capitalist Craig Whyte will go though by the middle of January, according to senior sources at the club.

Whyte, 39, met with Ibrox chairman Alastair Johnston in Glasgow to discuss the purchase of Sir David Murray's shareholding in the club.

 

The proposed £33 million deal will wipe out the existing debt that has stymied Rangers in the transfer market for two years.

 

Yesterday, sources at Rangers said the deal, barring any late hitches, could be completed before Christmas but it is more likely that it will be done by the middle of January. "We can't say with 100 per cent certainty, but Whyte has the money and is very convincing. We think the deal will happen," said the source.

 

Murray has presided over Rangers for 22 years but has been keen to sell his stake for some time.

 

Hopefully the debt thing is not true as that is what is holding them back at the moment.

Rumours are that Wallace, Shiels and Black will be offloaded.

 

Needs must and all that......would take Wallace.

Hun or no hun, would solve our left back weakness.

Incredible to think we're only three days into the new season

Said it before and I'll say it again.

The Rangers.........the gift that just keeps on giving 

“The Rangers Supporters Association, Rangers Supporters Assembly and the Rangers Supporters Trust are extremely concerned with current events at our club.

 

Walter Smith’s resignation is a matter of deep anxiety and we trust that Walter will give supporters a detailed statement outlining his reasons for leaving.

 

The recent request for an EGM to replace key personnel would suggest our concerns are shared by other significant shareholders. We would therefore urge the board of Rangers Football Club to agree to allow the EGM to proceed as soon as possible to enable the thousands of fans who have invested in the club to hear all sides in an open forum.

 

In the meantime, we have requested an urgent meeting with the Chief Executive in order to keep our members as informed as possible.”

 

Incredible to think we're only three days into the new season

Said it before and I'll say it again.

The Rangers.........the gift that just keeps on giving 

 

They've not even started their league season yet!

Wallace has been offered to sides down south, supposedly Wigan and Forest.

Why are they looking to punt these players? Is there some of the story that we've maybe not heard? They're looking at other players and offering trials/contracts so wouldn't have thought it be purely a money issue. These players wouldn't exactly be on fortunes anyway.

Financial experts have warned the various shareholders vying for ultimate control of Rangers they need to act quickly and then embark on a series of financial cuts before working capital runs out.

 

Music to my ears.

Happy days.  Fuck 'em, they'll never learn and neither will their (largely) moronic fan-base. Guess that's a symptom of being spoon fed success for the best part of 25 years.

And...

 

 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-glasgow-west-23587678

 

 

The McCall guy who was supposedly going to ride in to save them and buy up Greens shares has said he isn't putting any money in especially to Green 

SFA tell huns to shut the fuck up 

 

http://www.scottishfa.co.uk/scottish_fa_news.cfm?page=1961&newsCategoryID=3&newsID=12282

 

Statement in response to comments from Rangers FCTuesday, 06 August 2013

Scottish FA spokesperson:

 

In response to the recent public comments from Rangers FC, and in particular Craig Mather and Ally McCoist, the Scottish FA offers the clarification requested with regard to Insolvency Rules under the Judicial Panel Protocol.

 

As yet the Scottish FA has not received a formal, written request for clarification by Rangers.

 

Notwithstanding the fact that a full note of reasons was published by the Judicial Panel Chair, Gary Allan QC, at the time of the determination - disseminated to the club directly, and to the public via the media – we are happy to reiterate the salient points in the interests of clarity and transparency:

 

•    The Disciplinary Rules of the Judicial Panel Protocol provide a sliding scale of sanctions, with a suggested tariff of low-end, mid-range, top-end and maximum. This reflects the potential variations in seriousness of any breaches and any aggravating or mitigating factors.

 

•    Rangers were fined £50,000 for a breach of Rule 14(g) based on the panel’s view that the evidence presented on both sides merited a sanction at the maximum end of the tariff. This was evidenced in the Note of Reasons:

 

Page 30  – “At the time of the first withheld payment in September 2011 Rangers FC’s financial situation was such that it could have made the payment due to HMRC.”

 

Page 33 – “The non-payment was a deliberate act in furtherance of a decision of the Chairman and director of Rangers FC not to make payment as a negotiating tactic in the resolution of ‘the Big Tax Case’.”

 

Page 56 – “In the case of the non-payment of tax (which was possibly by the smallest margin the most serious breach) the massive extent of the failure and the intentional and calculated manner in which it was carried out aggravated the breach even further”.

 

•    Rangers were placed into administration following the deliberate non-payment of social taxes, despite – in the evidence provided - having the money to do so when the decision was first taken to withhold the money. This was not a feature in the Heart of Midlothian or Dunfermline Athletic cases.

 

•    Contrary to Mr Mather’s statement, Rangers’ registration embargo was applied in a separate rule breach, Rule 66 – Bringing the Game into Disrepute.

 

•    The administrators in the two other cases (Heart of Midlothian and Dunfermline Athletic) submitted that fines would be inappropriate as the clubs effectively had no money and any fine could jeopardise attempts to save the club. They made submissions on their clubs' financial position to reinforce their view.

 

•    Rangers' lawyer, in contrast, specifically asked for the club to be fined in respect of Charge 3, or Rule 14(g). He did not lead evidence of Rangers' financial position or ability to pay any fine.

 

•    Rangers did not appeal the fine.

Brilliant stuff from the SFA 

 

They can't argue with that!

Brilliant stuff from the SFA 

 

They can't argue with that!

 

Pound to a penny says they will though

Rangers bidder Dave King last night claimed the Ibrox club will be in administration by Christmas unless Charles Green lowers his asking price and sells up.

 

Despite losing £20million from a previous investment in the club, the former director is willing to plough more of his personal fortune into a controlling stake in Rangers.

 

Branding the current share asking price ‘absurd’, however, the South Africa-based businessman says he won’t pour his cash into the back pockets of Green and his associated investors if it means having nothing left for players.

 

However, keen to see the club recapitalised via the issue of new shares, King says the Yorkshireman and his cohorts risk losing everything unless they compromise over their selling price.

 

Speaking to Sportsmail, King said: ‘There is an inevitability to the fact the people currently operating Rangers are going to run out of cash.

 

‘The club raised £22m via an IPO (Initial Public Offering) and that was whittled down to virtually nothing.

 

‘I think it was down to £5m or £6m in the bank and has now got a boost via  season-ticket sales.

 

‘But the way directors are spending money on Green’s consultancy fees and other things, I don’t think they will make Christmas.

 

 

ooh this is embarrassing I've just cum

Rangers supporters' groups have called for Charles Green to be stripped of his consultancy role at the club.

 

More than 200 influential Gers fans met the club's chief executive, Craig Mather, and directors on Thursday.

 

They say Mather told them he would convene a board meeting within seven days, at which former chief executive Green's position will be considered.

 

Club funds have shrunk to £10m despite a stock market flotation and more than 30,000 season-ticket sales.

 

In December, the initial public offering (IPO) fundraising on the Stock Exchange brought £22m into Rangers.

 

Green quit as chief executive in April before being cleared by an internal investigation over claims of close links with former owner Craig Whyte during last year's takeover.

 

He returned to the club as a consultant last week, sparking a chain of events resulting in a public spat with manager Ally McCoist and chairman Walter Smith resigning on Monday.

 

A joint statement from the Rangers Supporters' Association, Rangers Supporters' Assembly and Rangers Supporters' Trust said: "We are extremely concerned to learn that there is only £10m left in club funds after the IPO and season-ticket monies have gone into the club and will be seeking more detailed answers from the club's board. We will seek to convene a follow-up meeting as soon as possible.

 

"We welcome the news that Craig Mather will convene a board meeting within seven days to consider the future of Charles Green.

 

"If the board reflect the mood of the room at the fans' meeting, then Mr Green will be stripped of his consultancy role."

 

On his return to Ibrox, Green said McCoist had to win a cup as well as League One this season and said former manager Smith had described last season's side as "the worst Rangers team you have ever seen".

 

The fans' groups statement said Green's "utterances regarding Ally McCoist and Walter Smith were horrifying".

 

It added: "We are glad that Mr Mather has committed to talking to [Rangers shareholder] Jim McColl and his colleagues. The issues facing the club are very clear and urgent - with good will they can be resolved without resort to an EGM."

Rangers defender Lee Wallace insists the opening day victory at home to Brechin City sent out a message to their League One title rivals. (Various)

 

And the message is.............what exactly?

 

We're paying players more per day individually than you're entire squad's season's wage bill, so we can occasionally beat part-timers that are down to 10 men, until we go bust again?

Good article in the Scotland on Sunday

http://www.scotsman.com/news/andrew-smith-could-rangers-history-repeat-itself-1-3040404

 

IN THE latest Rangers ructions, it can be a dizzying business attempting to figure out who sides with who.

 

Yet, ultimately Charles Green, Ally McCoist, Craig Mather, Brian Stockbridge and Walter Smith can all be lumped together. To a greater or lesser degree, they can all stand charged with being complicit in the fact that Rangers’ affairs have been mismanaged to the point where once more we are talking about financial catastrophe being visited on the club.

 

Fifteen months on from the old Rangers being liquidated, there are siren voices saying the current incarnation could be only months away from sliding into administration. No lessons seem to have been learned, no ways seem to have been mended. It beggars belief that despite a share flotation that reportedly brought in £22 million, season-ticket sales of £13m and other commercial income of around £3m, the club sits with only £10m in the bank, as financial director Stockbridge admitted in a meeting with fans on Thursday.

 

The cash burn simply doesn’t square with the fact that Rangers are a third-tier club, newly promoted from the bottom rung. It starts to do so, mind, when you consider Rangers are also a club where the manager’s annual salary is believed to be £760,000, where two chief executives could pocket more than a million in just over a year and where bonuses to executives exceeded £2m for the feat of winning the Third Division title with a £7m wage bill that ran to 28 times the budget of any of their competitors.

 

Rangers were supposed to make their way up to the top flight banking cash so, once there, they could make an assault on Celtic’s hegemony. Instead, they’ve squandered any potential reserves for no other reason, it seems, than the enrichment of certain individuals and to feel mighty despite the small-time environment in which they must operate. The hubris of former owner David Murray lives on as, it would seem, does the reckless overspend of Craig Whyte.

 

With good grace, McCoist didn’t shirk any questions on his part in the potential latest downfall. Asked on Friday if it would be alarming if the club were spending money they couldn’t afford, he said: “It would be, but Brian said the club are all right in that respect. It’s not losing money every month. Some months they are actually making money.”

 

McCoist was defensive on whether the club living beyond its means was directly linked to the player budget that he presented as a must, despite the modest nature of the challenge confronting Rangers. The club’s infrastructure and size made it inevitable their cost base would be way beyond other clubs in the third and fourth tiers. That is reasonable. But McCoist has recruited players, and a whole team of them now, on salaries that no club outside of Celtic would dare contemplate.

 

“Well the wages are down again this year, I know that,” he said. “Craig [Mather, who replaced Green as chief executive] said since the start of last season we’ve also lost ten players. We’ve lost six since last year, counting [Dorin] Goian and [Carlos] Bocanegra and boys like that. We brought in eight. It’s my job to get the best team I possibly can on the park for the fans in an effort to win the league and any other competition we are in.”

 

With Green telling him that he would be given £10m to spend on players in the event of a successful share issue, McCoist is entitled to be confused. However, McCoist cannot now be in any way be confused by the message being shouted out by former Ibrox directors. He admitted that the fact Alastair Johnston and Dave King have both spoken about the possibility of Rangers going into administration – King stating this could occur by Christmas – “would have to be a concern”.

 

“I definitely have a healthy respect for those two gentlemen, not just in the business sense but as Rangers men,” McCoist said. He accepted the pair had previously called much right on the affairs of Rangers, mostly in calling out Whyte. “Absolutely, there’s no doubt about it,” he said. “You’d have to say, in particular, those two gentlemen have voices that should be listened to.”

 

Yet if administration did happen, McCoist would not feel guilty about the costs he has racked up in conducting the club’s football business. “In the sense that I’ve not been told that we’re doing anything wrong,” he said. “If someone had said ‘don’t do that because you’re going to put the club at risk’, I would absolutely not do it. But I can’t act on something that I don’t have any knowledge of. So if someone said to me your wage bill is too high or your staff is too high, then that’s fine I can react to that and do something accordingly. But until that comes, it’s not my gig.”

 

The Rangers manager has said he would be willing to take a drop in wages but remains optimistic there won’t come a time that he will be agreeing to cut them with an administrator. “I’m not passing the buck here onto Brian Stockbridge but he is the financial director. He said there was £10m in the bank, and that not every month we were losing money, we were making money some months and there was money coming in from here and there. Rightly or wrongly, I didn’t see that I should be overly concerned about the current state. With the greatest respect, it’s maybe the board you should be asking about Dave King’s views.”

 

Administration has never been mentioned by the directors, McCoist said. “I’d hope if it was on the horizon, there would be an early warning system for us this time. Not like the last time, when we got 24 hours notice. You’d like to think we’d have a fair idea and have an opportunity to perhaps do something about it.”

 

Yet, even if McCoist understands the concept of cutting his cloth to suit – Queen of the South walked the third tier last season with a budget of £500,000 – he doesn’t necessarily agree with it. If told at the start of 2013 there was simply no more money to bring in players because of the need to build up profits for the long term, he said he would have found that “very disappointing” and “gone public” on such a block.

 

“I would have accepted that as long as everybody had a realisation of where we were. For example, everybody is saying you should be winning cups and this that and the next thing. What we have done from last year is bring in eight free transfers. That is what these guys are. Now I am thrilled, delighted and extremely grateful these boys are coming to our club. But they are free transfers from Motherwell, Kilmarnock, Southend, you know, but they are going to make us a better football team. But we are miles and miles and miles away from where we want to be.

 

“With the greatest respect, the boys from last year did not have the winning mentality in terms of winning cups. We have got one or two now that have in terms of [ian] Black, [Cammy] Bell and [Jon] Daly but they have not won trophies religiously through their career. I can understand the [Queen of the South] argument, I don’t necessarily agree with it in the respect I believe our club is different. We are expected to win every game, no matter where we are or what state the club is in. I can understand totally the logic behind Queen of the South, but with the greatest of respect, if someone said you have their budget to win the league I would have said: ‘Right, fine, as long as everyone knows that is the case then let’s get on with it.’ It is not my decision.”

 

Sally passing the buck big time at the end

"not every month we're losing money........"

Does that mean just 11 out of 12 then Sally?

 

you're still financially fucked

Just doesn't get it.

 

Not surprising though, they've always bought their way to success with money they don't have, so they've no idea how else to do it.

Sally passing the buck big time at the end

 

Yes but is it not the manager's job to instill a winning mentality?

 

He seems oblivious to the mess they're in.

Yes but is it not the manager's job to instill a winning mentality?

 

He seems oblivious to the mess they're in.

 

 

He's probably fully aware of the mess they're in. But he can just roll out these "everything's going to be ok" type of comments as long as he's getting his £760,000 a year in his hun hipper.

I had a discussion with 2 hun mates the other day about Rangers' punishment and they were of the opinion that they'd been "punished enough" and that "releagting them to the bottom teir was overly harsh". I did try to explain that they weren't relegated. Their club no longer existed. It was the new club that joined the bottom tier because that's where new clubs join the league structure. Not convinced they grasped what I was saying.

THE Advertising Standards Agency (ASA) is to review an advert in which Rangers were described as the ‘most successful’ club in Scotland.

The claim prompted nearly 80 complaints that the advert, which was used to promote season tickets for the Ibrox club, was misleading. Complainants said that the club had only been formed last year when the Sevco consortium, led by Charles Green, bought the assets for £5.5 million but the watchdog had already cleared the advert.

However, former top civil servant Sir Hayden Phillips, who acts as the independent reviewers of ASA decisions said there had been flaws in the way the decision had been taken.

Sir Hayden took issue with the watchdog’s assumption that the previous operator ‘The Rangers Football Club Plc’ or ‘oldco’, was the same entity as the ‘newco’ club formed by Green.

The Ibrox club claimed that ‘oldco’ entered administration last year but that the business and assets were bought by the ‘newco’ - another coporate entity.

Rangers provided an extract from a decision made by an SPL-appointed independent commission, which The Herald is reporting as saying: “A club is treated as a recognisable entity which is capable of being owned and operated and which continues in existence despite its transfer to another owner and operator.”

A letter from the European Club Association was also produced, which stated that Rangers was, despite being run by a different legal body, the same football club.

Sir Hayden took issue with the fact that the ASA relied on an extract of a report, and warned that there had been a ‘procedural flaw’ as a result, and added that there was a considerable risk of an error of adjudication in the distinction made between ‘club’ and ‘company’.

It was confirmed by the advertising watchdog that the Ibrox club could continue to describe itself as the ‘most successful’ club in Scotland until a conclusion was reached in the review, but a spokesman warned that the original decision could ‘potentially be overturned’.

http://www.theguardian.com/media/greenslade/2013/aug/19/daily-record-rangers?CMP=twt_gu

 

 

 

 

Daily Record engages in revisionism over its coverage of Rangers

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Today's Daily Record carries a magnificent piece of polemic by sports writer Keith Jackson about its coverage of the continuing crisis facingRangers football club.

In fact, once put into historical context, it turns out to be a self-serving piece of revisionism. It makes no reference to the paper's 180 degree turn.

The Record's record in its coverage of the lengthy financial shenanigans at Rangers shows that it has nothing to shout about.

According to Jackson's account, the paper has been at the forefront of exposing dodgy dealings down the years.

In January 2011, he writes, the Record "revealed the truth" about the "ruinous financial chicanery" of the then chairman, Craig Whyte.

I think he meant January 2012. But that's a mere slip. The point is that Jackson, the supposed exposer of Whyte, had previously portrayed him as the club's great saviour.

In November 2010, for example, Jackson described Whyte as the"financial whizzkid from Motherwell", a "high roller" who had become "Scotland's youngest self-made millionaire."

In a breathless piece of puffery, Jackson told of the venture capitalist's exploits that made him "millions from playing the markets" and able to control "a vast business empire".

Whyte's wealth was "off the radar", wrote Jackson, and enabled him to acquire a castle in Grantown-on-Spey, "one of the most historic buildings in Scotland."

Jackson and his then boss, Jim Traynor, depicted Whyte as a man of considerable wealth and thereby gave confidence to the club's fans that he was a good bet to become its owner.

At that time, and afterwards when Whyte acquired the club, the Record (in company with other newspapers) failed to investigate whether the fanciful claims about his riches stood up to scrutiny.

As Channel 4's reporter, Alex Thomson, revealed, in July 2011, Traynor even went to so far as to submit an article about Whyte for Whyte's approval prior to publication.

In February 2012, Whyte was forced to put Rangers into administration. And a month later Whyte was deemed "not a fit and proper person" to own a football club following an inquiry on behalf of the Scottish Football Association. He was also fined £200,000.

But this sad saga runs on and on. Traynor quit the Record in December last year in order to become PR of Rangers, having been appointed by Whyte's successor, Charles Green.

Four months later, the board of the reconstituted Rangers entity (Rangers International Football Club) issued a statement saying Green and the club's commercial director, Imran Ahmad, were to be the subject of an inquiry following allegations about their management of the club.

And Green, now a "consultant" with Rangers, could possibly be ejected from that position too, a claim reported by the Record now that it has cast off its Ibrox cheerleading role. Or is it secretly cheerleading for a group within the club? Is it just not possible for it to be entirely impartial?

Anyway, one single, simple fact emerges from all this - Rangers football club got into trouble a long time ago and the mainstream media, whether by commission or omission, failed to do its job. Rather than hold the people in charge to account, it acted as a spin-doctor.

Belatedly, the Record shows signs of realising the error of its ways (without apologising to its readers for those errors). Jackson wrote today that Rangers is "a club which continues to self-harm spectacularly."

If only he had written that three years or more ago. Then again, Traynor was his boss at the time. It's no wonder, perhaps, that the former journalistic colleagues have fallen out of late.