Yesterday evening STV revealed the real outcome of last week’s meeting between Stewart Regan, Neil Doncaster and David Longmuir as a proverbial gun was put to the head of Scottish Football League clubs.
In short, SPL chief executive, Neil Doncaster, no doubt with the support of some clubs but without the prior knowledge or support of Celtic, has threatened to kick 20 SFL clubs out of the senior game unless they acquiesce to his demand to parachute Sevco into the First Division.
The proposal was presented by SFL chief executive, David Longmuir, and appears to carry his endorsement.
Five scenarios are portrayed:
‘Rangers’ remaining in the SPL is dismissed as SPL clubs have confirmed they will vote no.
‘Rangers’ going to the third division is objected to on two grounds, financial (which is laboured a bit) and – wait for it – “The sporting opportunity is quashed for other clubs”.
Ponder that one for a moment, “The sporting opportunity is quashed for other clubs”.
‘Rangers’ to the First Division is presented as being “financially possible to recover from this scenario”.
‘Rangers’ to SPL2 is dismissed as apparently this would create “a bigger divide” than moving ‘Rangers’ to the First Division but not changing the name of the league. It is also noted that a legal challenge could bring paralysis.
Finally, they discuss ‘Rangers’ terminated or suspended, which apparently would lead to “complete financial meltdown”.
Then come the inducements to co-opt ‘Rangers’ into the First Division…. cash, your cash. Lots and lots of your cash, an “immediate cash benefit for all 30 clubs!” The exclamation mark is theirs!!
We could spend all day dissecting this disgraceful document but I’d like to focus on one immediate element:
‘Rangers’ terminated or suspended – complete financial meltdown.
So how do the SFA, SFL and the SPL rogues who participated in this shambles propose to ensure the SFA Independent Judicial Panel does not suspend ‘Rangers’ for subverting our game for over a decade for fielding illegally registered players for that period?
In short, it cannot. The independent judicial process will itself need to be subverted. As I suggested a few days ago, the judges will be told they are no longer wanted, we are back with the hand-selected SFA committee men.
The three most senior executives running our game have told you that one errant club is so powerful it cannot be subject to the rules and must not face the punishments which are due.
I’m not going to dispute the validity of this view (just now), but surely we deserve some honesty? If the Scottish Football Association and Scottish Premier League has accepted the ‘game’ is over, let’s hear from them. Where is the leadership from the SFA president on the collapse of the game under his watch? What are the chief executives saying to their paying customers?
Our sport cannot be subverted below radar.
You have been cheated and the rules will be changed to ensure there are no consequences. This is no longer a sport, it is a financial accommodation where a few executives are threatening to expel 20 clubs, most of whom have over a century history in the senior game, to allow Sevco to start two divisions higher than they otherwise would.
Celtic can have nothing to do with this.
The game here is dead. The leagues are set to collapse, most likely, no matter what happens now.
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No to a Newco
greenjedi on 29 June, 2012 at 10:33 said:
ASonOfDan on 29 June, 2012 at 10:26 said:
greenjedi
————————————————————
Position on what? A club that no longer exists want to come into a league, the vote is on 4 July, it has been made very clear that the nonclub will not be supported by existing members of that league.
There is no accounts, no identifiable owner, no players.
The Celtic board are doing exactly the right thing by making no comment on this farce. CW is still actively involved in the former football club.
There is currently a desperate attempt to ‘smoke out’ new money( Cardi’s bid was never meant to be accepted, he was to be a rallying point for other ‘off-the-radar’ investors; Mckenna’s bid was designed to appeal to their lowest common denominator, ‘a Tim buying them?!’, and provoke a groundswell of dormant investors; the latest desperate attempt by the Broon Binbag), but there is no new money.
The last act will consist of Greeny pointing out that he’s done his best but he has been left with no choice but to liquidate. Cw picks up his tab and exits stage left.
Don’t criticise the play ’til the fire-curtain drops!
Follow the money!
Posted earlier
FourGreenFields on 29 June, 2012 at 10:40 said:
Morning Bhoys , just off the phone to The Sport and Physical Activity Department at the Scottish Government , I asked if the Scottish Governments SFL Community Funding Scheme would stop if a NEWCO was not voted into the SFL 1st Division as was inferred in the joint SFA /SPL /SFL proposal (blackmail) document
circulated in the media and to all clubs . The answer was NO , the Community Funding was not dependant on a NEWCO being voted into the 1st Division , they are telling porkies Bhoys .
In an attempt to force through the vote they are lying to the clubs and to us , this must be exposed and the cheats must be stopped .
Hail Hail
read it and wept
Paul67
STV running a scare story that putting Sevco5088 into the Third Division would take £16 Million out of the Scottish Game.
I would ask every person in Scotland to consider this question, “How much did rangers take out the Economy by deliberately avoiding the paying of Tax over the years?”
HH
Paul,
where do Celtic want to go and what can we as fans do?
HH
GS
They’re as dead as dead can be, but Scottish football seems to be in complete denial about it.
Time to move onwards and upwards into the brave new world!
That proposal sounds like it was drafted and pitched by Lionel Getz
Especially the “!”
Our many expressions of dismay are understandable but cut no butter.
We need a rallying point.
Paul 67
So do we have a solution? A ‘rebellion’ perhaps with fans from every club demanding that Ogilvie and his cronies are removed from office and a new Scottish professional football association based on fair play and financial integrity established?
On the Team sheet No. 7.
This plan would set one club above the rules. It would confirm what many of us have suspected – one club can do anything it wants and get away with it.
I can’t see this happening in any other sporting league anywhere. A club is found guilty of numerous offences, fails to pay its taxes and goes bust. But the response of the authorities? Just let it back into the top league in a new guise. And when clubs won’t wear that? Why not gerrymander the whole game to allow it into the second tier?
A complete joke. And one that would make Scottish football a laughing stock.
Paul
You are completly and utterly wrong
Celtic must have something to do this, they must come out and publically slam these proposals and call for the heads of those are responsible for them!
You know what I would like Celtic’s statement to be? Not a big barn storming “Cheats Out” one. I would like Celtic to take the lead here as our position as the only “superpower” left in Scottish Football leaves us the responsibility to do.
There is a great deal of mistrust and antipathy towards the “Old Firm” from the clubs and supporters of every other club in the country. The death of Rangers has left a black hole that is currently sucking the whole of Scottish Football into it’s crushing singularity. The Murray years have left the top echelons of our game, the guys who should be making the decisions for not only the good of Aberdeen, but Arbroath and Elgin, terminally compromised. They are partial and cowardly, afraid and unwilling to do anything but save Rangers.
As you all know we are more than a football club, we were founded upon charitable principles by a modest holy man all those years ago. We have honoured our footballing hero’s, we have honoured the wee Canadian who saved us, this is our chance to honour the man who gave birth to us in the way he would want.
We need to take this craven save Rangers manifesto, including it’s filthy little bribe, and toss it in the bin. We then need to present a new blueprint to the rest of the teams who are feeling disenfranchised. We need to take the lead and present our own blueprint, based on fairness, inclusiveness and kindness.
Sporting meritocracy has to return. The English system should be adopted where there is a 4 team playoff tournament for the promotion places in EVERY league.
The bottom of Division 3 has to be opened to allow the ambitious a route and the unworthy an incentive to improve.
We should redistribute the wealth, with large subsidies paid for with SPL TV money, to Div 2 and Div 3 sides for paying and developing players under the age of 20.
We should allow all teams who visit Parkhead to keep the ticket money from selling away tickets but contribute to our costs for opening the stand.
Everything back under 1 umbrella, allowing the lower league clubs to be included in what is happening further up the tree.
Introduce a system of club memberships where clubs are compelled to ask their fans their views on decisions being made.
There was a feel good factor last week when all fans felt they mattered. That should be the way the game is period. The fans of Elgin should feel as empowered, involved and important as we do. Football should be about fairytales and fantasy, we need to give these guys something to believe in again.
Football is in danger of turning into the bank system, a murky underworld where only profit matters. Football is not and never should be that.
We have the biggest muscles in the playground now, they need to be flexed. There is a great deal of uncertainty about Rangers, their status changes hourly. We are the last stable island amidst a hurricane whipped sea. We need to turn on the lighthouse and do it now before everything crashes into the rocks.
They are dead and the rule makers would rather kill football in this country than have football without Sevco. That is the way of the funny handshake. Its ma baw and you are not playing unless I am and I am also the referee, question my authoriteeeee! you are out.
Paul – A couple of questions. Do you know if Celtic intend to say or do anything? You are painting a picture of armageddon, are we going to remain on the sidelines and lose any chance to counter the SPL/SFA/SFL agenda?
Paul67
And where exactly can they expel these 20 clubs from the SFL to?
There is nowhere else for them to go and the lawsuits would go on for years if they got this forced upon them while acting like decent citizens.
It is no longer about Celtic, it is now about the SFL.
Any changes to the structure need to be voted on. Is the paln to kick out 20 clubs to force this through?
The SFA committee men are committing suicide if they think this one will fly.
Even some Rangers fans don’t want to go to Division 1 with their new club.
Doncaster, Regan and anyone else involved with threatening other clubs in a different division and under a different body or anyone agreeing to this as a fair practice need to go pronto.
If they thought people were angry before, they had better withdraw this proposal in jig time before the rest of the fans in Scotland who are decent people and want nothing more than to support their local or childhood club will be the ones who win this war.
The suits cannot win this war in the long run and the game will die making them all out of a job.
Are they really that daft? (no need to answer that one).
“The sporting opportunity is quashed for other clubs”.
My personal favourite, I suppose the last 20 years where “Sporting Opportunity” was effectively quashed for all but one club doesn’t register with the morons running our game?
Always regarded as being paranoid, well that paranoia is now being proven as being justified.
The gamed in Scotland is finished, many thanks to the establishment.
Rogue
An outstanding post at 11.09
When I renewed my season ticket this year it was not done with the understanding that part of my money would be going to the other teams in Scotland, it was done with the understanding that 100% of the cash would be going to Celtic. If this vote goes through is it possible to have a refund based on a breach of T&Cs and then re-invest the cash into some sort of club membership scheme as others have suggested. In times of austerity it is hard enough to come up with the cash to renew without a proportion of it being used to prop up the rest of the game who incidentially don’t care one bit for our club
Paul67,
I take it the SFL clubs still have a vote about this nonsense. Surely they are not going to simply acquiesce in their own demise? I find it hard to understand how the majority of SPL clubs would see this as anything but a contrivance to circumvent what their supporters have demanded.
While I obviously hope it doesn’t occur, I can’t see how it will be brought about. Can it get any kind of support? If it does, then surely the game is a bogey, run by the Establishment for one team. Everybody else should surely either resign or demand the resignation of the likes of Ogilvie.
Duffield on Sky Sports News.
‘everyone expected they would come out via a CVA’.
‘why should a new company suffer the sanctions, they should be free to apply to the SPL’
‘some of the 3rd Division clubs might want ‘Rangers’ in there financially so will vote them in there’
‘Rangers have been helping keep the UEFA co-efficient up, so European side will suffer’
‘People do vote with self-interest rather than the bigger picture’
‘I can understand players leaving, it should be up to the individual to plan forward, just a pity ‘Rangers’ couldn’t get money for them to help the newco’
It’s a joke all right. And not a very funny one at that. To your point:
“So how do the SFA, SFL and the SPL rogues who participated in this shambles propose to ensure the SFA Independent Judicial Panel does not suspend ‘Rangers’ for subverting our game for over a decade for fielding illegally registered players for that period?”
Presumably they take the signing embargo (even tho it has been deemed an “illegal” punishment) and lose the titles won when playing ineligible players.
Paul you get to a stage were they grind and grind untill you have no fight left and I’m starting to feel that way now with the game in this country.
I had high hopes for Regan but now he’s just another puppet in this long line of corruption in our game.
I’m seriously getting to that stage now that I’m past caring and i will switch off from the game in this country.
Alternative news…
http://www.thedailymash.co.uk/sport/rangers-to-become-a-pub-team-2012062932480
HH
Paul 67
Some bad news.
The Darth Vader haunting voice infiltrated my sleep last night again.
Bad Dreams _ CSC
The SFA, SPL, and SFL are acting like a “life support” machine. SWITCH IT OFF! HH
The parellels between this nonsense and a situation I am involved in through my work are incredible.
We have a few stubborn people at the top refusing to accept logical argument and then presenting us with documents which lay out their ill thought out reasons for foisting their preferred course of action upon us. The twisting of common sense, logic and argument is truly a sight to behold. I have been saying on here for weeks that people at the ‘top’ of organisations are more often than not (there are notable exceptions) a mixture of self serving, scared of someone or something higher up the food chain, too orthodox to understand that other paths might be better, but mainly self serving. In Scottish footballs case I would suggest a mix of all these things but add in that it is still under the influence of the establishment club and the acolytes it placed in senior positions before it’s death.
It really is pathetic.
I don’t see it happenign though.
I am 95% convinced that there will be no functioning football team playing at Ibrox for 12 months. After that something will happen. But god only knows what.
Most of Deadco and Newco’s battles will be fought out in the court room. Ally McCoist will take his squad of 13 and play in any 5-a-side tournament that will have them, provided that the refs are suitably ‘understanding’ of course……..
Paul67
This needs leadership from Celtic.
Dry powder is useless if left to get damp.
So when is the right time?
That is the $1690 question.
I just hope they haven’t missed the boat (unless of course it was the Titanic).
MWD
Just in case you have forgotten what was said at the time.
“We are fully aware of our supporters’ concerns regarding the current situation across Scottish football and the breadth of opinion within our supporter base.
“The issues are complex and there is much uncertainty. Indeed, the situation repeatedly changes, even on a daily basis.
“I am sure our supporters understand that these developments are receiving our full focus and attention.
“Our guiding principle is that we will do what is in the best interests of Celtic Football Club and our supporters, consistent with upholding the interests and reputation of Scottish football.
“I can also give an assurance that we will communicate further and directly with our supporters at the appropriate time.”
Paul
The Governing bodies have admitted in this circular to SFL clubs that they cannot apply the Rules of the Game to Rangers or their successor.
You’re right, in this circumstance, the Game is dead.
Bloke109 is Neil Lennon on 29 June, 2012 at 11:16 said:
______________________________
The Wig sticks in my throat.
Yuch!
Philbhoy – It’s just the beginning! on 29 June, 2012 at 10:47 said:
>>>>
cancelled
So they throw out 20 teams if they vote against zomz in the SFL1?
That would mean setting up SPL2, except even the SFA don’t support that, as stated in the document.
So do we join with those 20 teams to setup two leagues of 14 and create a new association?
Where do those 20 teams go otherwise?
On what basis would they be expelled?
Legal challenges anyone?
£16m out of the game? From where?
From my arithmetic the biggest losers financially would be us if the TV money dropped significantly, even then you’re looking at about £1.3m per team, ok that’s a lot to ICT, but it would fall to those clubs to get more people through their gates to make up some of that money.
Oh and lest we forget the zoms don’t meet the requirements to get registered with the SFA and have until tomorrow to get the paperwork in.
This is a smokescreen obscuring the real story which is their demise.
Has their been any official word from anyone about this or is it just STV announcing this?
Bloke109 is Neil Lennon on 29 June, 2012 at 11:16 said
Sky give airtime to these balloons because they want a newco in.
Paul67
I used to feel uncomfortable about being paranoid, but I have found out that it is indeed …….normal.
Teuchter
hen1rik
That’s a good point, but the opposite is also true. They don’t give airtime to the opposite view because no-one is saying anything.
Gordon_J backing Neil Lennon on 29 June, 2012 at 09:37
The simplest questions are always the best ones. Well said sir.
brimmer