Dirthy Filthy Hun Scumbag Vermin (deceased) and Poundland tribute act

Kowalski · February 17, 2012

Milan Mandaric interested in buying crisis-hit club Rangers

Former Portsmouth and current Sheffield Wednesday chairman Milan Mandaric is interested in buying Rangers.

The administrators revealed on Thursday they had already heard from parties interested in the crisis-hit club.

And BBC Scotland has learned the Serbian - last week cleared of two counts of tax evasion - is one of those to have contacted Duff and Phelps.

Mandaric, who has also been in charge at Leicester, took over at Hillsborough 11 months ago .

Azteca1903 · February 17, 2012

Interesting take if you can be arsed with the long read.

Scottish politics seems to be having a wee holiday this week. The First Minister has a little chat with the Scottish Secretary over the referendum, deciding nothing, the Unionists demand “answers” to questions on a completely different subject, Jim Sillars witters on about something or other in yet another bitter rage about how well the SNP’s doing without him, and the Scotsman quietly admits that some of its previous scare stories (this time the ones about Scottish membership of the EU) were cobblers and hopes nobody notices. In other words, business as usual.

The reason everyone’s putting out a skeleton service operating on auto-pilot is, of course, that they’re all transfixed with the goings-on at Ibrox. And rightly so, because it’s an enormous story which reaches out and touches the entire population in a way that politics almost never does. For fans of Rangers, their entire world has fallen in. For fans of other clubs it’s either hilarious, or a time for rising above petty rivalries and showing solidarity with their fellow supporters, ie it’s secretly hilarious. For Rangers employees it’s a worry, for battered wives, social services and hard-pressed A&E staff it’s a blessing and for booze retailers it’s a catastrophe.

We also can’t ignore the possible political consequences. For decades Rangers FC has served as a weekly indoctrination service for the defenders of the Union – you can’t spend a large proportion of your leisure time waving Union Jacks and singing “Rule Britannia” with thousands of fellow loyal subjects of Her Majesty (she of the Revenue and Customs) without it having some sort of effect on your worldview.

But for the media, which for months on end has largely turned a blind eye to the scale of Rangers’ problems and left the blogosphere to pick up the slack, it’s a time of panic. If Rangers fall they’ll probably take half the circulation (and pagecount) of the Daily Record with them, and the tabloid media in general is desperate for the club to survive in something as close to its present form as possible.

So the story, told loudly and relentlessly, is that Scottish football couldn’t live by Celtic alone. Rangers, it’s insisted over and over, are vital to the continued health – nay, the very survival – of the domestic game. Their friendly, loveable fans, we hear, are the lifeblood of every other club in the league as they turn up twice a season to swell the stands and consume the Scotch pies and Bovril that pay the wages of the home side’s gangly centre-half. The TV riches that pour into SPL coffers would vanish too, without the juicy prize of four Old Firm games a year to tempt Sky into opening their gold-plated chequebook. All in all, take Rangers away and you might as well padlock the turnstiles from Inverness Caley Thistle to Queen Of The South and call it a day.

But is it true? No. It’s a load of balls.

This blog loves nothing more than a good delve in some stats, so we’ve been wading waist-deep in them this week. And the conclusion we’ve reached is that the collapse of Rangers would in all probability be the best thing to happen to Scottish football this century. Along with its Parkhead twin, the club is a giant vampire squid choking the Scottish game to death, and history strongly suggests that Scottish football can ONLY flourish if one or both of the Gruesome Twosome is in poor health.

Firstly, let’s look at some of the myths.

We’re told that the smaller clubs need the influx of cash generated by home games against the Old Firm every year. But how much is that really worth? Under the current SPL structure, there’s no guaranteed number of such fixtures each season. Aberdeen, for example, got just three last year (two against Rangers, one against Celtic), because they were in the bottom six of the league at the time of the “split”.

In season 2010/11, the Dons had an average attendance at Pittodrie of just under 9,000. For the three Old Firm games, the average attendance was 13,378. That’s 4,504 extra punters through the gates per match, or a total for the season of 13,512. In other words, having Rangers and Celtic come to visit was effectively worth the equivalent of about 1.5 extra home games a year. (1.52, if you want to be picky.)

Now, for a club on a tight budget like Aberdeen, 1.5 extra home games a season is a handy bit of cash. If we assume that the average spectator spends £40 on their ticket, programme, refreshments and whatnot, it’s over half a million quid in (gross) revenue. But it’s not the difference between life and death. It could be achieved just as easily by an extended cup run or qualification for Europe – things which are significantly more likely to happen if you take one or both of the Old Firm out of the picture.

Indeed, just a modest amount of progress in Europe can effortlessly eclipse a season’s worth of Rangers and Celtic ties. In season 2007/08 Aberdeen reached the last 32 of the Europa League, which is very much the poor relation of UEFA’s club competitions compared to the cash cow of the Champions’ League. Getting to the last 32 of it isn’t exactly spectacular success, but it nevertheless brought the Dons four extra home games that season, which drew a total of 74,767 paying customers.

Alert viewers will have noticed that even this humble adventure was therefore worth almost SIX TIMES as much to the Pittodrie club as an entire season of Old Firm fixtures, and that’s before you factor in the not-inconsiderable matter of extra TV money and participation bonuses, which would surely boost that multiplier to 10 or more. (It’s perhaps also worth noting that even the first-round first-leg tie against the unglamorous FC Dnipro of Ukraine attracted a larger crowd than any of 2010/11?s games against Rangers or Celtic, despite having thousands fewer away fans.)

From this we can see that if a team like Aberdeen qualified for Europe just fractionally more often, as as result of the demise of one or both of the Old Firm making places more easily attainable – maybe once every five or six years – the rewards could easily eclipse the losses. But there’s more to it than that, because the Europa League jaunt had a knock-on effect on domestic attendances too.

When Hearts came to Pittodrie in the middle of the Europa run, the gate was 14,000. The corresponding fixture in 2010/11, at roughly the same time of year, saw just 9,100 show up. In other words, a tiny glimpse of success saw attendance over 50% higher – exactly the same sort of boost delivered in a normal season by the visits of the Old Firm. Even two months after the Dons were knocked out of the tournament by Bayern Munich, a home game against Falkirk could pull a crowd of 11,484 – a comparable late-season match (vs Hibernian) in 2010/11 managed just 7,400.

Of course, you could argue that the higher attendances in 2007/08 were a result of a better season in general (Aberdeen finished 4th that year, compared to 9th in 2011). But then, that’s the point – fans are much more likely to turn up to watch games in a competition where their team has a fighting chance of achieving something than in a league where they’re just making up the numbers. Take one or both of the Old Firm out of the league and you instantly make it far more competitive, which makes it far more exciting, which makes it far more attractive for people to come and watch.

This isn’t just an idle theory. Within living memory, Scottish football has actually experienced an extended period where one or other of the Old Firm was in dire straits, and the result was a far more competitive league with substantially bigger attendances for the non-OF clubs. While this era is often dismissed as a brief Alex-Ferguson-inspired flicker in the mid-80s, it in fact lasted for almost 20 years.

The first phase was around the creation of the old Scottish Premier Division, running from the tail end of the 1970s and right through the 1980s, before David Murray and his bottomless wallet turned up at Ibrox around the turn of the decade. Rangers were in a woeful state at the time, winning the league just once in a 10-season spell between 1979 and 1988, and with home crowds at Ibrox regularly dropping below 10,000.

(One 1979 league game against Partick Thistle brought fewer than 2,000 loyal Gers fans to the stadium, and no, that’s not a typo – we really mean TWO thousand.)

But it wasn’t just Celtic who took advantage – in four of the other nine seasons of that decade the league title went to the smaller clubs (Aberdeen three times, Dundee Utd once), and it would have been five if not for the most infamous last-day implosion in Scottish football history robbing Hearts of the 1985/86 flag.

In other words, in a 10-team division fully 50% of the participants were mounting realistic challenges for the title – a feat probably never replicated anywhere else in the world in the history of football. The Scottish Premier Division was almost certainly the most competitive club league on the face of the planet, and such a healthy state of affairs was reflected on the broader stage.

Aberdeen won the European Cup-Winners’ Cup (with an all-Scottish team) in 1983, defeating Bayern Munich and Real Madrid to secure the trophy, and also beat that year’s European Cup champions SV Hamburg to join the illustrious list of winners of the Super Cup. The next season Dundee United got to the semi-final of the European Cup (with the Dons making the Cup-Winners’ Cup semis), and three years later Jim McLean’s men reached the final of the UEFA Cup, knocking out Barcelona along the way but losing the final 2-1 to IFK Goteborg.

The nature of Old Firm weakness changed between the late 1980s and the mid-1990s. David Murray had arrived at Rangers and was pouring money into the club, attracting big-name England internationals with the promise of European competition after English clubs were banned in the aftermath of Heysel. But while Rangers grew stronger Celtic weakened, and the Parkhead side hovered on the brink of bankruptcy for several years before being rescued by Fergus McCann in 1994.

As a result, the Scottish Premier Division remained competitive. Although that sounds a daft assertion in the wake of Rangers’ nine-in-a-row of league triumphs (1989-97), the fact remains that four different teams finished in second place over the period, with Celtic not managing to do it until 1996. Rangers’ average margin of victory in the league race during the nine-season run was under 7 points, which contrasts sharply with the typical modern-day gap between the Old Firm and the rest of 30+ points.

Indeed, over the entire 22-season lifespan of the old Premier Division, the Old Firm (in either order) took the top two spots just seven times, and five of those comprised the first two and last three seasons of the competition. Over a 17-year stretch in between, the Old Firm secured the 1 and 2 positions just twice. (Celtic-Rangers in 1978/79, and Rangers/Celtic in 1986/87.) In nine of the 22 seasons, the Old Firm couldn’t even both get into the top 3.

The SPL era, on the other hand, has seen Tweedlehun and Tweedlydee cosily slice up first and second place in 12 of its 13 seasons (the only blip being Hearts pipping Rangers to the runner-up spot by a single point in 2005/06). Where the Scottish Premier Division was the most competitive league in the world, the SPL is now the least competitive, and therefore one of the least healthy.

(During the life of the old SPD the Scotland international side qualified for World Cups in 1978, 1982, 1986 and 1998, and for European Championships in 1992 and 1996. Since the advent of the SPL in 1999, with the Old Firm hurling most of their money at foreign players, the national side hasn’t reached a single tournament finals.)

Of course, the game has changed since the Premier Division. The SPL, Sky TV, Champions League and Bosman have all conspired – entirely by design – to make life harder for the smaller teams and cement the dominance of the bigger ones who can command higher TV audiences. Even this, though, is a slightly misleading picture.

Media pundits are fond of pointing out that Sky’s interest in the SPL would plummet if it no longer had Old Firm games to offer its subscribers, and this is undoubtedly true. What nobody points out, however, is that the OF hog so much of the Sky money for themselves that even a massively-reduced deal from terrestrial broadcasters would be more evenly distributed in a notional post-Rangers world, and so would likely end up with the smaller teams seeing fairly similar amounts of money to what they get now.

By way of illustration of the sort of sums involved, we examined the 2010 public accounts of Motherwell, who finished 6th in the SPL in 2010/11. Their total income from TV and radio was just over £1.2m. We’d imagine the bulk of that came from the Sky deal, but some will also be from elsewhere, eg the BBC rights to highlights packages and radio coverage. Arbitrarily, then, let’s say Sky is worth £1m a year to Motherwell, out of the total £16m that Sky pay the SPL every year.

A typical home game at the average 2010/11 Fir Park attendance of 5,660 will generate something very roughly in the region of £225,000. If Sky disappeared and nobody took up the live-TV rights at all, the club would need to either play four extra home games OR attract an extra 1300 fans to each game to compensate, OR reduce its annual wage bill of a startling £3.3m, or some combination of the three.

In a more competitive league with more chance of European football, that’s hardly an impossible dream – for reference, in 2007/08 when Motherwell finished 3rd their average attendance was around 1000 higher, at 6,600. The further 300 extra was achieved as recently as 2004/05.

But even beyond that, the data in the early part of this feature (which is broadly reflected for all other Scottish sides, not just Aberdeen, but we’d be here all day if we were to list every one) proves that the crucial core principle remains the same – a team with a better chance of even the mildest definition of success, eg qualifying for Europe or reaching a domestic cup final, will see a large upshoot in its attendance figures, and more than enough to compensate for the less-frequent visits of Rangers/Celtic fans or a drop in TV money. And the prime driver of that increased prospect of success is the weakness (or absence) of at least one of the Old Firm.

For all the commentators asserting that Scottish football would collapse – either in footballing terms or economic ones – should Rangers FC not make it out of season 2011/12 alive, the numbers simply don’t add up.

http://wingsland.podgamer.com/why-scotland-doesnt-need-rangers/

glasgow sheep · February 17, 2012

Interesting take if you can be arsed with the long read.

http://wingsland.podgamer.com/why-scotland-doesnt-need-rangers/

Which was posted a few days ago.

As for the Salmond bashing as I said before all politicians are at it, Salmond, Labour no-marks, Cameron the lot. Idiots the lot of them.

Azteca1903 · February 17, 2012

Which was posted a few days ago.
As for the Salmond bashing as I said before all politicians are at it, Salmond, Labour no-marks, Cameron the lot. Idiots the lot of them.

Ah apologies, didn't see it.

Nellie The Don · February 17, 2012

I couldn't give a shite what ANY politician thinks about this. The two things are unrelated.

Back to the point. Are the cunts any closer to being over yet? *popcorn*

glasgow sheep · February 17, 2012

Ah apologies, didn't see it.

I meant to add, although I can see the argument that no huns in Scottish football may be a bad thing <spit> having a poor rangers in the spl would be a bloody good thing. From that article I would take that when one of the OF are poor there is much more competition and excitment in the league, more likely a repeat of the 90s than the 80s due to sellicks dominance but seeing rangers bounce around midtable for a few years would be as entertaining, if not more, than them going bust completely......fingers crossed.

As for TV audiences and interest in our league from outside Scotland, can't imagine anyone cares, OF or not, we need to be getting the locals interested for a start.

mizer · February 17, 2012

http://www.thescottishsun.co.uk/scotsol/homepage/news/4135658/Craig-Whyte-advisor-is-a-porn-star.html

You could not make it up.

Most of his sexploits are too graphic for a family newspaper.

But in one scene the self-styled stud has a FOURSOME with a latex-clad Katwoman, another woman and a second man dressed as Batman
At one point THREE scantily-clad blondes perform a sex act on a clearly delighted Baxendale-Walker.

He also romps with a blonde Wonder Woman and a girl in a leopard-print outfit.

The DVD blurb says "This is an action-packed, sex-filled adventure. It's not just chases, fights, explosions and action, It's also some of the hottest sex and group sex from the nastiest villains and heroes around!!"

glasgowdon · February 17, 2012

From today's Guardian web:

The Sheffield Wednesday chairman, Milan Mandaric, says he is shocked and disappointed by reports that he is interested in buying Rangers.

The BBC and the Yorkshire Post are among those to suggest the Serbian had contacted Rangers' administrators to register his interest in the club, but Mandaric has moved to flatly deny the reports.

"I am aware and shocked at the media reports today linking my name to an inquiry over the potential purchase of Glasgow Rangers Football Club," he said in a statement.

"First and foremost, I can categorically deny that there is any substance to these stories and I am disappointed that such articles are printed without any foundation whatsoever. I have never had any dialogue or contact to anyone relating to Glasgow Rangers.

"Glasgow Rangers is a huge football club with a great heritage and history, but I already have that that here at Sheffield Wednesday. For clarity, I have not instructed any of my associates to register an interest in the administration process at Glasgow Rangers and I have no interest, now or in the future, of becoming involved in the club."

Reekie_Red · February 17, 2012

"I have no interest, now or in the future, of becoming involved in the club."

Good call. Let those bastards fester in their administration hell!

BobbyBiscuit · February 17, 2012

amazingly enough, Paddy Power have installed the huns as Even money favourites for next season's league title.

Second favourites at 2/1 are Peterhead.

Penfold · February 17, 2012

Another statement from Whyte.

RANGERS chairman Craig Whyte has this afternoon released the following statement:

WHEN I took over as majority shareholder of Rangers in May last year, I knew I had been handed a huge privilege - and an enormous responsibility. My intention then was to do everything I could to safeguard the club's future. And that remains my intention today.

The traumatic events of the last few days have, understandably, led to a great deal of angst and uncertainty as well as firestorm of media speculation, much of it ill-formed and some of it downright malicious.
That an internationally-renowned institution such as Rangers should find itself in administration is bound to create shockwaves, particularly among the club's magnificently-loyal fans, and I fully understand their anxiety.

As chairman, I have been at the centre of this firestorm - and quite rightly so. I knew when I stepped up to take over the club that the challenge of restoring Rangers to financial health after many years of living well beyond its means would be daunting. But I accepted it, both as a life-long Rangers fan and as a businessman with experience in turning round companies in distress.

The decision to call in the administrators was painful but it was the right thing to do. They have promised to publish a full report as soon as possible and I very much welcome that. In spite of the endless speculation and attempts at character assassination by certain sections of the media, I am 100% confident that the administrators' report will prove that every penny that has come in and gone out of Rangers has been properly accounted for. And I wish to state categorically for the record now that I personally have not taken a single penny out of Rangers since I became chairman and have paid all my expenses from my own funds.

Today I learned that my predecessor, Alastair Johnston, has urged the Crown Office to order an investigation into my takeover of the club. Again, I have absolutely nothing to fear because any fair investigation will prove that I have always acted in the best interests of Rangers and been involved in no criminal wrong-doing whatsoever.

While the administrators get on with their work, it is only right that they are given the time and space they require to complete their task. That is why I have decided to take a step back from events so that I do not become a distraction to either that process or to Ally McCoist and the players.

Regrettably, I will not be attending tomorrow's match against Kilmarnock. Although I would dearly love to be at Ibrox for the game, my priority is, and will continue to be, to assist the administrators in any way I can to bring this process to as speedy a conclusion as possible.

Painful though it is for all concerned, administration now gives Rangers a fighting chance - a welcome breathing space - to fix major structural problems that will allow the club to grow and prosper again both on and off the field.

So I send Ally McCoist and the team my very best wishes for tomorrow. And I will end by simply saying to Rangers fans: I know that tomorrow you will prove why you are the best football fans in the world.

Statement from joint administrator David Whitehouse of Duff & Phelps:

CRIAG WHYTE has co-operated with us since our appointment as administrators and we believe his announcement brings further stability to the situation as we conduct the administration of Rangers' business.

As administrators we will continue to ensure the Club's business is run seamlessly as a plan to exit administration is developed.

He hasn't personally taken a penny from AFC. But many of his numerous companies have.

Mentorred · February 17, 2012

So by night he screws busty porn stars by day he screws Glasgow Rangers.

Kowalski · February 17, 2012

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/17079011

The Scottish Football Association are to hold an independent inquiry into the activities of Rangers.

In December, the SFA said they would investigate Craig Whyte after the Rangers owner admitted that he had been disqualified as a company director.

Now Rangers are in administration, the governing body say they are looking into "potential breaches of the SFA's articles of association".

"We are concerned by the developing situation," read an SFA statement.

"New information has come to light since the appointment of the club administrators, Duff and Phelps. The chairman and his panel will be briefed by the chief executive, Stewart Regan, next week and will consult further with the administrators, Duff and Phelps, as part of their inquiry.

"We have been guaranteed full co-operation by Paul Clark, representing the company.

"The Scottish FA's previous efforts in obtaining information relevant to the Fit and Proper Person requirement has been restricted by the club's solicitors' continued failure to share information in a timely or detailed manner.

"We now feel there is no option but to undertake an independent inquiry to establish the clear facts and to determine the extent of any possible rules breaches."

Kowalski · February 17, 2012

http://www.heraldscotland.com/news/home-news/police-probe-rangers-takever-as-administrators-hunt-missing-millions.2012028949

Police are to investigate Craig Whyte’s takeover of Rangers. The Strathclyde force has been handed a dossier of information surrounding Whyte’s purchase of the club from Sir David Murray last year.

Penfold · February 17, 2012

SPL block Daniel Cousin signing.

Stewart · February 17, 2012

http://www.scotprem.com/content/default.asp?page=s2&newsid=11079&back=home

The SPL was at 3.26pm today presented with a contract between Daniel Cousin (“the Player”) and Rangers FC dated 17 February 2012, signed by the Player and by Paul Clark, the Joint Administrator of The Rangers Football Club plc (in Administration).

In terms of SPL Rule A6.20, the consent of the Board of the SPL was required for the Registration of the Player with the SPL. The Board of the SPL declined to give that consent.

Accordingly the Player is not Registered with the SPL and is not eligible to Play in SPL Matches. Rangers FC have the right to appeal this decision to the Judicial Panel of the Scottish FA.

Notes

A6.20 Except with the consent of the Board and that only where (i) the term of a Player’s contract of service with his Club has expired and such contract has not been renewed or extended or such a contract has terminated with the mutual consent in writing of the Club and the Player concerned and, in either case, the registration of such Player with the League in terms of Section D of the Rules has been cancelled and a replacement Player is sought to be registered to replace the Player whose contract has so expired or been terminated; or, (ii) where the Player sought to be registered is a temporary replacement for a goalkeeper who is unable by reason of injury or illness to play and that only where written confirmation of such inability shall have been obtained by the Club from a qualified medical practitioner and submitted to the Board and the Board is satisfied that the Club concerned has no other goalkeeper who is registered and able to play, a Club that has taken, suffered or has been subject to an Insolvency Event or Events shall not be entitled or permitted to register any Player with the League and the League shall not register such a Player in terms of Section D of the Rules until such Insolvency Event or events shall no longer continue or subsist.

dickofthedons · February 17, 2012

Did you see the Huns greeting on the STV news about how now if the buy a season ticket in the next 4 years that the money goes to Ticketus and not to the club, even suggesting that it would put them off buying one. Don't they understand the concept of a loan? They just got given £24M just like that for doing fuck all. These people make me cringe, just go bust then fuck off and die please

Kowalski · February 17, 2012

tlg1903 · February 17, 2012

Thats the best one yet

rocket_scientist · February 17, 2012

I have a present for you...

I couldn't be arsed trawling back through all the shite to see if this had been offered before. You're right capitalsharpie. Don't let them get you down. Salmond is quite obviously a prick but tell me what politician isn't? But compared to Blair and Brown? No contest.