I was out of mobile phone range for most of yesterday and returned to read more histrionics. On Tuesday I wrote: “Whatever ‘good news’ Duff and Phelps come out with later”, knowing full well (you all knew too) that news of Bill Miller’s departure would soon be countered by a fantastic (literally) piece of optimism from Rangers administrators. They didn’t disappoint.
Today’s Guardian tells us that one bidder has “proved to Duff and Phelps they have a means of securing current owner Craig Whyte’s shares.”
Administrator, David Whitehouse, explains: “One of the bids is for a stand-alone CVA and there are a number of hurdles which need to be overcome. Our view is that it is challenging, but it is not impossible. The purchaser who is talking to us about a stand-alone CVA has demonstrated to us that they have got a mechanism where Craig Whyte’s shares are not an issue.”
Ah, the illusive mechanism! So Craig Whyte is irrelevant again.
We are three months into the process, Craig Whyte is no more irrelevant today than he was on 14 February, he remains the Only Show in Town. Once he stops being the main event, HMRC take top billing. After them, the players will have their 15 minutes of ‘action’. Then you will hear more of the story. If there is anything left after all this, the SPL and SFA will have their say.
Prior to appointing Bill Miller preferred bidder Duff and Phelps explained why a stand-along CVA was no longer possible. No amount of creative thinking will change this fact. The season ends on Sunday, Rangers last chance to pull a deal together passed on Monday, when Duff and Phelps were unable to present a proposal to the SPL.
Even IF a phoenix is assembled for next season, or the season after that, it will be a humbled shell of what was once Rangers.
Rangers Football Club is disintegrating and will do so at an increasing rate in the weeks ahead. Again, cease and desist with the adolescent hysteria. Chill. Go for a walk in the rain and spare a thought for those football fans with genuine worries.
You can buy a hard copy of the new issue of CQN Magazine via Magcloud here.
The graphic below is just for a flick through, to read the magazine go here to it’s dedicated site.
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O.G.Rafferty on 10 May, 2012 at 15:35 said:
Now now OG it can’t be that simple or our own intrepid football writers would be doing it, obviously AT is a member of a secret inner sanctum of privileged journalists and I am sure he had to undergo a strict initiation ceremony to have come so far…
Jabba eat your heart out..
As I have spared no haste in the past to point out Peter Lawwell’s shortcomings it’s only fair I jump to praise him when it is deserved.
Today he has been prphetic
“”The issues are complex and there is much uncertainty. Indeed, the situation repeatedly changes, even on a daily basis.”
Was he predicting the Souness’ Hokey-cokey – in-out – in out story?
¡ǝsoɥ ǝɥʇ ǝɯ ssɐd ‘sʞɔıʞ ʎןɟ ɥbnouǝ (o) /o\ z ʍoɹ on 10 May, 2012 at 15:48 said:
The question is where do the PLC stand on the Newco? Statement today can be interpreted any way you like.
I have my doubts.
Away game wise, I wont be back if any of the newco plans are passed.
DD
starry plough, 15:50
It’s hard to credit, right enough.
Neil canamalar, 15:49
Should find out tomorrow
RalphWaldoEllison-is Neil Lennon Season 2011-12
;-)
HAil Hail
Jim White :”‘No but they know a lot about football and have plenty of money!”
So where why not bid 3 months ago before the admins added a 7 figure sum to the debt?
I remember a photo in the press of a named administrator sitting beside Craig Whyte at Ibrokes, before they went RFC IA.
The rush through the courts to appoint their ‘own’ administrator wasn’t done for nothing, as time has shown, not a penny to the creditors and not a semblance of a
CVA.
I think it’s gone beyond ‘finance’ and Duff and Phelps are merely a double act who post on FF by night, whilst during the day stave off the inevitable ‘L’ word.
The Bill Miller collapse and subsequent alleged three new bidders within 35 minutes must surely have been the last time any of their semi sensible fans believed them.
Published on Friday 22 June 2007 13:56
LORD STEVENS and the Premier League have made it clear they have no concerns about Graeme Souness’ role in any transfers while he was manager of Newcastle.
Stevens’ report published a week ago had highlighted “inconsistencies in evidence” provided by Souness and Newcastle chairman Freddy Shepherd’s son Kenneth. Now the League and Stevens’ firm Quest say that related to “another matter” but not transfers.
Souness has strongly denied any wrongdoing whatsoever and a statement published on the Premier League website reads: “The Premier League and Quest wish to clarify a sentence in the Key Findings document which was issued on June 15, 2007.
“The following sentence appears to have been misinterpreted by sections of the media: ‘However, there remain inconsistencies in evidence provided by Graeme Souness (a former manager of the club) and Kenneth Shepherd (apparently acting in an undefined role but not as a club official) as to their respective roles in transfer negotiations.’ “We wish to make it clear that inconsistencies did not exist within the evidence given by Graeme Souness to Quest concerning his role in transfers covered by the Inquiry during his time as manager of Newcastle United FC and neither the Premier League nor do Quest have any concerns in this regard.
“There were inconsistencies, however, between the evidence of Graeme Souness and that of other witnesses on another matter.”
The statement does not make clear what the other matter is.
Souness fears his career could be ruined by the claims.
He said: “They have blackened my reputation without anything to back up their claims.
“Stevens’ report states there was absolutely no evidence of improper payments to clubs, officials or players – and yet they throw my name in to their report to generate headlines.
“Their only justification is some vague nonsense about there being inconsistencies in my answers to their questions. What’s that about?”
Anyone else gutted that Souness is not going to be involved. As the uber-hun I was hoping to see him put together a team containing Goram, John Brown , Nacho Novo, Richard Gough and a few youth players to scrap their way through the 3rd division next season.
“No one may buy or sell (shares in the huns) except one who has the mark or name of the beast (souness), or the number of his name, and his number is 666”
OG..,
a report or confirmation of contact ?
“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.
It’s not what you say but how you say it.
The perceived best interests of the club may not always coincide with what the supporters see as their best interests.
For example. Is there any indication that as of yet, DD and PL share common ground with the supporters on a Newco being admitted to the SPL.
Quest finds no irregular payments in McKay deals
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Matt Scott
guardian.co.uk, Thursday 8 November 2007 01.49 GMT
The investigator Quest yesterday issued a statement reiterating that it had not discovered any irregular payments in transfers involving the agent Willie McKay. In the immediate aftermath of the final report of Lord Stevens’ team in June, McKay threatened legal action against the investigator for having named him.
McKay had been involved in the transfers of Jean-Alain Boumsong from Rangers to Newcastle United for £8m and Amady Faye from Portsmouth to Newcastle for £2m, which were among the 17 Quest refused to sign off as satisfactory.
The agent’s name was also raised in connection with a racehorse he registered in the name of the Portsmouth manager, Harry Redknapp, which he explained had been merely a public-relations exercise.
“Further to the key findings from the final Quest report published on 15 June 2007 by the Premier League, Quest would like to emphasise that, in that report, it was clear that no evidence of irregular payments was found in the transfers in the inquiry period which involved the agent Willie McKay,” said the statement, which was endorsed by the Premier League. “Quest would also like to thank Mr McKay for his cooperation with the inquiry.”
McKay interpreted yesterday’s clarification as an exoneration. “I am delighted to hear that Quest and Lord Stevens’ team have cleared me of any wrongdoing in transfers,” he said in a statement. “The last year or so has been hard for me and my family, living with accusations and innuendo which I knew were not true.”
A separate City of London police investigation is continuing into transfer activities, with one of McKay’s clients, Pascal Chimbonda, currently on police bail for an alleged conspiracy to defraud.
Meanwhile, Sheffield United’s chairman, Kevin McCabe, yesterday stated that a date has been set for a Football Association tribunal to consider possible compensation over the Carlos Tevez affair. The Bramall Lane club were relegated from the Premier League as a Tevez-inspired West Ham United avoided the drop.
West Ham were fined £5.5m for their breach of Premier League rules over third-party influence on club affairs and McCabe continues to fight the verdict. “We have regrettably gone beyond reinstatement so it’s about financial compensation for having been relegated unjustly after another club, we purport, broke the rules,” said McCabe.
cardiffbhoy on 10 May, 2012 at 15:59 said:
Anyone else gutted that Souness is not going to be involved. As the uber-hun I was hoping to see him put together a team containing Goram, John Brown , Nacho Novo, Richard Gough and a few youth players to scrap their way through the 3rd division next season.
“No one may buy or sell (shares in the huns) except one who has the mark or name of the beast (souness), or the number of his name, and his number is 666″
H as he categorically stated that he is not getting involved.
share on F’book or Twitter
Stupid huns? You better believe it!
rangers media
The Rangers ownership saga took yet
another twist today as information
came to light that Craig Whyte has
agreed a deal in principle to sell his 85%
holding in the club to an as yet unknown
consortium based in London.
However, it is understood that, contrary
to media reports, neither Walter Smith
nor Graeme Souness have any links to
this party.
There has been speculation that the
consortium has links with the English
Premier League, but it is unclear how
strong these ties are.
Alongside this party there are at least
three other contenders. Singaporean
Bill Ng has been convinced to return to
the table, whilst Brian Kennedy is
waiting in the wings should any other
bid fail to materialise. The final bidder
is not known.
In seven days which have seen American
Bill Miller made preferred bidder, only
to pull out again, supporters will be
reassured that there is so much interest
in the club to take the towing magnate’s
place.
With Duff and Phelps confirming that
each of the parties have the financial
means to complete a deal, it looks like
perhaps we are finally approaching the
closing stages of one of the darkest
chapters in the club’s 140 year history.
Emu @ 14.25
TET 25 + 6 = 30 ???? Are you a Hun?
If he was a hun he would have `bought` it for 6k, spent 350k doing it up,turned it into a hotel (5 star) with an added casino, invited alll the hotel critics over for succulent paella washed down with a full bodied Rioja, told them that for every 5 million Hilton spent he`d spend 10million (tax free) and wouldn`t relax until he`d won the European Hotel of the Year award. Then he would pass it on, but only to a knuckledragger, sorry, cave dweller who would really look after it. Unfortunately, the dweller would dupe him and he may even end up getting the Title deeds stripped.
P.S. TET @ 15.12
The cave that was sold was just next to where you stayed btw, it had water, leccy and sewage, no bad for 6k.
Why would anybody want to buy a cave with sewage, apart from a hun?
quonno,
the last part of that quote is what I’ll be hopng is the whole point, there is no upholding the interests and reputation of Scottish football if tthe hun continue to dictate governance.
Are you allowed to sell shares were trading is suspended and there is a legal claim for 25% of them?
jimmci on 10 May, 2012 at 15:47 said:
HMRC might be thinking about hunting Duff & Duffer.
Brian Kennedy must have waited in more wings than Col Saunders.
Andrew Young @Hullbhoy
@bbcjimspence You may want to have a read of this before Traynor and Young spend another hour misinforming listeners. http://celticunderground.net/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=916:club-licensing-whats-the-point&catid=47:season-2011-2012&Itemid=83
BobbyRussell on 10 May, 2012 at 16:04 said:
Emu @ 14.25
TET 25 + 6 = 30 ????
Obv that was less commission.
Neil canamalar, 16:00
Sorry, I’m not sure what you’re asking me
TheGreenManalishsi
Hope journeys you’re undertaking are long ones if you’re listening to the audio books of Game Of Thrones! They were a real slog for me personally. I was never into that genre, but was given the books for my new kindle, so I read them.
As was said before, Tyrion Lannister is an immensley funny character with some great one-liners. The most memorable one for me was his response to those who wished to die on the battlefield with honour, which went something like preferring to dying in bed, an 80yo, with an 18yo girl with her lips…………..I’ll leave out the rest! You can listen to it on your audio book.
Back to American crime for me via The Holy Cross, Ardoyne story.
SPF
For Game of Throne fans (ideally those who’ve read the books)
Probably been posted already, but I can’t be bothered reading back.
*Game of Thrones
OG..,
will you find out if there is a report being made, or if anyone has been in contact ?
Let Ally Rebuild Gers
Thu, May 10, 2012
Tweet
By Andrew Dickson
ALEX RAE believes Ally McCoist was on a ‘hiding to nothing’ under Craig Whyte and has called for the manager to be given time to rebuild Rangers under a new owner.
As negotiations between Duff and Phelps and several prospective owners go on behind the scenes, Rae hopes McCoist is central to the plans of whoever takes over.
He has been hugely impressed by the statesman like way the Light Blues boss has kept players and fans alike so united during the administration period since it began almost three months ago.
McCoist, of course, was promised £25million over five years by Whyte to spend in the transfer market with a significant portion of that to be made available last summer.
But although Gers were able to bring some new players in, they weren’t able to spend as much as they anticipated they would.
With hopes high that a preferred bidder is close to being named, former Ibrox midfielder Rae wants the right person to come in and take control in the long term.
And while he wants them to be financially capable, he’d also like them to retain McCoist and give him the opportunity at last to manage in the way that everyone knows that he can
Rae said: “Once this is all sorted out sooner rather than later only then can Ally can have a fighting chance of competing next year.
“He has really sparked the support up but we are now at a stage where things need to be settled so that we can move forward.
“Hopefully a new buyer can come in and give Ally the time and money to build again because he hasn’t really had a chance.
“The likes of John Brown and Neil Murray were brought in as scouts and they haven’t had much of an opportunity to do their jobs properly at all.
“A whole load of money was promised but it wasn’t delivered through Craig Whyte and there was no leadership when he took control if truth must be told.
“In that respect, Ally was on a hiding to nothing but he has galvanised the support in these hard times and I hope he is allowed to put a dream team together going forward.
“It’s not just a case of doing that in the next three or four months, it’s about doing it over the next couple of years.
“There are a lot of good Bosmans out there so if the appeal against the SFA’s transfer embargo is successful, Rangers wouldn’t need absolute fortunes to compete.
“If someone forward-thinking takes control of the club and wants to take it forward by investing 30-40m on players which isn´t much today, I feel it can be successful.
“With the fanbase and infrastructure that are already in place, there’s a good foundation to kick on from. Ally needs time and the money and I hope he is given it.”
Auldheid,
Yup, this is my moniker for this site. There are so many Johnboys and JonBoys going about you can never be too sure. But it’s good to see you banging the drum about our ain wee theory here.
It was several months ago that I pointed out that if Rangers couldn’t get a licence for Europe, they couldn’t get a licence for the SPL. Monsieur Platini will not let Mr Doncaster forget that.
Just one wee pedantic little semantic point about licensing clubs for a licence. As with practising for the sake of some practice, it’s “s” for the verb and “c” for the noun.
So I’m advising you to get some better advice in future. (;-0)
Well in there, Auld Yin!
ASonOfDan on 10 May, 2012 at 16:03:
“rangers media
“it looks like perhaps we are finally approaching the closing stages of one of the darkest chapters in the club’s 140 year history.”
Naw. There is still much worse to come yet…
Donegal Danny
Too simplistic. I will be happy to return for an oldco or a newco as long as the sanctions are appropriate, painful and disabling;
I am also entirely happy with oldco death and applications (plural) to SFL Div 3.
Nexco sanctions for me would be:
Payments = to all debts avoided spread over 10 years maximum and a 25 point deduction for every year they have to make any payment. At £134m that’s £13.4m paid prior to the commencement of any season as a minimum, the funds going to youth football development.
HH
Apologies if this has been pointed out earlier, but how sweet would it be if the SPL rules ensured HMRC said “NO” to a CVA?
HMRC
INS10171 – Introduction to Voluntary Arrangements
Occasionally exceptional reasons will cause us to decline proposals. Examples might include:
“any proposal by any member of any organisation that requires debts owed to its members, to be paid in full, whether inside or outside the arrangement or before or after the completion of the arrangement when all other unsecured creditors will become bound to accept a compromise of their debt. Here ‘members’ includes any prescribed associate(s) or other creditor(s) specified by the organisation”
HMRC
SPL
Defaulting Clubs
C9.1 If any Club defaults in making payment of any sum or sums due to the Company and/or to another Club the Board shall be entitled to apply any sums which, under these Rules, would otherwise be payable to the defaulting Club by the Company in discharge of any debt due by such Club in default to the Company and/or such other Club in such manner as the Board shall determine.
SPL
Souness might be a stupid hun (mutually inclusive) but he’s no a daft stupid hun.
Neil canamalar, 16:13
I’ll find out if there has been further contact
OG…,
thanks, heres hoping
Awe_Naw_No_Annoni_Oan_Anaw_Noo on 10 May, 2012 at 16:18 said:
A case of fiddling while Govan burns?
He’s calling for Ally to be given the chance to build a team with money from where?
He should be focusing on how the support can occupy themselves on a weekend with rangers existing. A guide to golf courses, bowling alleys, gardening centres, shopping malls, restaurants and betting shops would ne more appropriate.
There are none so blind….
‘GG on 10 May, 2012 at 16:29
I think we have to give these imbeciles a bit of leeway due to the fact that they are imbeciles.
Hail Hail
http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/16251776
http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/16293115
http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/football/16411485
So quite clearly if you pay the tax man first over footballers you will incur the wrath of the SPL. The other way around is entirely acceptable.
On that fact alone I truly believe that everybody associated with the SPL especially Celtic’s representatives should resign.
For me that position is untenable and it has been maintained for quite some time now.
Hail Hail
¡ǝsoɥ ǝɥʇ ǝɯ ssɐd ‘sʞɔıʞ ʎןɟ ɥbnouǝ (o) /o\ z ʍoɹ on 10 May, 2012 at 16:19 said:
Obviously I meant dependent on the sanctions.
DD